THE WOODS OF NEW BRUNSWICK. ll 
a distance by the greater size and length of the terminal brushes 
of leaves.” —Hmerson, 
Lumbermen are acquainted with two varieties, which they 
denominate by the names of the Sapling and Old Red Pine. The 
former is an inferior wood, generally having those niches of sap 
which rot quickly on exposure to the weather, It has been 
largely used in the State of Maine for hogshead heading, for 
which purpose it answers well. The old red pine, now nearly 
extinct here, sometimes attains the height of 90 feet and a 
diameter of 3 feet, the trunk being nearly uniform and without 
branches for a height of 40 or 50 feet. The wood is strong and 
durable, resembling that of pitch pine, but with less resin, and 
was formerly largely employed, like the latter, for the decking of 
vessels and for beams, having a fine compact grain with few knots. 
It grows as a scattered tree on dry and sandy soil; some of the 
best trees ever obtained in the Province were cut on the granite 
boulder district which crosses the New Brunswick railway about 
fifty miles north of St Andrews. The Tobique river traversed a 
tract which was once a great habitat of the old red pine, especially 
that branch called the Wapskyhegan, on whose banks it grew 
abundantly, and the trees stood so close on the ground that there 
was hardly room to turn a sled between the stumps. The axe 
and fire have now, however, completely removed them from this 
locality. 
3. GREY OR NORTHERN SCRUB PINE (Pinus Banksiana, Lamb). 
This tree is readily distinguished from the other species of pine 
by its scrubby growth, and by the colour and appearance of the 
peculiar scales by which the trunk is covered, and by its 
singularly spreading boughs, as well as by the cones which hang 
under them. Timber made from it in former times, when it was 
tolerably abundant, was considered to be of good size if it averaged 
three-quarters of a ton to the tree. The wood is hard, full of 
pitch, and free from sap, but it is apt to be full of streaks. It is 
much used by the Intercolonial railway for ties and railway 
sleepers, being one of the best woods for this purpose. 
Certain sections of country on the South-West Miramichi, the 
forests on which were destroyed by the great fire of 1825, have 
since become so thickly covered by forests of Banks’ pine that it 
is almost impossible to press one’s way through the trees. It 
grows also extensively on the Little South-West Miramichi. 
