o, and
were at that time the only settlers in that part of Canada.

As I did not much like the appearance of the lodgings I was likely to
obtain in the new town, I went on to Mr. Stewart's house, and presented
my credentials. Nothing could have been more cordial than the welcome I
received from him. This gentleman and his brother-in-law, Robert Reid,
Esq., obtained a grant of land from the Colonial Government, on
condition that they would become actual settlers on the land, and
perform certain settlement duties, which consisted in chopping out and
clearing the concession lines.* Before the Crown patent could issue,
the party contracting to perform the settlement duties was obliged to
appear before a magistrate, and make an affidavit that he or they had
chopped and cleared certain concession lines opposite the lots of land
mentioned in the certificate.

[* Every township is laid out by the surveyor in parallel lines, sixty-
six chains apart. These lines are sixty-six feet in width, and are
given by government as road allowances, for the use of the public, and
are called concession lines. Cross lines run at right angles with the
former every thirty chains, and are called lot-lines: they subdivide
the township into two hundred acre lots: every fifth cross line is a
road allowance.]

This was a bad law, because many of these lines crossing high hills,
swamps or lakes, were impracticable for road-purposes: many thousand
pounds consequently were entirely and uselessly thrown away: besides,
it opened a door for perjury.

Land-speculators would employ a third party to perform their settlement
duties; all they required to obtain the deed, or "lift" as it is called
in Canadian parlance, was the sworn certificate for cutting the road,
allowances, and the payment of certain fees to Government. The
consequence of this was, that many false certificates were sworn to, as
few persons or magistrates would be at the trouble and expense of
travelling thirty or forty miles back into an uninhabited part of the
country, to ascertain if the parties had sworn truly or not.

A magistrate in my neighbourhood told me that a Yankee chopper came to
him one day and demanded to be sworn on a settlement duty certificate,
which he did to the following effect, "that he had cut a chain between
two posts opposite lots so and so, in the concession of ----- township.
The road allowances are a chain in width, and posts are planted and
marked on each si