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THE EVENING TELEGRAM, ST. JOHN’S, NEWFOUNDL AND, MARCH 8, 1919—RENNIES SEEDS• Produce*Victory Cnopr *THE Rennie Catalogue Ibr 1919 is brimful of information and suggestions on the growing of flowers and vegetables. Beautifully illustrated in colors, this catalogue is truly valuable as a gardening guide.Itshuws you the practical results obtained by planting tested seeds, and it proves to you the best kind of seeds to buy.Use the Rennie Catalogueas a Reedy ReferenceMake your selection of seeds from it—then go to your dealer and have him fill the order. If he cannot supply you with all you require write us direct.To safeguard our easterners all Rennie's Seeds are tested at our trial ground. This insures that buyers of Rennie's Seeds get nothing but the very best.If you haven V received a copy of our 1919 Catalogue, write for one to-day.THEWILLIAMRENNIECOMPANYLIMITEDKING AND MABKET STS. TOTONTOALSO AT MONTREAL WINNIPEG VANCOUVERhim Out the Storied Past.BUSINESS 100 YEARS AGO.(H. F. SHORTIS.) ARTICLE 4.I hare always i bought that Trinity i one of the most prominent cen-at which the Irish youngsters nted their feet on their arrival in ifoundland, and the invaluable [interesting letters of Mr. Kelson iblish this to a certainty. It will noticed in my last article that as as ninety youngsters arrived at tf in one of Mr. Garland’s ves-S. and we can easily assume the *rv and hardship to which they subjected during the voyage ms the Atlantic. Those vessels id not have been over one hun-tons. and in Newfoundland a jparativelv few years ago. the pslature had to pass an Act of rliament limiting the number of Bengers on our vessels to and from brador. I remember about 187S re were 110 men, women and chilli arrived from Labrador on a looner of about 70 tons. I went board, and I can assure you, I ill never forget my experience, and pe and trust I may never witness I a sight again. How they lived idst such surroundings has been a Oder to me from that day to this, iitwas only through the mercy of d that fever or some other epidem-iid not break out amongst them, ay a time in years gone by I wrote die condition of affairs in the andard and other newspapers, never, the Government woke up at and had this last relic of bar^ ism aboh-hed by Act of Farlia-Xigrnterr Immigrants.I It is my opinion that the Irish who ived at Trinity in Slade’s, Garland’s other vessels, after a time, mov-Bonavista Bay, and becameresidents of King’s Cove. Knight’s Cove, Broad Cove and other settlements where their descendants are to be found to-day in great numbers. Many of them must have gone north to Fogo, for instance, because we know that the Rev. Father Lundrigan was performing his sacred duties and died there, in 1797, which is recorded on the tombstone erected over his remains in that settlement. He would not have gone there unless there were a considerable number of his people in that district. In fact, the Irish youngsters became scattered over the whole country. Last Spring I asked that sturdy and independent planter Mr. William Reid, of St. John’s, who has carried on an extensive fishing business in Englee for many years, to try and ascertain for me the names of the earliest settlers in that thriving little village up north. Mr. Reid is a highly intelligent man, an antiquarian on a small scale, and delights in gleaning all information possible about our country and our people. He found out and interviewed the patriarch of the village one of those human repositories of local tradition, and ascertained the fact that the first inhabitant of Englee was an Irishman named Shaun Moe (undoubtedly John Moore). Then there were William Canning, a native of King’s Cove, Bonavista Bay, Henry Gillard, of Twillingate. The , last two Canning and Gillard were ; herring catchers about 90 years ago.; Gillard married Mary Ann Hendry. ! There were also Win. Shelley and James Blake, natives of England, and Jacob Morgan, born in the United States, who died at Englee and lies buried at South West Brook. He wasfamiliarly known as Sailor Jack. Mr. Reid would have procured further information for me, only he could not •pare time, having to devote all his energies to looking after his fish, as he has done for the past forty years, to see that no discoloration would occur amongst his cargo, which would be the means of importing some bogus scientists amongst us to pass their opinion upon a subject that they know nothing at all about. I should like to see the scientist from abroad that would give any information to Messrs. Wm. Reid, John Toole, Fredk. Moore or some others of our practical fishermen as to how they should catch or cure fish. If the authorities wish to know the reason of the fish being discolored, etc., let them ask eno of these old-timers, or better still, let them view the fish they ship to market, and ask them how they turn out such a first class article.English Deserters.The English youngsters did not come ®ftt in such large numbers by each ship as did the Irish. The majority of them shipped on board British vessels on a voyage to Newfoundland, and when they arrived here they Jumped the ship, married, settled down and carried on the fishery. Of course great numbers were shipped at Poole, Bristol and other ports of England by the representatives or principals of Newfoundland firms who lived in England, and a fine class of men they were those English youngsters. Honest, industrious and big-hearted fellows, and very many of them became our most enterprising and successful planters, seal-killers and master-mariners. Again large numbers deserted from the men-of-war ships that were moored in our harbors during the winter months in years gone by, and I can remember several of them, who were very old men, when I was a small boy, and a pity it is that I cannot relate some of their personal experiences. De Ju-bainville says that the legends of Ireland are just as interesting as those of ancient Greece, but I maintain that the legends and traditions of Newfoundland are more interesting than either one or the other.man how much he owed him for his services. “Fifteen shillings,” replied the man. “I’ll double it, if you say it in Irish,” said the M.P. “Cuig sgille-acha deng,” said the Kaffir in purest Galway Irish. The money was paid and when they had recovered from their astonishment the Kaffir told them that his father was a Connaught Ranger who had deserted from the British Army and escaped into the Transvaal where he had married a native woman and had raised a family of Gaelic-speaking Kaffirs.