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Government House. Ottawa.
4th February, 1936.
Stair A. Gillon, Esq., The New Club, Edinburgh.
My dear Stair
The reading of your admirable chapter in the first volume of the new Stair Society's publications has reminded me tht I have never sent you a line since I arrived here, though I believe I did send you a Christmas card.
Well, we are comfortably settled down after a wonderful welcome. One may be a little homesick for Oxfordshire here, but not for Scotland, for Canada is simply Scotland on an extended scale. About three-fourths of the people one meets have Scottish names. So far we have been having a mildish winter, though when I went to the Northern Ontario gold mines a few weeks back the temperature was 27 below zero. One leads a funny life, for the houses are as hot as Hades and the out-of-doors, if there is a wind blowing is a sort of hyperborean inferno. The difficulty is to get the right kind of air and exercise. Before the snow closed down I had long walks in the Gatineau Hills, which were very delightful. I have taken up ski-ing to enable me to get about the country, but I am still pretty bad at it, though Alastair is rapidly becoming an expert. I suppose it is the old story of an old dog learning new tricks! But I am slowly improving, and I combine
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with it a good deal of skating and curling. Here, for some reason or other, they curl with iron stones which are fifteen pounds at least heavier than the ones we use in Scotland.
Before the King's death I had to do a good deal of speaking, both here and in Montreal and Toronto, and it seems on the whole to have gone down pretty well. I get more prestige than I deserve, for I speak without notes, and on this side of the Atlantic everyone reads their lengthy orations. Now we are in for a long period of mourning, and I am using it to see privately many people, especially the younger men. They are an uncommonly good lot, and there is a good deal of really vigorous thought among them, which wants a little guidance. On the whole I am deeply impressed by the Canadian people. They are the right stock, and the kindliest folk in the world.
I feel the King's death a good deal, for he had been a very kind friend to me. I think I shall get on very well with King Edward, for I have known him a long time and always liked him. I hope that he will allow me to relax certain ceremonial obligations, such as my not being able to go to the U.S.A. except with a cavalry escort and 19 guns! The new position of the Governor-General, who represents the King only, has the advantage that Canada regards him as their own man and is very frank and confidential with him; but it is a draw-back, for since he represents the King only, his style is cramped about things like visits to the U.S.A.
Our plans are to go on tour in May in Western Ontario, and then to go in residence in the Citadel of Quebec for June. In
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Government House. Ottawa.
July we visit the Maritimes, and early in August I go West for a most extended tour. I want to see at first hand the back country of the Prairie Provinces, which have the hardest deal of all, and which feel a little neglected. I propose to go about with one A.D.C. in a car and pick up a lodging where I can.
I hope to get a good deal of sport in the summer: trout fishing in Quebec, salmon fishing in the Maritimes, and a certain amount of fishing and shooting in the West, and possibly a little mountaineering. I won't manage to get to the annual meet of the Alpine Club this year, but another year I hope it may be possible. Another year, too, I intend to go to the Arctic, down the Mackenzie River, coming back by air; and some time or other to go to the Hudson's Bay islands and to the Yukon. This vast country has enormously whetted my appetite for travel, and the people who live and work in these outland places are the salt of the earth.
We hope that my mother and sister will be able to pay us a visit in April, when the St. Lawrence is free from ice. John has had so much dysentery in Uganda that they have sent him back to England to be cured. I hope that his leave will be extended so as to enable him to come out here to recruit and to get a little fishing.
We lead a very comfortable, not to say cosseted life, but I think I shall be happier when I go on tour and feel that I am really getting my teeth into the country. Ottawa, in the seclusion of winter, is a little like any other city.
