[Audio extract] Letter from Charlotte Watts, Drummondville, April 24, 1847

Drummondville, 24th April 1847

My dear Mother,

At last we have a real spring day. The sun is shining is [sic] bright that it looks quite tempting to go out. The children have enjoyed this morning greatly and have just come in. I hear three little voices giving Sarah an account of a battle that Harriet had with the turkey cock. She seems to have come off victorious by her exulting tones. I suppose you would rather hear that she had concurred the alphabet. That seems to be a very hard business, however there are only a few letters now to learn. Laight brings her books every morning and her memory is so good that she learns with little trouble either to herself or me.

I suppose it will be a fortnight before you will be enabled to leave Quebec and, even then, you will have dreadful roads, very different from what they were when you came up last spring to welcome little William. We cannot persuade the little fellow to eat a bit, and half a teacup of milk is all he will drink in the day. How shall we ever wean him? The warm weather I fear will be here before it is accomplished and Nugent will not hear of our forcing the food into his mouth. We starved him for three days from morning to night, until I saw the dear little baby was looking quite ill, and he would not walk any more. I long to hear if you have had a satisfactory answer from Mr. Lindsay about Lord’s farm.

Goodbye dear Mother, love to dear Father.

Your affectionate daughter.

Charlotte Watts