12 FROM BLOMIDON TO SMOKY. 



This view and the winning hospitality of the 

 Halifax people were fresh and bright in our 

 memories as we took the Intercolonial train 

 northward on Tuesday morning. Outside the 

 train, scanty forests, growing over a country 

 which apjDeared to have been bombarded with 

 rocks, offered no encouragement to an inquisitive 

 gaze. Inside, motley humanity invented many 

 ways of distracting us in more senses than one. 

 Salvationists sat three in a seat and played con- 

 certinas ; a company of maroons, the big negroes 

 of the country, disported in their best clothes ; 

 dozens of young Christian Endeavor delegates 

 hobnobbed together ; while some Nova Scotia 

 militia-men, by their calf-like antics, made us 

 think more kindly of the British garrison left 

 behind. If the scenery failed to charm, the 

 names of places did not fail to astonish us. 

 Acadie, Tracadie, Shubenacadie, rang in my ears 

 for days, and so did the less harmonious refrain 

 of Tignish, Antigonish and Merigomish. When 

 I heard of Pug wash the climax seemed attained. 

 It did not seem possible that any swain could 

 go a-courting a girl from Pugwash. 



The day wore on. Names became places and 

 faded back to names again, and then it began to 

 rain. It was in the rain that we first saw the 

 hills of Cape Breton looming up on the further 

 side of the Gut of Canso. We had expected to 



