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T.C. Haliburton
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Sam Slick
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up the Mirror
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| Nature and Human Nature – Holding
Up the Mirror
by Thomas Chandler Haliburton …
From Cumberland,
Squire, the eastern coast of Nova Scotia presents more harbours fit for the entrance
of men-o’-war than the whole Atlantic coast of our country, from Maine to Mexico.
No part of the world I am aquainted with is so well supplied, and so leetle frequented.
They’re "thar," as we say, but where are the large ships? Growin’ in
the forest, I guess. And the large towns? All got to be built, I recon. And the
mines? Why, wantin’ to be worked. And the fisheries? Well, I’ll tell you if you
promise not to let on about it. [We Americans,] We’re a-goin’ to git ‘em
by treaty, as we now have ‘em by trespass. Fact is, we treat with the British
and the Indians in the same way. Bully ‘em if we can, and when that wun’t
do, git the most valuable things they have in exchange for trash, like glass beads
and wooden clocks. Still, Squire, there is a vast improvement here, though
I wun’t say there ain’t room for more; but there’s sich a change come over the
people as is quite astonishin’. The Bluenose of 1834 ain’t no longer the Bluenose
of 1854. He is more active, more industrious, and more enterprisin’. Intelligent
the critter always was, but onfortunately he was lazy. He was asleep then; now
he is wide awake and up and doin’. He never had no occasion to be ashamed to show
himself, for he’s a good-lookin’ fella; but he needn’t now be no longer skeered
to answer to his name when the muster is come and his’n is called out in the roll,
and say, "Here am I, Sirree." A new generation has sprung up; some of
the drones is still about the hive, but there is a young, vigorous race comin’
on who will keep pace with the age. It’s a great thing to have a good glass
to look in now and then and see yourself. They’ve had the mirror held up to them.
Lord, I shall never forgit when I was up to Rawdon here wunst. A countryman come
to the inn where I was, to pay me for a clock I’d put off on him; and as I was
appassin’ through the entry I see’d the critter standin’ afore the glass, awfully
horrified. "My good gracious," said he, a-talkin’ to himself,
"my good gracious, is this you, John Smiler? I ha’n’t seen you afore now,
goin’ on twenty years. Oh, how shockin’ly you are altered; I shouldn’t ‘a
know’d you, I declare." Now, I’ve held the mirror to these fellas to
see themselves in, and it has skeered ‘em so they’ve shaved slick up and
made themselves look decent. I wun’t say I made all the changes myself, for Providence
scourged ‘em into activity, by sendin’ the weavel into their wheatfields,
the rot into their potatoes, and the drought into their hay crops. It made them
scratch round, I tell you, for to arn their grub, and the exartion did ‘em
good. Well, the blisters I’ve put on their vanity, stung ‘em so they jumped
high enough to see the right road; and the way they travel ahead now is a caution
to snails. Now, if it was you who had done your country this sarvice, you’d
‘a spoke as mealy- mouthed of it as if butter wouldn’t melt in it. "I
flatter myself," you’d ‘a said, "I had some leetle small share
in it. I’ve lent my feeble aid; I’ve contributed by poor mite," and so on,
and looked as meek and felt as proud as a Pharisee. Now, that’s not my way. I
holds up the mirror whether, when folks see themselves in it, they see me there
or not. The value of a glass is its truth. And where colonists have suffered is
from false reports: ifnorance and misrepresentation. There ain’t a word said of
‘em that can be depended on….British travellers distort things….They
land at Halifax, where they see the fust contrast atween Europe and America, and
that contrast ain’t favouable, for the town is dingy-lookin’ and wants paint,
and the land round it is poor and stony. But that is enough; so they set down
and abuse the whole country, stock and fluke, and write as wise about it as if
they’d see’d it all instead of overlookin’ one mile from the deck of a steamer.
The military enjoy it afore anythin’, and are far more comfortable than in sodjerin’
in England; but it don’t do to say so, for it counts for foreign sarvice….Governors
who nowadays have nothin’ to do, have plenty of leisure to write, and their sufferin’s
and sich, their pens are inadequate to the task. They’re very much to be pitied…
An Excerpt From –
Nature and Human Nature – Holding Up the Mirror
by Thomas Chandler Haliburton
Originally published by Hurst & Blackett,
London, 1854
Edition consulted
The Sam Slick Anthology
Selected and
Introduced by Riginald Eyre Watters
Edited for modern readers by Walter S.
Avis
Clarke, Irwin and Company Limited, Toronto and Vancouver 1969
HRL
SG 819.7 H17sa pg 256
Holding Up the Mirror | |
