My mother used to look back upon
that evening as one of the happiest of her life. She had found her loved
ones, after torturing her mind with all sorts of horrors--Indians, wild
beasts, snakes, illness, and death had all been imagined. The next day,
Mike Troyer's canoe was laden with wild turkeys, and he returned alone,
as my mother refused to separate herself again from my father. A few
days after, a party of pedestrians arrived, on the look-out for land,
and they at once set to work and put up the wished-for log-house or
houses, for there were two attached, which gave them a parlour, two
bedrooms, and a kitchen and garret. On removing from the shanty to this
house, my mother felt as if in a palace. They bought a cow from Mr.
Troyer and collected their goods, and when cold weather set in they were
comfortable.

"My father found it necessary to return to Niagara to secure the patent
for the lands he had selected, and also to provide for wants not
previously known or understood. The journey was long and tedious,
travelling on foot on the lake shore, and by Indian paths through the
woods, fording the creeks as he best could. At the Grand River, or River
Ouse, there was an Indian reservation of six miles on each side of the
river from its mouth to its source, owned by two tribes of Indians,
Mohawks and Cayugas, whose wants were well supplied with very little
exertion of their own, as the river and lake abounded with fish, the
woods with deer and smaller game, and the rich flats along the river
yielded abundance of maize with very little cultivation. They were kind
and inoffensive in their manner, and would take the traveller across the
river, or part with their products for a very small reward.

"On my father's application for the lots he had chosen, he was told by
the Council that the two at Ryerse Creek could only be granted
conditionally, as they possessed very valuable water privileges, and
that whoever took them must build both a flour and a saw-mill. My father
accepted the conditions, secured the grant for his own lands, but left
my mother's for a future day, and at once made arrangements for
purchasing the necessary material for his mills--bolting cloths,
mill-stones, iron, and screws, etc.--and then with a back load of twine,
provisions for his journey, and his light fusee, he commenced his return
home, where he arrived in good health, after an absence of twelve days.
It is only the settlers in a new country that