There’s rest when angry storms are o’er,
    And fear no longer vigil keeps;
  When winds are heard to rave no more,
    And ocean’s troubled spirit sleeps;
  There’s rest when to the pebbly strand,
    The lapsing billows slowly glide;
  And, pillow’d on the golden sand,
    Breathes soft and low the slumbering tide.

  There’s rest, deep rest, at this still hour—­
    A holy calm,—­a pause profound;
  Whose soothing spell and dreamy power
    Lulls into slumber all around. 
  There’s rest for labour’s hardy child,
    For Nature’s tribes of earth and air,—­
  Whose sacred balm and influence mild,
    Save guilt and sorrow, all may share.

  There’s rest beneath the quiet sod,
    When life and all its sorrows cease,
  And in the bosom of his God
    The Christian finds eternal peace,—­
  That peace the world cannot bestow,
    The rest a Saviour’s death-pangs bought,
  To bid the weary pilgrim know
    A rest surpassing human thought.

CHAPTER IV

TOM WILSON’S EMIGRATION

  “Of all odd fellows, this fellow was the oddest.  I have seen
  many strange fish in my days, but I never met with his equal.”

About a month previous to our emigration to Canada, my husband said to me, “You need not expect me home to dinner to-day; I am going with my friend Wilson to Y—–­, to hear Mr. C—–­ lecture upon emigration to Canada.  He has just returned from the North American provinces, and his lectures are attended by vast numbers of persons who are anxious to obtain information on the subject.  I got a note from your friend B—–­ this morning, begging me to come over and listen to his palaver; and as Wilson thinks of emigrating in the spring, he will be my walking companion.”

“Tom Wilson going to Canada!” said I, as the door closed on my better-half.  “What a backwoodsman he will make!  What a loss to the single ladies of S—–!  What will they do without him at their balls and picnics?”

One of my sisters, who was writing at a table near me, was highly amused at this unexpected announcement.  She fell back in her chair and indulged in a long and hearty laugh.  I am certain that most of my readers would have joined in her laugh had they known the object which provoked her mirth.  “Poor Tom is such a dreamer,” said my sister, “it would be an act of charity in Moodie to persuade him from undertaking such a wild-goose chase; only that I fancy my good brother is possessed with the same mania.”

“Nay, God forbid!” said I.  “I hope this Mr. —–­, with the unpronounceable name, will disgust them with his eloquence; for B—–­ writes me word, in his droll way, that he is a coarse, vulgar fellow, and lacks the dignity of a bear.  Oh!  I am certain they will return quite sickened with the Canadian project.”  Thus I laid the flattering unction to my soul, little dreaming that I and mine should share in the strange adventures of this oddest of all odd creatures.