ed, and the waggon remained
_fixed_ for upwards of three hours, during which we laboured hard, and
were refreshed with plentiful showers of rain.

Chatham, on the river Thames, is at present a sad dirty hole; but, as
the country rises, will be a place of great importance. From Chatham I
embarked in the steam-boat, and went down the Thames into Lake St
Clair, and from thence to Sandwich, having passed through the finest
country, the most beautiful land, and about the most infamous roads that
are to be met with in all America.

Within these last seven or eight years the lakes have risen; many
hypotheses have been offered to account for this change. I do not
coincide with any of the opinions which I have heard, yet, at the same
time, it is but fair to acknowledge that I can offer none of my own. It
is quite a mystery. The consequence of this rising of the waters is,
that some of the finest farms at the month of the river Thames and on
Lake St Clair, occupied by the old Canadian settlers, are, and have
been for two or three years under water. These Canadians have not
removed; they are waiting for the water to subside; their houses stand
in the lake, the basements being under water, and they occupy the first
floors with their families, communicating by boats. As they cannot
cultivate their land, they shoot and fish. Several miles on each side
of the mouth of the river Thames the water is studded with these houses,
which have, as may be supposed, a very forlorn appearance, especially as
the top rail of the fences is generally above water, marking out the
fields which are now tenanted by fish instead of cattle.

Went out with a party into the bush, as it is termed, to see some land
which had been purchased. Part of the road was up to the saddle-flaps
under water, from the rise of the lakes. We soon entered the woods, not
so thickly growing but that our horses could pass through them, had it
not been for the obstacles below our feet. At every third step a tree
lay across the path, forming, by its obstruction to the drainage, a pool
of water; but the Canadian horses are so accustomed to this that they
very coolly walked over them, although some were two feet in diameter.
They never attempted to jump, but deliberately put one foot over and the
other--with equal dexterity avoiding the stumps and sunken logs
concealed under water. An English horse would have been foundered
before he had proceeded fifty yards. Sometime