ler being carried
into effect shall benefit a great number. We have already felt the
beneficial effect of the access of respectable emigrants locating
themselves in this township, as it has already increased the value of
our own land in a three-fold degree.

All this, my dear friend, you will say is very well, and might afford
subject for a wise discussion between grave men, but will hardly amuse
us women; so pray turn to some other theme, and just tell me how you
contrive to pass your time among the bears and wolves of Canada.

One lovely day last June I went by water to visit the bride of a young
naval officer, who had purchased a very pretty lot of land some two
miles higher up the lake; our party consisted of my husband, baby, and
myself; we met a few pleasant friends, and enjoyed our excursion much.
Dinner was laid out in the _stoup_, which, as you may not know what is
meant by the word, I must tell you that it means a sort of wide
verandah, supported on pillars, often of unbarked logs; the floor is
either of earth beaten hard, or plank; the roof covered with sheets of
bark or else shingled. These stoups are of Dutch origin, and were
introduced, I have been told, by the first Dutch settlers in the states,
since which they have found their way all over the colonies.

Wreathed with the scarlet creeper, a native plant of our woods and
wilds, the wild vine, and also with the hop, which here grows
luxuriantly, with no labour or attention to its culture, these stoups
have a very rural appearance; in summer serving the purpose of an open
ante-room, in which you can take your meals and enjoy the fanning breeze
without being inconvenienced by the extreme heat of the noon-day sun.

The situation of the house was remarkably well chosen, just on the
summit of a little elevated plain, the ground sloping with a steep
descent to a little valley, at the bottom of which a bright rill of
water divided the garden from the opposite corn-fields, which clothed a
corresponding bank. In front of the stoup, where we dined, the garden
was laid out with a smooth plot of grass, surrounded with borders of
flowers, and separated from a ripening field of wheat by a light railed
fence, over which the luxuriant hop-vine flung its tendrils and graceful
blossoms. Now I must tell you the hop is cultivated for the purpose of
making a barm for raising bread. As you take great interest in
housewifery concerns, I shall send you a recipe for what we ca