THE FORESTS OF ACADIE. 27 



especially pleasing to the eye when studying details of 

 a landscape in which the various forms of vegetation 

 form the leading features. The luxuriant mosses and 

 great lichens which cover or cling to everything in the 

 forest act a similar part. Even the dismal black swamps 

 are somewhat enlivened by the long beards of the Usnea ; 

 fallen trees are often made quite brilliant by a profusion 

 of scarlet cups of Cladonia gracilis. 



But now let us examine further into the specific cha- 

 racter of at least some of the individuals of which the 

 forest is composed. As we wander on we chance, perhaps, 

 to stumble upon what is called, in woodsman's parlance, 

 a " blazed line " — a broad chip has been cut from the side 

 of a tree, and the white surface of the inner wood at once 

 catches the eye of the watchful traveller ; a few paces 

 farther on some saplings have been cut, and, keeping the 

 direction, we perceive in the distance another blazed mark 

 on a trunk. It may be a path leading from the settle- 

 ment to some distant woodland meadow of wild grass, or 

 a line marking granted property, or it may lead to a lot 

 of timber trees marked for the destructive axe of the lum- 

 berer — perhaps a grove of White Pine. This is the great 

 object of the lumberer s search. Ascending a tree from 

 which an extensive view of the wild country is commanded, 

 he marks the tall overbearing summits of some distant pine 

 grove (for this tree is singularly gregarious, and is gene- 

 rally found growing in family groups), and having taken 

 its bearings with a compass, descends, and with his com- 

 rades proceeds on his errand of destruction. In the 

 neighbourhood of the coast, or on barren soil, the pine is 

 a stunted bushy tree, its branches feathering nearly to the 

 ground ; but the pine of the forest ascends as a straight 



