46 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
unlike any other so-called marshes known to exist. Every incoming 
tide bears landward its burden of sediment formed by the action of 
the tidal currents upon the sides and bottom of the Bay, and during 
the quiescent interval between the flood and the ebb, the suspended 
sediment is precipitated as a film of soft and glistening mud upon the 
partly dried and hardened deposits of the previous tides. Thus layer 
after layer accumulates of the fertile marsh-land. 
“The great fertility of this alluvium,” writes Dr. F. H. Eaton, 
“may be inferred from the fact that portions of the Annapolis, Corn- 
wallis, Grand Pré and Cumberland marshes have been producing 
annually, for almost two centuries, from two to four tons per acre of 
the finest hay. Besides, it is a common practice after the hay has been 
removed to convert the marshes into autumn pastures, on the luxuriant 
tender after-growth of which cattle fatten more rapidly than on any 
other kind of food. Thus virtually two crops are annually taken from 
the land, to which no fertilizing return is ever made.”’ 
Rather less than two years before the expulsion of the Acadians 
Lawrence wrote that great efforts were being made by the French at 
Louisbourg to induce them to withdraw from the peninsula, but that 
the greater part were too much attached to their lands to leave them. 
In view of the opinion formed as to the fertility and attractive situation 
of the lands, by the New England explorers in 1759, and of all that 
is said in their favor to-day, we need not wonder that the Acadian 
fugitives, who remained furtively in their hiding places, viewed with 
bitterness of soul the coming of those whom they could not but regard 
as intruders. The advance agents beheld the blackened ruins where 
the Acadians once had dwelt. In the district of Grand Pré alone, 225 
houses, 276 barns, 11 mills and a large number of out-houses and sheds 
had been burned. 
IV.—Dificulties with Indians and Acadians, the Elements and the 
Lords of Trade. 
The minutes of the Governor in Council at Halifax show that when 
once the tide of immigration had set in, applications for townships came 
thick and fast. On the 22d of June, 1759, committees representing 
four different associations in New England appeared before the Governor 
with proposals to settle “the vacated lands.’”? On being acquainted 
into the interior. Local conditions largely determine the great diversity in the 
height, velocity and other tidal phenomena. In some places the extreme elevation 
of the flood-tide above low-water mark is as great as sixty feet. In some rivers 
the upward flow against the fresh-water current forms a rapidly moving wall, or 
bore, several feet in height. 
