G8 SALT-MARSHES. 



Scadook Eiver to Cape Tormentine, and -round to Bay 

 Verte, salt-marshes occur, chiefly in creeks and at the 

 mouths of small rivers. These marsh-lands are sometimes 

 of great extent, and have been dyked in ; more fre 

 quently, however, they are undyked, liable to overflow 

 in floods, high tides, and wet weather. The undyked 

 are rendered drier and more valuable by the occurrence 

 of hot dry seasons like the present. All, however, both 

 dyked and undyked, are far from being so valuable as 

 the marsh-lands at the head of the Bay of Fundy, of 

 which I shall afterwards speak. When undyked, they 

 are properly called salt-marshes, and are valued at 5 ; 

 when dyked, at 8 to 10 an acre. They yield large 

 crops of inferior hay ; and it is by means of the manure 

 which this hay produces that such of the habitants as 

 possess marsh-land are enabled to keep their uplands from 

 being exhausted by the system of farming which they 

 follow. Hence, a coast farm is considered incomplete 

 which does not possess a portion of this marsh just as, 

 along the river St John, a portion of intervale is con 

 sidered an almost indispensable adjunct to an upland farm. 

 A question I had often discussed with the New 

 Brunswick farmers was, whether a man could make 

 money in this province by the employment of hired 

 labour only. I had met with many negative answers to 

 this question, but Mr Murray boldly answered it in the 

 affirmative provided the farmer attended to his own 

 business, and speculated in nothing else. He instanced 

 himself as an example. With no children old enough to 

 help him, labouring little himself, employing hired men 

 to work for him, he made money ; and believed that the 

 man who hired most labour, if he judiciously applied it, 

 would make most money too. 



And yet, though ahead of his French neighbours in 

 industry and skill, he was himself far behind in the 

 management of wet land, and in green-crop husbandry. 



