ATTEMPTS AT A BUSH SETTLEMENT. 



having got the timber down, imtrimmed one tree over another, until we opened a 

 circular space on the summit. We began on the outside of the circle, and by means 

 of blocks and tackles, we drew the trees one by one inwards, with their heads toward 

 the top of the hill, until the pile got so high that they literally had not room to fall 

 or even to be dragged down. 



In this dilemma T had to call in my choppers, who pronounced it impossible to clear 

 up the hill until the timber got diy enough to burn sufficiently to get into it and cut it 

 up. As we had expended above six Aveeks labor on about a quarter of an acre, and I 

 was anxious to get the space cleared up for my house, I determined to burn it up some 

 Avay. So having piled an immense heap of dry cedar trees, carried from the borders 

 of the lakes, over my sylvan monument, I set it on fire in different places at night, and 

 Aveut out on the lake to enjoy the magnificent breadth of light and shade which the 

 blazing pile thrcAV over the surrounding landscape. The eft'ect was truly superb at night ; 

 but in the morning it had a very different aspect, as the first persons I saw when I left 

 my room next day Avere my choppers, who came to tell me that the fire had run over the 

 ground Avhere they had been at work, and left nothing but a bare rock behind. The 

 statement seeming incredible, AAdiere there was such a growth of fine heavy timber, all 

 hands started off" together. The first place we came to Avas the hill, Avhich presented 

 the most desolate and miserable sight I ever beheld in the bush : the lofty trees 

 stretched one over the other in the most chaotic confusion, charred and blackened, 

 with their bare and spreading branches grappling with each other as if in final deadly 

 strugo-le ; while just beyond where the day before lay the rich black mold, with its 

 thick, soft covering of crisp, dry leaves, nought was to be seen but the bare, flat, 

 water-Avorn limestone rock, out of which solid bed the fine but now scorched and 

 blackened trees seemed to spring up as if firmly rooted in the solid rock. A scene 

 more utterly desolate I have seldom viewed ; and as if to deepen the effect, the first 

 snow storm of the season, descending in its fleecy shower, threw its cold and dreary 

 mantle over the blighted scene. 



The first shock of astonishment haAang subsided, we proceeded to examine into a 

 phenomenon for which none of us could account, and found that the surface of black 

 mold was only a few inches deep, spread over a laminated limestone rock, Avhich had 

 evidently at some remote period been the bed of a communication between the two 

 lakes ; and that the fine timber with which it Avas covered, sprung up from and was 

 rooted in the interstices with Avhich it was intersected, varying in Avidth from four to 

 eight or ten inches, and in some places very deep, and all filled up with black mold, 

 formed by the accumulation of decayed leaves and other vegetable matter. After a 

 careful examination, being fully satisfied that the whole tract was of the same quality, 

 and totally unfit for agricultural purposes, we resolved to start the next morning for 

 Toronto, and get the Governor's permission to exchange my unfortunate location, and 

 made preparations accordingly. But even in this I found that I had reckoned with- 

 out my host ; as the ice, though not strong enough to be traveled over, Avas too strong 

 ce a boat through, and there was not even a ^practicable bush blaze to gu 



