Settlor

“ To a first settler, the uncertainty of the how, the when, the where, the everything, connected with his prospects, is distracting; but to those coming out to join their friends, what is there but pleasure? ”

“ In the many instances in which we find old settlements named as the tunor ham of a man, the settlement was not only the tun or ham of a man, but also of his family and of some, at least, of his near kindred who assisted him in the cultivation of the land. ”

“ The memory of the sufferers in this war as well as that of their descendants still looks back upon them with regret, and abhorrence, and the page of history will consign their names to posterity, with the full weight of infamy they deserve. . . .
. . . our early land laws . . . allowed four hundred acres, and no more, to a settlement right. Many of our first settlers seemed to regard this amount of the surface of the earth, as the allotment of divine providence for one family, and believed that any attempt to get more would be sinful. ”

“ But above all this, the state and circumstances of our settlements render such a measure not only proper and eligible, but absolutely necessary. The English settlements, as they are at present circumstanced, are absolutely at a stand; they are settled up to the mountains: and in the mountains there is no where together land sufficient for a settlement large enough to subsist by itself, and to defend itself, and preserve a communication with the present settlements. ”

“ Even in the wilds and deserts of the land, the most secluded and untutored settler would hoist some cloth or rag above his shanty, and startle the solitude of the forest with a shot from his rusty firelock and a lusty cheer from himself and his children in glad allegiance to his country's Queen. ”

“ Whenever I hear of any new settlement, I pay it a visit once or twice a year, on purpose to observe the different steps each settler takes, the gradual improvements, the different tempers of each family, on which their prosperity in a great nature depends; their different modifications of industry, their ingenuity, and contrivance; for being all poor, their life requires sagacity and prudence. ”

“ This is the case with every person in every land; but it is pre-eminently the case with the early settlers of a colony. They labour, and others will enter into their labours; they sow, and others will come and reap. The first settlers in any land lay the foundation of the social edifice, and the building of after ages much accords with the foundation. Your principles and conduct will produce a more powerful impression in a thinly peopled territory than in the dense population of home. ”

“ You take the men in your own settlement—for there are men in most of your settlements who have spent considerable time upon missions—and you will find, upon examining the results of their labors, that they have been more prospered, when at home, than men who have not gone upon missions, so that their absence from home has not been a loss to them. ”

“ It is like a settlement beyond the frontier of civilization, with no law above them except a neighborhood agreement—a settlement made up of a few progressive men, a number of “ne’er do weels”, several idiots and insane and a number of dissolutes. ”

“ If a man was born in any parish, his settlement is there. If he is bound for an apprentice forty days in a parish, his settlement is there. If he has been hired for a year and a day, he gains a settlement. ”

“ I expect every settlement is represented here to-day, probably by the Bishops and leading men, who know the feelings of the people and who, more or less, control the business portions of their settlements. ”

“ The Settlement is in itself an expression of this sense of responsibility, and under its roof many divergent groups have come together to discuss measures “for the many, mindless, mass that most needs helping,” and often to assert by deed their faith in democracy. Some have found in the Settlement an opportunity for self-realization [vi] that in the more fixed and older institutions has not seemed possible. ”

“ I had as yet fallen in with no considerable towns, and whenever I had seen a house near the road, or one of the small hamlets of the south in my way, I had gone round by the woods or fields, so as to avoid the inhabitants; but on the fourth night after swimming the small river, I came in sight of a considerable village, with lights burning and shining through many of the windows. ”

“ Such were the folk who crowded the streets of the capital of this strange offshoot of France which had been planted along the line of the great river, a thousand leagues from the parent country. And it was a singular settlement, the most singular perhaps that has ever been made. ”

“ The land around the settlement was irrigated by canals, and here the corn and vegetables were grown and the flocks and herds were tended for the maintenance of the population. The central figure was always the god, who occasionally gave his name to the site, and who was the owner of all the land, the inhabitants being merely his tenants who owed him rent for their estates. It was the god who waged wars with the neighbours, and with whom treaties were made. ”

“ Those of us who are in this city, and who have not had the privilege of travelling through the settlements, can form very little comprehension of the extent, strength, and population of the Territory, and of the amount of labor, toil, and the results of that toil and labor which are progressing throughout. ”

“ We shall visit the new settlements as fast as practicable, and the older ones also, to labor among the people according to our calling, to teach the people their duty, and to organize them as shall be necessary, and to set in order all things necessary for their development and growth, and to maintain the union and fellowship of the Saints, and respect for the Gospel and the order and government of His Church and Kingdom. ”

“ Here I beg leave to observe to your Lordship, that if settlers are sent out, and the Convicts divided amongst them thi Settlement will very shortly maintain itself but without which, this country cannot be cultivated to any advantage. At present I have only one person (who has about one hundred Convicts under his direction) who is employed in cultivating the ground for the public benefit, and he has returned the quantity of corn above-mentioned into the public store. ”

“ Others settled on the outskirts of the neglected domains of the nobility, where they soon converted the barren wastes into productive fields, and reared new and flourishing settlements, to the great satisfaction of the landlords. ”

“ Towns and lands are also granted to the ladies of the king’s harem, and to the other numerous members of the royal family. The whole country is looked upon as crown property; and the waste and uncultivated parts are at the disposition of any one who will settle in them. The only duty incumbent on the settler is that he must inclose and cultivate it. ”

