RIVER LIFE. 255 



and awful silence reigned over every thing. All nature appear- 

 ed to be hushed, when suddenly a lengthened and sullen roar came 

 booming through the forests, driving a thousand massive and de- 

 vouring flames before it. Then New Castle and Douglasstown, 

 and the whole northern side of the river, extending from Barti- 

 bog to the Kaashwaak, a distance of more than one hundred 

 miles in length, became enveloped in an immense sheet of llame, 

 that spread over nearly six thousand square miles .' That the 

 stranger may form a faint idea of the desolation and misery which 

 no pen can describe, he must picture to himself a large and rapid 

 river, thickly settled for one hundred miles or more on both sides 

 of it. He must also fancy four thriving towns, two on each side 

 of this river, and then reflect that these towns and settlements 

 were all composed of wooden houses, stores, stables, and barns ; 

 that these barns and stables were filled with crops, and that the 

 arrival of the faU importations had stocked the warehouses and 

 stores with spirits, powder, and a variety of combustible articles, 

 as well as with the necessary supplies for the approaching winter. 

 He must then remember that the cultivated or settled part of 

 the river is but a long, narrow strip, about a quarter of a mile 

 wide, lying between the river and almost interminable forests, 

 stretching along the very edge of its precincts and all around it. 

 Extending his conception, he will see the forests thickly expand- 

 ing over more than six thousand square miles, and absolutely 

 parched into tinder by the protracted heat of a long summer. 



" Let him then animate the picture by scattering countless 

 tribes of wild animals, and hundreds of domestic ones, and even 

 thousands of men in the interior. Having done all this, he will 

 have before him a feeble outline of the extent, features, and 

 general circumstances of the country which, in the course of a 

 few hours, was suddenly enveloped in fire. A more ghastly or 

 a more revolting picture of human misery can not well be im- 

 agined. 



