Thomas Chandler Haliburton

“ Why not have your home here by this lake, and this mountain? His tastes are like yours, and yours like his; you can live two lives here,—the forest of the red man around you—the roof of the white one above you. To unite both is true enjoyment; there is no eye to stare here, no pride to exclude, no tongue to offend. You need not seek the society of others, let them solicit yours, and the doctor will make them respect it. ”

“ Innocence is the sweetest thing in the world, and there is more of it than folks generally imagine. If you want some to transplant, don’t seek it in the enclosures of cant, for it has only counterfeit ones, but go to the gardens of truth and of sense. Coërced innocence is like an imprisoned lark, open the door and it’s off for ever. The bird that roams through the sky and the groves unrestrained knows how to dodge the hawk and protect itself, but the caged one, the moment it leaves its bars and bolts behind, is pounced upon by the fowler or the vulture. ”

“ Above the beach and parallel with it, ran a main road, on the upper side of which were the houses, and on a swelling mound behind them rose the spire of the chapel visible far off in the Atlantic, a sacred signal-post for the guidance of the poor coaster. As soon as you reach this street or road and look around you, you feel at once you are in a foreign country and a land of strangers. The people, their dress, and their language, the houses, their form and appearance, the implements of husbandry, their shape and construction—all that you hear and see is unlike anything else. ”

“ But the lake and the forest is nature’s amphitheatre, and it is at home there. It won’t speak as it can do at all times and in all places; but it gives its whole soul out in the woods; and the echoes love it, and the mountains wave their plumes of pines to it, as if they wanted to be wooed by its clear, sweet, powerful notes.1 All nature listens to it, and keeps silence, while it lifts its voice on high. The breeze wafts its music on its wings, as if proud of its trust; and the lake lies still, and pants like a thing of life, as if its heart beat to its tones. ”

“ Ain’t my cheek all burning, Sam? it feels as if it was all a-fire;’ and she put it near enough for me to see, and feel tempted beyond my strength. ‘Don’t it look horrid inflamed, dear?’ And she danced out of the room, as if she was skipping a rope.
“Well, well,” sais I, when she took herself off. “What a world this is! This is evangelical learning; girls are taught in one room to faint or scream if they see a man, as if he was an incarnation of sin; and yet they are all educated and trained to think the sole object of life is to win, not convert, but win one of these sinners. ”

“ It is natural that regret for the past and despair for the future should have been the burden of the mournful ditties of such a woman; that she who had mated without love, and lived without affection, the slave, the drudge, but not the wife or companion of her master, should die with imprecations on her lips for a race who were the natural foes of her people, and who had reduced her to be an object of scorn and contempt to both. It is no wonder therefore poor Jessie had a repugnance to the union, when she remembered her mother, and the sad lesson her unhappy life and fearful death contained. ”

“ A politician therefore is the last man in the world to write a biography. Having a kind of sneakin’ regard for a winding, wavy way himself, he sees more beauty in the in and out line of a Varginny fence, than the stiff straight formal post and rail one of New England. As long as a partizan critter is a thorn in the flesh of the adverse party, he don’t care whether he is Jew or Gentile. He overlooks little peccadilloes, as he calls the worst stories, and thinks everybody else will be just as indulgent as himself. ”

“ The way they are going ahead is a caution to them that live in Sleepy Hollow, a quiet little place the English call Downing Street. It astonishes them as a young turkey does a hen that has hatched it, thinking it was a chicken of her own. She don’t know what in the world to make of the great long-legged, long-bodied critter, that is six times as large as herself, that has cheeks as red as if it drank brandy, an imperial as large as a Russian dragoon, eats all the food of the poultry-yard, takes a shocking sight of nursing when it is young, and gets as sarcy as the devil when it grows up. ”

“ But, Doctor,” sais I, “just listen to the noises on shore here at Chesencook. It’s a curious thing to hear the shout of the anxious mother to her vagrant boy to return, before night makes it too dark to find his way home, ain’t it? and to listen to the noisy gambols of invisible children, the man in the cloud bawling to his ox, as if the fog had affected their hearing instead of their sight, the sharp ring of the axe at the wood pile, and the barking of the dogs as they defy or salute each other. ”

“ Poor dear old Minister used to say, ‘Sam, you must instruct your conscience; for an ignorant or superstitious conscience is a snare to the unwary. If you think a thing is wrong that is not, and do it, then you sin, because you are doing what you believe in your heart to be wicked. It is the intention that constitutes the crime.’ Those sour crouts therefore, by creating artificial and imitation sin in such abundance, make real sin of no sort of consequence, and the world is so chock full of it, a fellow gets careless at last and won’t get out of its way, it’s so much trouble to pick his steps. ”

“ From the lake, Peter, where he was spawned, and where he returned you see, to die. You were spawned on the shores of one of the bays of the Highlands of Scotland. Wouldn’t you like to return and lay your bones there, eh? From earth you came, to earth you shall return. Wouldn’t you like to go back and breathe the air of childhood once more before you die? Love of home, Peter, is strong; it is an instinct of nature; but, alas! the world is a Scotchman’s home—anywhere that he can make money. Don’t the mountains with their misty summits appear before you sometimes in your sleep? ”

“ Now this ain’t the case in a steamer. They ain’t vessels, they are more like floating factories; you see the steam machines and the enormous fires, and the clouds of smoke, but you don’t visit the rooms where the looms are, that’s all. They plough through the sea dead and heavy, like a subsoiler with its eight-horse team; there is no life in ’em; they can’t dance on the waters as if they rejoiced in their course, but divide the waves as a rock does in a river; they seem to move more in defiance of the sea than as if they were in an element of their own. ”

