Land of Smoke and Maple Syrup.

John McLeod, farmer from Linguick Quebec, The Horse. My husband, this man’s great great grandchild, has a slight palsy too and the same eyes.

Here’s a bit from a History of Compton County by L. S. Channell. You know, I called my website about John’s descendants, Tighsolas, because that is the name of the comfortable home in which the Nicholson family lived. Reading this bit below, no doubt taken from first-hand accounts (perhaps Margaret’s Mom lent her bit in Gaelic, as that is all she spoke) it is easy to see why this lovely brick house meant so much to the family. This book was published in 1896, the year Norman Nicholson (husband of Margaret Macleod) built Tighsolas, in Richmond, Quebec and the year Wilfrid Laurier came to power

This is from the chapter on Lingwick. The first settlers to the region were Americans, then some Irish, then the Scotch..

“They were shortly followed by a number of Highland Scotch from the Isle of Lewis. They were Donald MaKay, Murdo Maclean, Donald MacDonald, John MacLeod (the Horse so-called because he he was the only Scotchman to have a horse for the first four years) Donald MacLeod,

Donald Matheson, Angus MacLeod and John MacLeod the weaver. There were so many MacLeods and MacDonalds, the Scotch to this present day have many nicknames to distinguish one from the other.

These Highlanders had several reasons for seeking their fortunes in far away Canada. They were poor and had considerable trouble at home with their land-lords. They wanted to own farms of their own. Some of them had been mislead by stories of the advantages of the New Country. They had been told that tobacco is grown in Canada as easily as barley. That when they wanted sugar they simply went to the woods, bored a hole in a maple tree and filled a bucket with syrup, which immediately flowed and which after a little boiling made splendid sugar. When they had all the sugar they wanted they put a plug in the hole until more was needed.

The first 8 families were brought over by the British American Land Company but the rest paid their way. They they settled on the road between Bury and Gould and lived as close together as they could. This was always the main thought with the Scotch settlers in those days. It was this that made them leave the farms close to Sherbrooke, which could be secured at the same price. They wanted to have a settlement of their own, where they could live like Highlanders “shoulder to shoulder.” None of them in those days thought of owning a larger farm than 50 acres.

The cabins built by the settlers the first year were very small. The season was so late when they came that the bark would not peel, so they roofed them with split cedar and some with spruce and fir boughs. They were floored with little poles, hewed on one side, and had one door one window, being only one story high. The cabins had no fire places or chimneys the first winter. Flat stores were laid on the floor and against the end of the cabin furthest from the door. A hole was made in the roof to let all the smoke out and that was inclined to escape. The roof was generally so badly constructed that whenever it rained outside, it rained inside also. The kitchen utensils were a few dishes brought over from Scotland and a pot or two. The furniture consisted of a table, a cupboard or a dresser as it called, some clumsy home-mde tools and a bed or two.

The settlers lived the first year principally on oatmeal, advanced by the BAL Company. They paid for this the following summer at the rate of $5 for one hundred pounds by grubbing out a road from Bury to Gould.”

The Church Problem

Nicholson relations likely. Styles suggest 1900

OK. As I write my novel Flo in the City, about a young woman coming of age in the exciting 1908-1913 era, using the letters of http://www.tighsolas.ca/, my social studies website, I worry about one thing, the part religion plays in their lives.

They came from very religious people, Isle of Lewis, Scots who immigrated to Canada, and the US and Australia in the mid 1800′s.

Here’s a letter I have from a member of the older generation, written to Marion McLean (Mother of Margaret McLeod) in 1896, the year Sir Wilfrid Laurier came to power in Canada, the year the Nicholsons built their beloved home Tighsolas.

Now, this relative was a preacher’s wife (but weren’t they all if they were not illiterate).

The Free Church Manse

East Charlton

Victoria, Australia

My dear cousin Marion,

Your letter of the 23rd came safely to hand and I need not say that my dear husband and myself were truly glad to hear from you. It is refreshing indeed to me and my husband is shared in my joy. Let us thank the gracious Lord for his care over us in our youth and age and press on to a nearness to God… and so. Then she complains that the younger generation only wants to have fun.

The Nicholson letters, which number about 1000, contain many letters from Ministers of the Cloth, all kind of doom and gloom. If there was a disaster, no one to describe it better than a minister. That was their job.

I write this, because the next part of my story takes place on a Sunday. The girls are at home. I know what Marion does on Sundays at home because I have her diary from the last year. She goes to church, usually twice, once in the morning and once in the evening. She goes for the boys, and the social aspect, and for something to do,and to show off a dress and for entertainment, as sermons are entertaining. I have little to show she is going for religion, but she must be on some level.

And she goes for drives or walks with a beau.

Working on Sunday is a no no. I have a letter Marion writes in 1913, where she cooks a chicken in her new flat, which she shares with three girls, including FLO. I made a chicken, and on a Sunday! she writes.

But that’s for later on in the book.

So this Sunday, Margaret isn’t at home. I will have Marion doing some school work, preparing a test of some kind, for it is end of term. I have some material from the Royal Crown Reader I can use.

I will have Flo remark that Mother wouldn’t be pleased to see her working and she will reply: Teachers don’t have days of rest.

Margaret was religious, but not one ‘of the dour and sour old ladies dressed in black who ran around carrying their bibles’ as a grandchild described the older generation of Scots in Richmond. No, she was a modern woman who wanted to have it all, freedom, security, equality with men (not quite in the way we see it) and most of all ideas.

She wanted her daughters to have it all too. That’s why she insisted on them getting an education. “An education is something they can’t take away from you,” she told them. Ironic, as the story of Flo in the City will reveal how the Nicholsons are in danger of losing their house to creditors.

Remember, the Isle of Lewis Scots were cleared from the land in Scotland and forced to come to Canada.

Of all the girls, Edith is the one who speaks about religion in her letters. She loves ‘the old songs’ and she loves a good sermon, as she loves a good lecture.

In some ways, Edith is the one most like Mother Margaret, as she wants it all, spiritually and intellectually, whereas Marion wants fairness and power (she ends up leading a Union) and Flo, well, Flo wants a family above all.