Endnotes

1. From our experience of over a quarter of a century, writing rhymes on local subjects, we find they are preserved more carefully, and are more impressed on people’s minds than prose articles on the same subjects. This has induced us to compile this little volume. Please accept this apology. —⁠The Author ↩

2. The oration on the above interesting occasion was delivered by the late Hon. William H. Merritt, projector of the Welland Canal. He served at the battle when a young man. We witnessed the interesting ceremony and shall never forget it. —⁠The Author ↩

3. The nurls and birds’ eyes and curls were highly prized in furniture thirty years ago, when we used the smooth plain. ↩

4. James Noxon, Mayor. ↩

5. Tom Moore paddled his own canoe along the Canadian shore of Lake Erie and was enraptured with the view. He landed and remained over night at a farm house. His “Canadian Boat Song” is immortal. ↩

6. The valley of the Thames we presume includes Stratford on the north and Woodstock and Ingersoll on the south. The Avon, on whose banks Stratford is located, joins the Thames near St. Mary’s. The middle branch flows throngh Embro and Thamesford, the south and middle branches unite and flow through Dorchester and Westminster and blend with the northern branch at London, where it deviates to Elgin in the south. ↩

7. Some imagine the Thames is too insignificant a stream to be sung in verse. “Distance lends enchantment to the view,” and they fancy the old Scottish rivers are more worthy of song; but many of them are polluted of late years with vile odors from factories; and, as the county of Oxford is agreeably diversified with hills and dales, the clear, sparkling stream, flowing over a pebbly bottom, is indeed “a thing of beauty and a joy forever.” ↩

8. Among the earliest champions of the Factory System of making cheese were Messrs. Chadwick, Casswell and Ballantyne. The North Oxford Company were awarded the highest honor at the Centennial Exhibition. Messrs. J. L. Grant & Co. have a fine large cold storage warehouse on the G.T.R., and the C.P.R. have erected one on their line, which is leased by Mr. Riley. Ingersoll being the great dairy centre of Ontario it was deemed requisite to have those facilities for preserving the cheese in the hot season. The following is a list of the most prominent cheese factories in this district and the salesmen thereof:

   • Dereham and West Oxford⁠—W. Nancekivell.

   • Harris Street⁠—T. R. Mayberry.

   • W. Oxford⁠—G. Galloway.

   • N. Oxford⁠—D. J. Dundass.

   • Maple Leaf⁠—Thomas Caddy.

   • W. Zorra⁠—John Blair.

   • Burnside⁠—H. George.

   • Gore⁠—H. C. Hopkins.

   • Salford⁠—Foster & Gregg.

   • Mt. Elgin⁠—W. Tripp.

   • Brownsville⁠—Hopkins & Fulton.

   • Prouse’s⁠—T. Prouse.

   • Kintore⁠—G. Alderson.

   • Harrietsville⁠—R. Facey.

   • East Nissouri⁠—W. J. Walker.

   • Cold Springs⁠—H. Matheson.

   • Dorchester⁠—L. D. Monk.

   • Lawson⁠—N. Wilford.

   • Wilkinson⁠—J. H. Wilkinson.

   • Dereham and Norwich Union⁠—W. Fewster.

   • Verschoyle⁠—James Hunter.

   • Avon and Firby⁠—W. Kirkly.

   • Thamesford⁠—F. Patterson.

   • Lyons⁠—James Mitchell.

   • Lakeside⁠—T. Marshall.

   • Belmont⁠—John Evans.

   • Cherry Hill⁠—H. Webster.

