or me; since besides getting their luggage on
board and procuring them a hearty breakfast, I had also to arrange about
my own costume, of which I now felt really ashamed at every step.

At length we got under way, and steamed stoutly against the fast-flowing
St. Lawrence; our decks crowded with a multifarious and motley crew of
emigrants, all bound for various places in the Upper Province, but with
as pleasant an ignorance of where they were going, what it was like, and
how far off, as the most devoted fatalist could have wished for. A few,
and they were the shrewd exceptions, remembered the name of the city in
whose neighborhood they were about to settle; many more could only say,
negatively, that it was n't Lachine, nor it was n't Trois Rivieres; some
were only capable of affirming that it was "beyant Montreal," or "higher
up than Kingston;" and, lastly, a "few bright spirits" were going, "wid
the help o' God, where Dan was," or "Peter." They were not downhearted,
nor anxious, nor fretful for all this; far from it. It seemed as if
the world before them, in all the attractions of its novelty, suggested
hope. They had left a land so full of wretchedness that no change could
well be worse; so they sat in pleasant little knots and groups upon the
deck "discoorsin!" Ay, just so,--"discoorsin'"! Sassenach that you are,
I hear you muttering, "What is that?" Well, I'll tell you. "Discoorsin'"
is not talking, nor chaffing, nor mere conversing. It is not the
_causerie_ of the French, nor the _conversazione_ of Italy, nor is it
the _Gespraech's Unterhaltung_ of plodding old Germany; but it is an
admirable _melange_ of all together. It is a grand _olla podrida_, where
all things, political, religious, agricultural, and educational, are
discussed with such admirable keeping, such uniformity in the tone of
sentiment and expression, that it would be difficult to detect a change
in the subject-matter, from the quiet monotony of its handling. The
Pope; the praties; Molly Somebody's pig and the Priest's pony; Dan
O'Connell's last installment of hope; the price of oats; the late
assizes; laments over the past,--the blessed days when there was little
law and no police; when masses were cheap, and mutton to be had for
stealing it,--such were the themes in vogue. And though generally one
speaker "held the floor," there was a running chorus of "Sure enough!"
"Devil fear ye!" "An' why not?" kept up, that made every hearer a
sleeping partner i