THE BOIS BRULE. 85 



Russia has suggested ; it may have occurred iu connection with some 

 endeavour to divert into another channel the waters of the same or 

 some other water-course ; it may have occurred in consequence of the 

 damming up of some outlet from a lake which it was sought to 

 enlarge as a reservoir for the supply of a canal, or a mill-lade, or some 

 other purpose ; or it may have been the effect of the woi'k of a 

 beaver, for cases of all such occvirrences can be cited. But, however 

 produced, the consequence to that portion of the forest which is laid 

 under water, though only to the depth of one or two feet, is the same 

 — the trees are killed as if girdled by fire, or by the woodman's axe, 

 and, most probably, by a similar operation, through the decay and 

 destruction of the bark and sapwood at the water-line, or between 

 wind and water, promoted by alternate exposure to each by the 

 ripple, and the consequent severance of the communication between 

 rootlet and leaf, or it may be by such a severance being occasioned by 

 the rupture and decay of vessels through which that communication 

 was maintained. 



A graphic sketch of the destruction thus wrought occurs in 

 an account given by Gosse of a forenoon's excursion, which he 

 made in Canada to the Bois Brule, a large tract of land which lay at no 

 great distance from his residence, but was so hidden in the recesses of 

 the woods, and so out of the way of any travelled road, that it was 

 not often visited except by the trapper. The first quarter of a mile 

 lay through what he calls a very rough slash. " Such a labyrinth of 

 fallen timber we had to penetrate," says he, " climbing over the 

 trunks, and scrambling through the dry branches of the prostrate 

 trees, often falling through ; and, to make the matter worse, these 

 were concealed by the tall Indian wickup, epilohkcjn latefoUum, with 

 which the ground was absolutely covered, and, as the long seed-pods 

 were just bursting, our every movement dispersed clouds of the light 

 downy cotton, which, getting into our mouths and nostrils, caused us 

 considerable inconvenience. Presently we descended the steep bank, 

 and walked, or rather scrambled, up the rocky bed of the stream, by 

 means of the stones which were above water, though, as they were 

 wet and slimy, we occasionally wetted our feet. Thus we went on 

 sometimes in the stream, sometimes among the alders and underwood 

 of the banks, for about a mile and a-half. We were much surprised 

 in going up this brook, about a mile up, at coming upon a ruined 

 building, which had been erected over the stream at a craggy fall, the 

 timbers of which had fallen down, and some of them had been 

 carried a considerable distance down by the freshets, I supposed it 



