is meditations, and served him now as a type
wherewith to illustrate his remarks respecting the meeting we had
attended--like those professors of religion we to-day heard, he said,
was his beautiful cherry tree. It gave forth fair green leaves of
promise and bright truth-seeming blossoms, but in summer, when he sought
for fruit there was none; and false as it, were they of words so fair
and deeds so dark, and he'd "double sooner trust one who laughed more
and prayed less, than those same whining preachers." This was the old
man's opinion, not only respecting the baptists, but all other sects as
well. What his own ideas of religion were I never could make out.
Universalism I fancied it was, but differing much from the theories of
those evanescent preachers who sometimes flashed like meteors through
the land, leaving doubt and recklessness in their path. The first truths
of Christianity had been imparted to him, and these, mingling with his
own innate ideas of veneration, formed his faith; as original, though
more lofty in its aspirations, than the wild Indian's who tells of the
flowery land of souls where the good spirit dwells, and where buffalo
and deer forsake not the hunting grounds of the blessed. He held no
outward form or right of sanctity. The ceremony which bound him to his
wife was simply legal, having been read over by the nearest magistrate.
His children were unbaptised, and the green graves of his household were
in his own field, although a public burying-ground was by the
meeting-house of the settlement.

Meanwhile the old lady, who had hailed our advent with the hospitality
of her country, set about preparing our entertainment. Tradition says of
the puritans, the pilgrims of New England, that when they first stood on
Plymouth Rock, on their first arrival from Europe, they bore the bible
under one arm and a cookery book under the other. Now, as to their
descendants, the refugees, I am not exactly sure if, when they
pilgrimised to New Brunswick, they were so careful of the bible, but I
am certain they retain the precepts of the cookery book, and love to
embody them when they may. Soon as a guest comes within ken of a blue
nose, the delightful operations commence. The poorer class shifting with
Johnny-cake and pumpkin, while, with the better off, the airy phantoms
of custard and curls, which flit through their brains, are called into
tangible existence. The air is impregnated with allspice and
nutmeg--apple "