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208
AN ECCENTRIC.
Chap. X.

pleased with the friendly, agreeable society of the neighbourhood. There are a great many gentlemen residing there, with fixed incomes, who have adopted Canada as their home because of the comforts which they can enjoy in an untaxed country, and one in which it is not necessary to keep up appearances. For instance, a gentleman does not lose caste by grooming his own horse, or driving his own produce to market in a lumber-waggon; and a lady is not less a lady, though she may wear a dress and bonnet of a fashion three years old.

I was surprised one morning by the phenomenon of some morning-callers—yes, morning-callers in a Canadian clearing. I sighed to think that such a pest and accompaniment of civilisation should have crossed the Atlantic. The "callers" of that morning, the Haldimands, amused me very much. They give themselves great airs—Canada with them is a "wretched hole;" the society is composed of "boors." In a few minutes they had asked me who I was—where I came from—what I was doing there—how I got to know my friends—and if I had come to live with them. Mr. Haldimands, finding I came from England, asked me if I knew a certain beautiful young lady, and recounted his firtations with her. Dukes, earls, and viscounts flowed from his nimble tongue—"When I was hunting with Lord this," or "When I was waltzing with Lady that. "His regrets were after the Opera and Almack's, and his height of felicity seemed to be driving a four-in-hand drag. After expatiating to me in the most vociferous manner on the delights of titled society, he turned to Mrs. Forrest and said, "After the society in which we used to move, you may imagine how distasteful