Canadian Houses
of Romance

by

Preface

IT is possible that people may ask what Canada has to do with old houses, that have been called the ghosts of old races. For it is said there is little to be found here but the mark of the present; a hard mark, like a self-complacent rubber stamp. To this I can only answer that I have tried to reach and record the little. In doing so I have heard stories so interesting, and at times so strange, that their telling might place Canada among fantastic countries, as well as those of vast natural resources. But they are still too near our time; for while descendants linger they spoil true stories. Yet the fact remains that had my publishers allowed this book to grow stouter there might easily have been more than the sixty houses recorded here that played a significant part in the courageous days of early Canada. [page ix]