174 THE FLORIST. 



diate unrigging of every thing that has been required for the purpose 

 of loading. 



I write of a year long since gone, when, on a fine sunny day in 

 August, we announced in this manner to the sliips in Wolfe's Cove 

 that we should soon be on our way homewards. It so happened 

 that our jolly-boat had either broken adrift or been taken from the 

 ship's stern in the previous night, and I was ordered to take a light 

 skiff, and search the shore as far down as the Falls of Maranza, in- 

 quiring as I went wherever I was likely to get information. I started 

 on the ebb-tide, pleased enough with my mission, and commissioned 

 by the crew not to return without a good handsome young pine-tree 

 top to fasten to our jib-boom end. 



The St. Lawrence is a glorious river to float upon, and the city 

 of Quebec, for the beauty and grandeur of its situation, can scarcely 

 be surpassed. And were it not that the Falls of Niagara stand pre- 

 eminently at the head of all the cataracts in creation, these of Ma- 

 ranza would draw thousands of admiring visitors from all parts of 

 the world. 



But my business lies not with them, though I spent hours of 

 leisure waiting for the returning tide, and gazing on the sublime 

 spectacle of a whole river tumbling headlong down a precipice, only 

 broken by a projecting mass of rock, on which a few fir-trees and 

 shrubs braved the dangers of their position. 



I found not the boat; but I procured a splendid fir-tree top with 

 a noble one year's leading shoot, which on my return to the ship 

 was securely fastened to the jib-boom end. 



In due course we went to sea, and carried with us a westerly 

 breeze from the Island of Anticosti, which steadily increased as we 

 sped before it, until it became a downright hard gale of wind, before 

 which we scudded under a close-reefed main-top-sail, with a high 

 Atlantic sea chasing hard after us, and hazy weather. 



It was desperate kind of work ; but we had daylight, and we 

 hoped the gale would moderate during the day. Is^oon came, but 

 brought no change ; and there was every thing to portend a very bad 

 night, particularly about four o'clock, when all hands were set to 

 work to secure all that was upon the deck. 1 had the look-out for- 

 ward. There was nothing very sentimental about me, but it cannot 

 be thought surprising if, with that pine-tree top before my eyes, my 

 thoughts involuntarily wandered back to the time and place of beauty 

 when and where I procured it. Then how exquisitely beautiful was 

 every thing around me ; now all was wild uproar, the wind howling 

 through the rigging, the ocean wrought by its violence into the most 

 orderly confusion, the brig one moment lost between two seas, sail 

 becalmed, and looking as if she would quietly subside altogether ; 

 the next moment, with stern lifted up, she was running along on 

 the crest of an enormous wave, the sail stretched to the point of 

 splitting. It seemed a very race of Hfe and death between wind 

 and waves on the one hand, and our poor barky on the other, which 

 seemed determined they should not have her. But they had nearly 

 succeeded ; and missing her, had much more nearly caught me. 



