From Thomas Waters Jr. to his parents, Elizabeth Waters and Thomas Waters Sr. (November 15, 1852)

[Thomas Waters to his parents]

[from a transcript]

15 November 1852

Digby. Nova Scotia

Dear Father and Mother

After a long silence occasioned by business I commence a long letter occasioned by a few days leisure.  We received your letter or rather Eliz’s dated 16th October on 13th November and were glad to hear all well at home.  Little Lizzie is growing finely but can hardly be said to walk alone, she is not weaned yet. She looks a good deal like me and like most of your children in their babyhood according to my recollection, is sometimes cross, six teeth help her to demolish an apple or any other edible that comes in her way, often a sharp nip on my fingers gives me painful knowledge of teeth cutting.  Amaret looks well but rather thin and is in good health, for myself I never felt better and am rather stouter than I was.

We sold the Antelope and I am about commencing to build another, we did pretty well with her but she was not suited to the trade, we got a fair price but half the amount is a note on one and a half months.  At present I am doing nothing particularly, carpentering a little, and sometimes with axe on shoulder walk into the woods and help to clear some land for my future house.  The place where I purpose to build is on my Father in Law’s farm which a new road has lately divided, the place is as yet a wilderness, not a house on or by the road, nothing but immense trees, a nice little brook meanders close to the spot and birch and sugar maple trees surround. It is hard work cutting down trees, pulling out roots and burning off.  I have engaged to go Master of the Scotia as Captain Dakin intends stopping home this winter, it will employ me until my other one is ready to rig and launch in Spring.  I am going to join her in about three weeks time, I expect to go to England in her, if so I shall bring Amaret and Lizzie and you will see them in Surbiton probably about Xmas, but still I am not sure that I shall be bound there, when I find out I will write to you.  Eliz writes that she is reading Domestic Manners of the Americans, if it is by Mrs Trollope I have read it and found it as far as I know grossly incorrect.  The summer here has not been so sultry as last and the weather now is very mild.  If I get to Surbiton I should like to get some filbert suckers and a slip or two of the willow, I mean to bring some real Bluenose potatoes grown by Mr Dakin, they are of a kind that has almost entirely escaped the rot and are counted this side of the world the best that can be raised, they command the highest price in the markets and we export them largely to the United States, in fact so largely that the Yankees call the Scotian by the nickname of Bluenoses, they are an early kind.  Have you heard from little Joseph I hope he has reformed, in this part of the world drunkards are utterly despised and avoided, still intoxicating drinks are very plentiful and cheap. I often spin Amy a yarn about home and you and our round and a quarter days.  I suppose none of them but Mary and I remember those times, none of the youngest ones enjoyed that allowance.  We are going to have a railroad here soon, the telegraph is already from Digby to Halifax and on to the States through the Provinces. Apples are very plentiful here, a large crop this year and cider mill next door; apples and other fruit trees all round; ducks, geese and cows with a sprinkling of hens before the door.  I can reach apples off the trees from the window.  I receive your newspapers regularly and enjoy them much.  I have only had one chance to go to Church since Xmas and that was yesterday.  I have not heard from Mary or Ben for some time though I should like to very much.

I am busy making a wheelbarrow and have nearly got it done.  I am now sitting by my own fireside with a blazing wood fire, my wife getting the baby to sleep and a pitcher of cider (which I got for nothing as they are busy grinding apples and making cider next door – when I say next door you must not imagine an adjoining building but one on the next lot of land) on the table, with writing materials etc.  Out of doors the wind whistling and the hail pattering against the house making the already cheerful fireside more comfortable by comparison.  We will soon have sleighing again the most pleasant mode of travelling that I know of.  The winters here are very cold and severe but still they are pleasant.  Living is very cheap, good flour 20 shillings per barrel of 196 lbs, beef 2 pence per lb, butter (on account of the dry season dear) 10 pence a lb.  I have got a nice fat pig of my own. My Father in Law keeps it with his and is now fattening it for Xmas.  I can go about a stone’s throw from my house and gather first rate shell fish called clams which are capital eating, in summer time I can catch as much cod fish and haddock in one day as would last me a year. In winter I can snare as many hares (they call them rabbits here) in one night as you could eat in a week, no game laws here, food is plentiful but money scarce.  Should I come home I want Jane to collect some flower seeds for me as I intend to live soon on my own land and in my own house if possible and I like flowers round me, it puts me in mind of home in Old England which I often think of though I hardly expect to enjoy that home much more, my home must now be Nova Scotia, but still for memory’s sake I would like to draw as much of Old English scenery round me as I could.  I do not have that indescribably lonely feeling now which I used to have before I was married, in fact I feel I have a home.  I daresay my Father has felt the loneliness before he was married.  I must now conclude with best love, and Amy sends hers to all enquiring friends, Sisters and Brother, Uncle and Aunt. 

I remain

 Your affectionate son

Thomas Waters