uncommon brilliancy.

"It will be past midnight before we reach your brother's clearing," (where
we expected to spend the night,) said D____. "I wish, Mr. Moodie, we had
followed your advice, and staid at Peterborough. How fares it with you,
Mrs. Moodie, and the young ones? It is growing very cold."

We were now in the heart of a dark cedar swamp, and my mind was haunted
with visions of wolves and bears; but beyond the long, wild howl of a
solitary wolf, no other sound awoke the sepulchral silence of that dismal
looking wood.

"What a gloomy spot," said I to my husband. "In the old country,
superstition would people it with ghosts."

"Ghosts! There are no ghosts in Canada!" said Mr. D____. "The country is
too new for ghosts. No Canadian is afeard of ghosts. It is only in old
countries, like your'n, that are full of sin and wickedness, that people
believe in such nonsense. No human habitation has ever been erected in
this wood through which you are passing. Until a very few years ago, few
white persons had ever passed through it; and the Red Man would not pitch
his tent in such a place as this. Now, ghosts, as I understand the word,
are the spirits of bad men, that are not allowed by Providence to rest in
their graves, but, for a punishment, are made to haunt the spots where
their worst deeds were committed. I don't believe in all this; but,
supposing it to be true, bad men must have died here before their spirits
could haunt the place. Now, it is more than probable that no person ever
ended his days in this forest, so that it would be folly to think of
seeing his ghost."