“ The new-ploughed earth, the snowy-headed clover, the wild flowers, the blooming trees, and the balsamic spruce, all exhale their fragrance to invite you forth. While the birds offer up their morning hymn, as if to proclaim that all things praise the Lord. The lowing herd remind you that they have kept their appointed time; and the freshening breezes, as they swell in the forest and awaken the sleeping leaves, seem to whisper, ‘We too come with healing on our wings;’ and the babbling brook, that it also has its mission to minister to your wants. ”

“ An ounce of essence is worth a gallon of fluid. A wise saw is more valuable than a whole book, and a plain truth is better than an argument. She had no answer for that. She had been reasoning, without knowing it, as if in fact she had been in reality an Indian. She had imbibed in childhood the feelings of her mother, who had taken the first step and repented it—of one who had deserted, but had not been adopted—who became an exile and remained an alien—who had bartered her birthright for degradation and death. ”

“ Here too we have had Cutler, who is a scholar and a skilful navigator, filling the berth of a master of a fishing craft. He began life with nothing but good principles and good spirits, and is now about entering on a career, which in a few years will lead to a great fortune. He is as much out of place where he is, as a salmon would be in a horse pond. And here am I, Squire, your humble servant, Sam Slick the Clockmaker, not an eccentric man, I hope, for I detest them, they are either mad, or wish to be thought so, because madness they suppose to be an evidence of genius ”

“ You are at peace with all the world, and the world is at peace with you. You own not its authority. You can worship God after your own fashion, and dread not the name of bigot, idolater, heretic, or schismatic. The forest is his temple—he is ever present, and the still small voice of your short and simple prayer seems more audible amid the silence that reigns around you. ”

“ Edged tools never wound thee when thee is used to them, and the razor that cutteth the child, passeth smoothly over the chin of a man. He who locketh up his daughters, forgetteth there is a window and a ladder, and if gaiety is shut out of the house, it is pitied and admitted when the master is absent or asleep. When it is harboured by stealth and kept concealed, it loses its beauty and innocence, and waxeth wicked. The crowd that leaveth a night-meeting is less restrained than the throng that goeth to a lighted ball-room. ”

“ Now, I like a republic, but I hate a democracy. The wit of man never could have devised anything more beautiful, better balanced, and more skilfully checked, than our constitution is, or rather was; but every change we make is for the worse. I am therefore a conservative at home. On the other hand, the English constitution is equally well suited to the British. It is admirably adapted to the genius, traditions, tastes, and feelings of the people. They are not fitted for a republic. ”

“ The morning, as the doctor predicted, was clear, the fog was gone, and the little French village lay before us in all the beauty of ugliness. The houses were small, unpainted, and uninviting. Fish-flakes were spread on the beach, and the women were busy in turning the cod upon them. Boats were leaving the shore for the fishing-ground. Each of these was manned by two or three or four hands, who made as much noise as if they were getting a vessel under weigh, and were severally giving orders to each other with a rapidity of utterance that no people but Frenchmen are capable of. ”

“ It ain’t those who have one, or those who have none, that comprehend what it is; nor those who in the course of nature leave the old and found a new one for themselves; nor those who, when they quit, shut their eyes and squinch their faces when they think of it, as if it fetched something to their mind that warn’t pleasant to recollect; nor those who suddenly rise so high in life, that their parents look too vulgar, or the old cottage too mean for them, or their former acquaintances too low. ”

“ It’s a living flame, not enough to illuminate the room, but to cheer you through the night, and if you want more, it will light stronger ones for you. People have a wrong idea of romance, Sam. Properly understood, it’s a right keen, lively appreciation of the works of nature, and its beauty, wonders, and sublimity. From thence we learn to fear, to serve, and to adore Him that made them and us. Now, Sam, you understand all the wheels, and pullies, and balances of your wooden clocks ”

“ It was the first time I had heard so distinct an avowal of her American origin, and as I saw it brought the colour to her face, I thought I had discovered a clue to her natural pride, or, more properly, her sense of the injustice of the world, which is too apt to look down upon this mixed race with open or ill-concealed contempt. The scurvey opens old sores, and makes them bleed afresh, and an unfeeling fellow does the same. Whatever else I may be, I am not that man, thank fortune. ”

“ It takes two or three years to build and finish a good house. A wigwam is knocked up in an hour; and as you have to be your own architect, carpenter, mason, and labourer, it’s just as well to be handy as not. A critter that can’t do that, hante the gumption of a bear who makes a den, a fox who makes a hole, or a bird that makes a nest, let alone a beaver, who is a dab at house building. No man can enjoy the woods that ain’t up to these things. ”

“ Barring such things as climate, over which we have no control, happiness, in my idea, consists in the mind, and not in the purse. These are plain common truths, and everybody will tell you there is nothing new in them, just as if there was anything new under the sun but my wooden clocks, and yet they only say so because they can’t deny them, for who acts as if he ever heard of them before. ”

“ They feel how powerless they are of themselves; how frail their bark; how dependent they are on the goodness and mercy of their Creator, and that it is He alone who can rule the tempest and control the stormy deep. Their impressions are few, but they are strong. It is the world that hardens the heart, and the ocean seems apart from it.
“They are noble fellows, sailors, and I love them; but, Cutler, how are they used, especially where they ought to be treated best, on board of men-of-war? ”