* An Irreparable Loss.What a loss Newfoundland sustained by the wanton destruction of the documents of that eminent Irish immigrant, Clance, that I have already referred to at some length. It is only after his death, jaany years afterwards, that the value of hie knowledge is appreciated. How I wish that I was a young man at the time of his death, how carefully I would have treasured his reiharks that were embodied in those documents, coming from such a brilliant mind and master hand! The Scotchmen did not appreciate Burns until long after his demise. As an eminent statesman and orator said, “Now how did it happen that the noble and high-born, the scholar, the novelist, the ^historian, the statesman, the poet, all mingling with the joyous acclamations of those wider classes that come more nearly down to his own great station, gave point and significance to festivals got up to honor the memory of a poor Ploughman a century after he had passed away?”Seotia’s Poet.Scotch Traits.The Scotch immigration to this country was never very extensive, but what they lacked in numbers they make up in natural commercial ability, keen intelligence, as well ts thrift and economy so characteristic of their race. They grasped the first source o£ employment that came to hand and eventually struck out in business for themselves. Their natural adaptability for business enabled them to quickly forge to the front in the commercial life of our country, and we have an example of what they have done, and can do, in the enterprising and timo-honored firm of Baine Johnston Co., whose house-flag was known in all the great centres of commerce before Queen Victoria was born, when the Great Napoleon was crowned by Pope Pius VII., when he was at the zenith of his power and glory after the battles of Jena, Wagram and Austerlitz, and when lie was defeated and exiled to the Island of St. Helena after the battle of Waterloo, and the same grand old firm is with us to-day, ever foremost in the commercial life of our country, with the same vigor and success, thanks to the energy, foresight and enterprise of Mr. Walter Baine Grieve, as it was 100 years ago,. or, I should have said far more so. Mr. Grieve, like Julius Caesar, with his immortal 10th Legion, can call all of his faithful servants by name as he kindly greets them. The Irish and the Scotch always worked in harmony. The Scotch with a determination to succeed always stuck to their business, but the Irish and many of the English were of a roving disposition and emigrated to the United States, Canada and elsewhere, and thus we find the Irish race scattered , over the civilized world. I came across a good story told by a prominent Irish member of Parliament a short time ago. The member lived in Pretoria, the capital of the Transvaal, South Africa, with a few associates, for some time. It was their j custom on Sunday and holidays to I hire “rickshaws” (small two-wheeled j conveyances drawn by Kaffirs), to take them out to a small holiday resort some few miles away. Cn a certain I Sunday morning three “rickshaws” | were hired, as was their custom, and i one of them observed that his “driver” was the bearer of a lighter skin | than that possessed by his two con-I freres. They had a very enjoyable ! day, and on their return to Pretoria in the evening one of them asked theBobbie Burns was no saint—sharp of speech, and loose of life, at times he had tried the patience of many friends, and made many enemies. He had lived and died in poverty; his errors, whatever they were, being veiled by no drapery of convention, nor refined away by the ordinary accessories of elegant self-indulgence. He left behind him no relatives who could defend his memory—no sect to battle for his opinions—no wealth to purchase venal advocacy—no station or organ.zed influence to disarm independent criticism. It was because, long after he was dead, and his faults and follies were forgotten, it was discovered (as it had been btefore by a few keeen-sighted and appreciative friends who knew and loved him) that in this man’s soul there had been a genuine inspiration—that he was a patriot—an artist—that by his genius and independent spirit he had given dignity to the pursuits by which the. mass of mankind live, and quickened our love of Nature by exquisite delineation. It was found that hypocrisy stood rebuked in the presence of his broad humor—that he had put one lyric invocation into the mouth of a dead warrior that would be worth to his country, in any emergency, an army of ten thousand men—that he had painted one picture of his country’s rural life, so touching and so true, that it challenged for her the respect of millions who knew her not, and gave character and refinement to the thoughts of those who knew her best.Holy Willies.What has become of the wrangling race of bloody chieftians, whose mutual slaughter and mutual perfidy, Tytler so well describes? With the exception of Wallace and Bruce we would not give the Ayrshire Ploughman for a legion of them. What has become of the drowsy Holy Willies, whose interminable homilies made the Sabbath wearisome, in Burns' time, and the gospel past finding out? They are dozing In the churchyards, as their congregations dozed in the churches; and no one asks to have them waked up by a festival; yet, the man they denounced, and would have burnt if they could, shows his “Cottar’s Saturday Night” to the admiring world and puts them all to shame.Just Before Waterloo.And now we shall continue Mr. Kelson’s interesting letters from “Out the Storied Past.”Trinity, June 14th, 1815. Mr. Robert Slade,Sir,—Hearing a vessel is to sail shortly from St John’s for Liverpool and a craft now going off for the former place, I embrace the opportunity of forwarding you the annexed copy of No. 4, since which nothing material has transpired.I remain, sir,Your obedient servant,WM. KELSON.MILLYChWlNe.effcestBe£NcW €GIntended to care of Messrs. Earle Co., via Liverpool.Trinity, 24th June, 1815. Mr. Robert Slade,60 qtls. of fish, vista, I have su ster some time “George” was ai be getting so la turn with lumbe cannot do withoi salt and other glt; to lay hold on. pose it is useles awhile.
Newspaper Details
Saint Johns Evening Telegram
Saint Johns, Newfoundland, CA
Sat, Mar 08, 1919
Page 3
Full Page
Clipped by
Laurie C.
CA 17 Feb 2025
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