16 BULLETIN OF THE NATURAL HLSTORY SOCIETY. 



their long spurs reminding one strongly of tropical 

 orchids. This water shed, dividing the St. John from 

 the Restigouche, is a gently undulating tableland, ele- 

 vated about eight hundred or a thousand feet above 

 the sea-level and well watered. Many of the streams 

 trickle slowly through swamps and find their Avay either 

 to the tributaries of the St. John or Restigouche. It has 

 a soil, to judge from the vegetation upon it, nowhere 

 exceeded in richness throughout this province, except in 

 the alluvial valleys of its chief rivers. Derived from the 

 disintegration of the underlying Silurian slates, the soil is 

 apparently of considerable depth, remarkabl}^ free from 

 stones, and would form a rich agricultural district if ren- 

 dered more accessible by post road and railway. A rail- 

 way across the northern part of New Brunswick from the 

 Bay of Chaleur to the valley of the St. John, would open 

 up for settlement this rich tract of watershed and the upper 

 Restigouche, and bring into general view some of the most 

 rugged and picturesque scenery of Eastern Canada. But 

 this grand primeval wilderness would be blackened and 

 desolated by forest fires, — the sure attendant of frontier 

 settlements. The shrill Avhistle of the locomotive would 

 be daily heard in those solitudes whose silence is only 

 occasionally broken b}' the gentle sounds of the canoeman's 

 paddle, the whir of the angler's rod, the ringing echo of 

 the sportsman's gun, or the clear strokes of the lumber- 

 man's axe. The adventurous spirits who love these 

 solitudes might wish that " the greatest good to the 

 greatest number" would be indefinitely postponed, and 

 that the difficulties in the way of railroad communica- 

 tion may prove an insuperable obstacle in breaking up this 

 sportsman's paradise. 



About four o'clock on the afternoon of July 25th, onr 

 ears were gladdened by the welcome sounds of rippling 



