DISAFFECTION IMPORTED FROM IRELAND. 153 



Gulf Stream. But the north-west wind is the highest, and 

 most destructive to vegetation. When it drifts the 

 snow off the ground, or sweeps over the land when bare, 

 it actually burns up and completely destroys the grass. 



These facts show the importance of belts of plantation to 

 protect the fields, especially from the north-west wind, and 

 of leaving such shelter when the original forest is cleared. 

 They show also how important, in connection with scien 

 tific agriculture, is the study of that branch of meteorology 

 which deals with the direction, prevalence, and tempe 

 rature of the different winds i-n different localities. 



A severe frost, after a partial thaw in spring, when 

 the land is soaked with water, is here very destructive to 

 the grass-land. The clover in April is sometimes thrown 

 out, so that the roots will stand frozen and upright from 

 four to six inches out of the ground ! A liability to 

 such alternate thaws and frosts in spring is the main 

 reason, also, why winter wheat refuses now to grow in 

 the more extensively cleared parts of the province. 



This county is said to be much affected with the pas 

 sion for Annexation. I did not meet with any at St 

 Andrews whose professed inclinations lay that way, 

 though one might expect that the neighbourhood of the 

 State of Maine would inoculate the discontented and the 

 lovers of change with that form of political disease. 

 But the residents explain its existence in another way. 

 Most of the immigrants who come here are of the poorer 

 class of Irish, from the county of Cork. It is with these 

 men, and from Ireland so at least the descendants of the 

 Scotch and English settlers, and of the old loyalists, say 

 that the disaffection to England has been mainly imported. 

 To those who know the facts which I have stated in the 

 preceding chapter, as to the material depression of Maine, 

 it cannot be believed that by annexation the colony of 

 New Brunswick could become more prosperous. 



I staid only a few hours in St Andrews, during which 



