Poor substitute

(Newburgh) - July 13th 1849

We don't like this country very well. I think as soon as possible we will come home to old Ireland again. You need not believe the one half of what you hear. There is no constant work here. What you earn in the summer, you spend it in the winter. I do not recommend anyone to come here if he can live anyway at all at home.

There were twenty two thousand landed in York in one week. The people is never free from disorder here - the colera is very bad at present.

Sept 17th 1832

This town and Quebec has suffered very much, there is one large pit or grave in the French burying ground here which contains three thousand dead bodys which died of the Cholera, besides many other pits and graves where some thousands, more are intered, the disease is greatly abated, god grant it may continue long so.

Health is very bad here in general, the poor Irish at home thrives far better on potatoes and milk and sturabout than we do here on the best - indeed the best food here is bad enough, fish and flesh are not near so good here as that of Ireland. One shilling goes as far as three does in any part of Canada.

The poor emigrants that went up the country, about forty thousand in number, are dying in hundreds, mostly starved to death. Those that have money enough are all returning to their native homes as fast as possible.

This country is in a miserable state at present, owing to that terrrible quick disease, the cholera, it is also very bad in many parts of the United States, and is spreading over the whole globe. I would rather prefer the States to any part of Canada, being quite a superior country altogether.