“When I got home I found father had gone to offer himself to the Government, and everyone was busy preparing food and baking bread. We had once been supporters of Mackenzie, and everybody knew we had turned against him after he came back from England. Some people were, therefore, very bitter against us, and we thought it wise to fill the house with food, leave the place open, barn, grain, everything, so that they could get it all easily, and take the chance of the house therefore not being burned down. So we left everything ready for them, and went to stay at a relative’s farther back in the country.
“There are plenty to say that Moodie was not shot at all. Some declared that he was alive when taken to the tavern and that he would not give in, and it ended in his being trampled to death in the tavern.
“Sheriff Jarvis took the news of the rising coolly. When father was going down Yonge Street to offer himself he met the sheriff, who said, ‘Well, John, what’s the news with you to-day?’ And when father said, ‘There’s great news--Toronto will be taken and burnt, if you don’t stop it,’ the sheriff said, ‘You don’t say so!’ and only half believed him.
“For a long time before the rising I did not go very often to the Mackenzies, for they thought I would spy on them, and father thought I had better leave them alone anyway. We had supported Mackenzie strongly, like the rest of the farmers, before he went to England, and my father and his friends took their turn in watching him for fear the Compact people would spirit him away; but that was when he was all for reform and agitating for our rights. Whatever it was happened to him in England turned everything into fighting, and father wasn’t going to fight against his country. That Mackenzie was the craziest man you ever did see. He wore a wig, and when he got excited--he was always excited, for the matter of that--he would throw it on the floor, or throw it at you if he felt extra pleasant. You’ve heard of the time he was brought home with cheering and torches and great doings, and given the gold chain?[6] A fine chain it was, long and thick, and he was very pleased and worked up. He saw me standing by, laughing--for I was excited, too--and he cried at me, ‘Ah, Mary!’ and quick as lightning threw the chain at me and the wig on the floor, and then he flung his arms round his mother’s neck and kissed her.