162 THE CAN'ADIAN NATURALIST. [Junc 



Continental Acadia is included within the limits of its basin. 

 A connection with the sea, as singular as that of the St. John, is 

 to be found in few rivers (if any) of equal size, on the globe. 



The outlet of this river at the " Palls " (or, more correctly 

 speaking, Rapids), is a narrow and tortuous channel, bordered 

 by cliffs and obstructed by rocky ledges. Over this barrier, as 

 is well known, there is a flux and reflux of the tide twice a day ; 

 but as the tidal wave must rise fifteen feet or more before it can 

 overcome this impediment, its influence on the river above is 

 comparatively trifling, the water within the barrier not rising 

 more than 2^ feet, while at high tide the level of the water in 

 the harbour is about 13 feet above that of the river at its summer 

 level. 



It is not so generally known, however, that during the spring 

 floods the quantity of water poured into the t. John's River, 

 through its various tributaries, is such as to exclude any influx 

 from the sea. At this season of the year the contracted entrance 

 to the river, which at other seasons excludes the rushing tides of 

 the Bay of Fundy (preventing the formation of mud flats, a 

 striking feature in the estuaries of rivers further up the Bay), 

 also impedes the discharge of the spring floods. 



These pent up waters are then compelled to spread themselves 

 over the lowlands of the valley of the river, and such aflluents as 

 the Kennebeckasis, Nerepis, Washademoack, Belleisle, Grand 

 Lake and the Oromocto. Two extensive, though very irregularly 

 shaped, lakes are thus formed, — the lower one extending, in the 

 form of an oxbow, down the valley of the Kennebeckasis, around 

 Grand Bay, and up the " Long Reach " and Belleisle Bay ; the 

 upper one embracing a large area, beginning at the lower end of 

 Long Island, and extending upwards over the low lands lying 

 around the Washadmeoack River, Grand Maquapit, and French 

 Lakes, and all the interval lands between Gagetown and the 

 Oromocto — submerging also the lands on each side of this river 

 for many miles up. The area of the lake-like expansions of the 

 St. John River, which lie partly among the southern hills, and 

 partly to the northward of them, cannot fall far short of 600 

 square miles. 



During the summer and autumn these extensive sheets of 

 water, which ramify through the southern part of the Province 

 at the opening of navigation. on the river, have shrunken to very 

 limited proportions, being represented chiefly by the waters of 



