12 DEVIL FISHING. 



flung the perfume of lier white blossoms far over 

 the murmuring waters and herds of deer and 

 buffalo bro>vsed, unconscious of fear, on the luxu- 

 riant her'bage an4l?irds of unknown plumage and 

 i^irjvaifedfQi^"ilu,ttered and carolled among the 

 trees what pleasant fancies must have crowded 

 upon thy mind ! and who but must sympathize in 

 thy emotions thou pioneer and file-leader of the 

 Huguenots ? 



The deep, too, had its attractions. " We took 

 to our nets," says the same -memoir, " and caught 

 such a number of fish, that it was wonderful." 

 Yet, half of these wonders was not guessed at by 

 the ancient mariner, who first visited these waters. 

 How few could they have seen, compared with the 

 uncounted varieties that must have escaped the 

 sweep of their nets ! There was the golden bass ; 

 and the drum, with its mysterious, and, to a 

 stranger, its startling sound ; the porpoise, showing 

 its back above the water; and the unseen and 

 unsuspected tribes that thronged the depths below ; 

 the sting-ray, with its jagged spine ; the saw-fish ; 

 the omnivorous shark; and mightiest, strangest, 

 most formidable among them all for its strength, 

 the devil-fish ; then rarely seen, and deemed, even 

 down to our own times, scarcely less fabulous than 

 the Norwegian kraken! 



