48 Eastern Towftskips, 



quiescent condition, give a flat surface ; but here, being dis- 

 turbed and corrugated, they give origin to a surface beauti- 

 fully varied with hill and valley. The physical structure of 

 this part of Canada is thus exceedingly complicated. The 

 rocks of which the district is composed abound in mineral 

 ores, and many beautiful varieties of marble. The lakes, 

 however, are its great glory. By them the glens, the moun- 

 tains and the woods are illumined ; reflected in this pure 

 element the great and stern objects of Nature stand out "a 

 second self" The first settlements in the Townships were 

 made about 1 795 by families from Massachusetts, Vermont, 

 and New Hampshire ; and to those enterprising and adven- 

 turous pioneers is due, in a great measure, the prosperity 

 their descendants now enjoy. Then "tall pines, blackened 

 by fire, stood as monuments of the prevailing loneliness," and 

 the forest closed like a fortress round the first settler, whose 

 only hope against its shutting him in for life, was his axe. 

 How well that has been wielded, what hardships have been 

 undergone, what fortitude shewn, the smiling homestead and 

 thriving villages of to-day full truly record ; and the nearer 

 we approach the frontier lines, the more do the evidences of 

 prosperity increase, as it was there the first settlements were 

 made. The noble River St. Lawrence sweeps past in its 

 course to the ocean, on the north-west of these Townships. 

 Its banks still retain that remarkable boldness which they 

 possess at and near Quebec^ till after passing Craig's Road, 

 where there is a remarkable cliff called the Devil's Bit, they 

 lose gradually the boldness of their features till they sink 

 into the flats of La Baie du Febvre. Soon after crossing 

 the Chaudi^re, the line recedes from the banks of the St. 

 Lawrence, running through the heart of the Townships, and 

 the country begins to assume a peculiarly picturesque aspect. 

 On the upper waters of the pretty river Nicolet we come to 

 Becancour and Somerset, forty-one and fifty miles respec- 

 tively from Quebec, south of which places, in the Townships 