   ↩

9. Grand Master Brigade Col. Moffat, of London. ↩

10. Mrs. Traill lives near Peterboro. Mrs. Moody died in Toronto. I sent her a copy of my poems in 1885, and she thanked me for the same through a friend as she was in feeble health at the time. ↩

11. Niagara, once the capital and business centre of Upper Canada, and also an important fortress. It is located at the mouth of the Niagara River. ↩

12. A flock of geese, by there loud cackle in the midst of a dark night, saved the city of Rome from being captured by the Barbarians. ↩

13. Mrs. Mary McKay McLeod, the author of some fine poems on Scottish and Canadian subjects. ↩

14. John Sandfield McDonald. ↩

15. Sir John A. McDonald, Canada’s most celebrated statesman. ↩

16. We have been congratulated by many on the truthfullness of the “Canadian Romance.” They declare it is not a romance but a true picture of rise and progress of worthy industrious people in Canada. ↩

17. Mathew Arnold saw fit to say that Longfellow was not the National Poet of America, but we presume few believed him; one of Longfellow’s grandest pieces, the scene is laid in Canada. ↩

18. Alas, the reapers and mowers have displaced the Bonnie Lasses in the fields, 1884. ↩

19. The Royal Stuarts are owners of large estates on the banks of the Findhorn and their great rivals were near by the Royal Comyns. The Lion Hunter Gordon Comyn was of this stock. Professor J. S. Blockie has written a fine poem on the wars of the rival houses.

    “Mere where the dark water’d stream rushes free child of the mountain.”

    ↩

20. Lord Rae, chief of the clan McKay. The family formerly owned large estates in Sutherland, which they lost. The present Lord Rae was born in Holland, and he married a rich lady with an estate near Edinbursh. He is one of the foremost scientific men in Britain at the present time, and he frequently presides at assemblies both in London and Edinburgh for the advancement of education and science. ↩

21. Mr. T. D. Millar has just secured, Sept., 1884, the first prize for cheese at the great cheese fair at Amsterdam, Holland. They weighed over 600 pounds each, and were manufactured by the burnside Factory of Dorchester. The Galloway Factory is manufacturing several cheese weighing one ton each. The mammoth cheese, alluded to in cheese ode, was manufactured by Mr. Tames Harris, Ingersoll Factory. The Dunn Cheese Factory, North Oxford, secured first prize at the great Centennial Exhibition, but where all factories produce such excellent cheese perhaps it would be making invidious distinctions to specify the honours won by any particular factory. The West Oxford Company have recently built a fine factory on the Culloden Road. ↩

22. Entwining of the thistle around the maple tree, Scotia’s sons have indented their names deep in Canadian history. The names of McDonald, McKenzie, Cameron and Mowat stand conspicuous, and Brown second to none. For wealth, enterprise and benevolence those Montreal Scotsmen stand high, Sir Donald A. Smith, Sir George Stephens and Duncan McIntyre. ↩

23. The most celebrated lady traveller in Britain is Miss Cumming, a niece of the Lion Hunter. She has written several volumes of her travels in distant lands. ↩

24. Battle of the Thames won by American Cavalry. ↩

25. Woodstock hath now breadth as well as length. ↩

26. Dick was both a geologist and botanist and was of great service to Hugh Millar. ↩

27. Edward is a shoemaker by trade, remarkable for his knowledge of the lower grades of animated nature. ↩

28. Mr. Stanley Simpson. ↩

29. Mr. James Sinclair of this town has written a fine piece remonstrating against the removal of the sword of Wallace from its old place of safety, Dunbarton Castle. ↩

30. According to E. A. Poe the Albatross sleeps in air. ↩

31. See Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner for the calamity befell a crew for wantonly killing this bird. ↩

32. Though we have described the above cheese as mighty, yet it did not contain a single mite.

    The late Daniel Pheisan took a deep interest in the great cheese, and in promoting cheese factories, he became wealthy and died in Woodstock. Mr. Robert Facy was the cheesemaker at Mr. Harris, Factory the time when the big cheese was made. ↩

33. The above factory is now the North Oxford Company’s. ↩

34. That enterprising Scotsman, Duncan McIntyre, of Montreal, was the first enthusiastic promoter of the above mine, and in conjunction with Sir D. A. Snuth and Sir George, now Lord, Mount Steven, built the C.P. Railway. ↩

35. James Sutherland, M.P., re-elected at Buffalo, June, 1891. ↩

36. The executioner was Radcliff. ↩