THE OHIO DISTRICT 223 



light. On the heights, in addition to many other trees, 

 walnuts, chestnuts, oaks, and sycamores are conspicuous ; 

 and everywhere, even in the forests of the plains, odd 

 pine trees are found. But it is singular that grow- 

 ing wild — that is, self-planted — each species of tree as a 

 rule keeps to its own territory. Many of the pines grow 

 in what are called pine-barrens. Here the soil is supposed 

 to be wretchedly poor, and is always waterless ; and you 

 will look in vain for trees of other species. 



Animal life in the depths of the forest is very scanty, 

 more so even than in the northern Canadian forests, a 

 fact for which I can advance no probable surmise. 

 Small birds are quite absent ; not a single species breeds 

 after you have fairly entered the forest, though a few 

 haunt the outskirts. Rattlesnakes are still found in out- 

 lying portions of the State, but neither these nor any 

 other snakes were ever seen by me in the forests. There 

 are a few bull-frogs in the cedar swamps ; but these bat- 

 rachians prefer the woodland ponds where they obtain 

 plenty of light. They are always found in such ponds 

 unless there are no fish in them, which sometimes 

 happens. A few loons haunted the ponds of Ohio at the 

 time of which I am writing, and there would probably 

 have been more had they not been so persecuted. 



Although there are no small-bird inhabitants actually 

 in the forest, a few are occasionally seen as they pass on 

 their way in their migrations. But they never make 

 more than a temporary halt. The birds which I have 

 found to frequent the interior of the great primeval 

 forests are two species of grouse : the Canadian Canach- 

 ites canadensis, here called the New England partridge ; 

 and the ruffed grouse, Bonasa umhellus. Neither of 

 these birds seems to breed within the forest, though they 

 do on the outskirts ; and the attraction that induces 

 them to visit the gloom of the interior is a mystery that 

 I could not fathom. Possibly they feed on some of the 

 wild fruits of the trees ; for an odd wild plum or wild 



