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Thomas Chandler Haliburton
Published by Good Press, 2019
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This lazy fellow, Pugnose, continued the Clockmaker; that keeps this inn, is going to sell off and go to the States; he says he has to work too hard here; that the markets are dull, and the winters too long; and he guesses he can live easier there; I guess he'll find his mistake afore he has been there long. Why our country aim to be compared to this, on no account whatever; our country never made us to be the great nation we are, but we made the country. How on airth could we, if we were all like old Pugnose, as lazy as ugly, make that cold thin soil of New-England produce what it does? Why, Sir, the land between Boston and Salem would starve a flock of geese; and yet look at Salem, it has more cash than would buy Nova Scotia from the King. We rise early, live frugally, and work late: what we get we take care of. To all this we add enterprise and intelligence—a feller who finds work too hard here, had better not go to the States. I met an Irishman, one Pat Lannigan, last week, who had just returned from the States; why, says I, Pat, what on airth brought you back? Bad luck to them, says Pat, if I warn't properly bit. What do you get a day in Nova Scotia? says Judge Beler to me. Four shillings, your Lordship, says I. There are no Lords here, says he, we are all free. Well, says he, I'll give you as much in one day as you can earn there in two; I'll give you eight shillings. Long life to your Lordship, says I. So next day to it I went with a party of men a-digging a piece of canal, and if it wasn't a hot day my name is not Pat Lannigan. Presently I looked up and straightened my back; says I to a comrade of mine, Mick, says I, I'm very dry; with that, says the overseer, we don't allow gentlemen to talk at their work in this country. Faith, I soon found out for my two days' pay in one, I had to do two days' work in one, and pay two weeks' board in one, and at the end of a month, I found myself no better off in pocket than in Nova Scotia; while the devil a bone in my body that didn't ache with pain: and as for my nose, it took to bleeding, and bled day and night entirely. Upon my soul, Mr. Slick, said he, the poor labourer does not last long in your country: what with new rum, hard labor, and hot weather, you'll see the graves of the Irish each side of the canals, for all the world like two rows of potatoes in a field that have forgot to come up. It is a land, Sir, continued the Clockmaker, of hard work. We have two kind of slaves, the niggers and the white slaves. All European laborers and blacks, who come out to us, do our hard bodily work, while we direct it to a profitable end; neither rich nor poor, high nor low, with us, eat the bread of idleness. Our whole capital is in active operation, and our whole population is in active employment. An idle fellow, like Pugnose, who runs away to us, is clapt into harness afore he knows where he is, and is made to work; like a horse that refuses to draw, he is put into the Team-boat; he finds some before him and others behind him, HE MUST EITHER DRAW, or be DRAGGED TO DEATH.
No. V
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