“ The settler who wielded at morn the sickle that was to give his children bread, grasped at noon the weapon of the soldier, and ere night-fall moistened with the life-tide from his bosom, the clods of the valley. Civil war unveiled its rovolting features. Neighbor stood against neighbor, and friend against friend. ”

“ Not once, but again and again we have laid our whole thought and purpose before the world, not in general terms only, but each time with sufficient definition to make it clear what sort of definite terms of settlement must necessarily spring out of them. ”

“ The people in the settlements are satisfied with their location. I heard but very little complaint, and what complaints I did hear were, I thought, almost entirely due to the inconvenience incident to emigration, to breaking up their homes, to disposing of their property, to riding distances upon railroads, landing at their destination wearied, to not being so carefully housed and protected for a limited length of time after their arrival, and to their being unacquainted with the country. ”

“ A further reason for the spreading out of the settlement arose from the fact that people would ask for a number of contiguous blocks to be reserved for themselves and their friends, and after the land had been reserved for them, only one or two blocks were taken up or cultivated. ”

“ The settlement that is older is the one that uses horses. The settlement that is younger is the one that owns one dog. The settlement that has the meaning is the one that says that woman. A very strong thing is everything. ”

“ They are addressed to those whose minds are in some measure fixed; and it is to those who have to choose the most advantageous situations in new Settlements for their future residence, that any practical knowledge is offered. ”

“ It was natural, therefore, that the new settlements which such a people founded should be grouped so as to reproduce as much as possible facilities for communication similar to those to which they were accustomed. ”

“ Why then did we so much rejoice over the dwelling of these old settlers? Merely because their industry had saved us much trouble; for in the course of their labours, they had cleared above thirty acres of excellent hay land; work which we should take a long time to execute, and not perform near so well; the truth was, this industrious colony, by whose previous labour we were thus to profit, were already extirpated, to my unspeakable sorrow, who had been creating a beaver Utopia ever since I heard of the circumstance. ”

“ But, however admirably gifted by nature any situation may be deemed for the purpose of forming a new settlement, many weighty considerations must press upon the mind, and much privation will be endured, before any individual will determine to quit his native land, in search of ease or affluence in a distant uninhabited world. ”

“ On the other hand, it must be allowed that the presence of an English settlement anywhere always brings with it a degree of civilisation in many points such as is not always found in towns of much greater size which our countrymen do not frequent. ”

“ It is a great object, that the land taken up by settlers should be brought into cultivation as soon as possible, or, at least, if it has been entrusted to the management of those who, from indolence or ignorance, do not make a good use of it, that it may revert to the Crown, for the benefit of some worthier occupant. ”

“ Your memoralists beg leave further to represent, That the quantity of lands in the Territory open for Settlement is by no means sufficiently large to admit of a population adequate to the purposes of Civil Government. ”

“ The most of them paint themselves red, others a dark hue, and others different colors, which, I understand, is done to keep the sun from injuring them. The houses and towns are very attractive, and the inhabitants live in each settlement under the rule of a sovereign or judge, to whom they pay implicit obedience. ”

“ And Squirrels, formerly.
Until a Pioneer, as
Settlers often do
Liking the quiet of the Place
Attracted more unto —
And from a Settlement
A Capital has grown
Distinguished for the gravity
Of every Citizen. ”

“ Probably the real hides, the real old settlers’ tenements, which you could count if you looked at a village and its fields, are rapidly going to pieces, and the fragments thereof are entering into new combinations. ”

“ The settlement has its critics and its devoted supporters; it is one of the voluntary experiments that shows the spirit of its promoters and that helps along social progress, and it must be estimated among the assets of a community. Here and there in the country among certain groups, as lumbermen, miners, or construction workers, or even in a settled town, many of the methods of the settlement are likely to find acceptance, and the settlement idea of neighborliness is fundamental to all happy and successful social life. ”

“ The folkland is what our scholars have called ethel, and alod, and family-land, and yrfeland; it is land held under the old restrictive common-law, the law which keeps land in families, as contrasted with land which is held under a book, under a 'privilegium,' modelled on Roman precedents, expressed in Latin words, armed with ecclesiastical sanctions, and making for free alienation and individualism. ”

“ The will of the settlers told in this way directly and immediately on the legislation in a way unknown to the English Parliament, and the settlers were men whose will was braced and invigorated by their personal independence and comfort, the tradition of their past, and the personal temper which was created by the greater loneliness and self-dependence of their lives. ”

“ Should the reader desire a more distinct impression of them, he may imagine on each square league of territory, and to each thousand of inhabitants, one noble family in its weathercock mansion, in each village a curate and his church, and, every six or seven leagues, a conventual body of men or of women. ... {1257} A fifth of the soil belongs to the crown and the communes, a fifth to the third estate, a fifth to the rural population, a fifth to the nobles and a fifth to the clergy. Accordingly, if we deduct the public lands, the privileged classes own one half of the kingdom. ”

“ The enlightened and liberal policy of the settlers, together with the simplicity of manners and refinement evinced in their domestic and social economy and general intercourse, contributed to the powerful attraction exerted by the Colony on all who were disposed to escape from the tyrannous exactions and almost continuous commotions agitating and embittering civil society in Europe. ”

“ The first settlers were, as a rule, rough people who had to make their living, and little time to think of anything beyond, but we are indebted to them, for they are everywhere the necessary pioneers of civilisation—the mass whose dead bodies form a bridge for their more fortunate successors. ”