My wife, Mrs. Corbet, by her country education, suffered less change in her feelings and habits by coming to this country than I had apprehended. Being entirely domestic in her dispositions, she often, indeed, acknowledged that she felt more at home in Canada than in the neighbourhood of London. Unfortunately, however, as I must say it was, she conceived it to be her duty not only to know the usages of other settlers, but to practise them, without sufficiently considering whether in our case it was requisite or not; and in consequence we had always, to me, a most afflicting to-do in our householdry.

To say nothing of pigs and sheep to kill, and joints to send to obliging neighbours who had remembered us in similar operations, sausages to stuff and yarn to bleach, and worsted to dye; we had quilting beds, upholstery jobs, and, in short, more various manufactures in hand than would have served for the supply of any ten decent families in the old country. This bustle often interfered with our comfort; and yet, though it was the evident heart's delight of Mrs. Corbet to be stirring in hot water of her own boiling, the more she had to do the less was she content, and gave vent to the most pathetic complaints concerning her turmoils, telling me that her “bit and her drop were dearly bought,” adding with a sigh, “it would come to an end;” and whenever I responded amen, which I did on every occasion with perfect sincerity, she would accuse me of being destitute of sympathy.