294 SCOTTISH GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE. 



in all parts of Canada. At this time of the year we read in the news- 

 papers of numerous buildings being set on fire every week from this 

 cause, and we should naturally expect many fires to originate in the same 

 way in the forests, and there is ample proof that they do originate in this 

 manner, especially in these northern woods. The writer has been an eye- 

 witness to the fact, and most persons who have travelled much in these 

 regions have seen the same thing happen. A description of one of these 

 great fires in our northern forest-belt forms a part of their natural history, 

 being the concluding event from which the growth starts afresh. 



FIRES IN THE NORTHERN FOREST. 



Let us imagine ourselves in an old forest of this region, of practically 

 unlimited extent, and consisting of a dense growth of black and white 

 spruce, Banksian pine, tamarack, and balsam fir. The smaller trees fill up 

 the spaces between the larger ones, and all are crowded so closely together 

 that their branches touch or intermingle with each other. In this way 

 a sufficiently dense mass of fuel is formed to support a continuous sheet of 

 flame on a grand scale, and yet it is sufficiently open to furnish a plentiful 

 supply of air to carry on the conflagration. The ground is deeply covered 

 with moss, and an accumulation of fallen trees and branches is lying 

 about in all directions. After the prolonged hot weather and drought of 

 the summer months the moisture has become thoroughly dried out of the 

 gummy boughs of the standing trees, leaving their great store of resin 

 and turpentine, as well as the wood itself, all ready for burning. The 

 mossy carpet and the fallen timber are alike dry. All the conditions are 

 now ready, and only await a spark of fire to start one of the wildest and 

 grandest scenes of destruction which can take place on the face of the 

 earth. 



When the fire has got under way the pitchy trees burn with almost 

 explosive rapidity. The flames rush through their branches and high 

 above their tops with a terrifying sound. The ascending heat soon 

 develops a strong breeze, if a wind does not happen to be blowing already. 

 Before this gale the fire sweeps on with a roaring noise as fast as a horse 

 can gallop. The irresistible front of flame devours the forest before it as 

 rapidly as a prairie fire licks up the dry grass. The line of the gigantic 

 conflagration has a height of 100 feet or more above the tree-tops, or 

 200 feet from the ground. Great sheets of flame disconnect themselves 

 from the fiery avalanche and leap upward as towering tongues of fire, 

 or dart forward, bridging over wide spaces, such as lakes and rivers, and 

 starting the fire afresh in advance of the main column, as if impatient of 

 the slower progress it is making. These immense shooting flames are 

 probably due to the large quantities of highly inflammable gas evolved 

 by the heat from the pitchy tree-tops just in advance of actual com- 

 bustion, and they help to account for the incredible speed of most of the 

 larger forest fires. 



One of them, which occurred in the Saguenay region, and of which 

 we have exact particulars, was known to run over 150 miles in ten hours, 

 or at the rate of fifteen miles an hour. Thus in a single day the appear- 



