chard Dobie, in Montreal, that it is the best place in the
world for the recovery of strength. "You shall drink the best of wheys
and breathe the purest sea air in the world and, although luxuries will
be wanting, our friendship and the best things the place can afford to
you, I know, will make ample amends:"--a simple standard of living that
subsequent generations would do well to remember. In 1801 the manor
house must have been the scene of some gaiety for there and at Malcolm
Fraser's were half a score of visitors. Christine, Nairne's second
daughter, who preferred Quebec to the paternal roof, had come home for a
visit and other visitors were the Hon. G. Taschereau and his son, Mr.
Usburn, Mr. Masson, Mrs. Langan and Mrs. Bleakley, Fraser's daughters,
described as "rich ladies from Montreal," the last with three children.
No doubt they drove and walked, rowed and fished, much as people from
New York and Baltimore and Boston and Toronto and Montreal do still on
the same scene, when they are not pursuing golf balls. The coming of
people with more luxurious habits made improvements necessary and also,
Nairne says, increased the expense of living--a complaint that
successive generations have continued with justice to make.

With Tom and Mary Nairne absent at school in Edinburgh, the family at
Murray Bay during Nairne's last days consisted of but four persons--of
himself and his wife and the two daughters Magdalen and Christine.
Christine, a fashionable young lady, disliked Murray Bay as a place of
residence, tolerated Quebec, but preferred Scotland where she had been
educated. "Christine does not like to stay at Murray Bay and Madie her
sister does not like to stay anywhere else," wrote Nairne in 1800. In
the manner of the eighteenth century he was extremely anxious that his
children should be "genteel". Christine's Quebec friends pleased him. "I
saw her dance at a ball at the Lieutenant-Governor's and she seemed at
no loss for Genteel partners but does not prepare to find one for life.
I am well pleased with her and do not in the least grudge her so long as
she is esteemed by the best company in the place." It was not easy to
find at Quebec proper accommodation for unmarried young women living
away from home. Nairne writes in August, 1797, that he and Christine
each paid $1.00 a day in Quebec where they lodged, although they mostly
dined and drank tea abroad. "The town gentry of Quebec are vastly
hospitable Civil and wel