THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 77 



Barns containin^^ a large quantity of hay newly stored, 

 'or of recently harvested sheaves of cereals, which may be 

 thought to emit a rarefied air or fermenting gases, seem at- 

 tractive to electric currents in the atmosphere when thunder 

 clouds are about. About two and a half years ago a large 

 barn near here and valuable contents were burnt by lightning 

 during a nocturnal thunder storm. During the day previous 

 to this burning fourteen large loads of millet sheaves ha:l 

 been hauled from a harvest field and stored in the already 

 partly hay-filled edifice. During the progress of the violent 

 midnight tornado a neighbour who, being anxious for the 

 safety of his own outbuildings, was looking out of the window, 

 saw two streaks of lightning dart together from two separate 

 <:louds and unite in the sky just over the doomed barn. The 

 much-enlarged fire streak after the junction struck the build- 

 ing, which, with all it contained, was quickly reduced to ashes. 

 The facts in this case support the above theory. 



A subject of occasional reflection has been the difference 

 in the wild plant gfarniture of two well-defined zones or areas 

 in this county and the sharpness of the limits by which the 

 said areas are bounded. A wooded swamp of only two or 

 three hundred yards in width, but stretching lengthwise across 

 a number of concessions in Burford Township, divides what 

 is called "The Plains" from the heavier timbered sections or 

 districts of Brant County. There are several genera of wild 

 flowers abtmdant in one of these divisions that do not exist 

 in the other, and even where the genera may be identical or 

 similar the species dififer in one zone from the other. A few 

 inay be here noted: 



SCRUB OAK SECTION OR PLAINS FLOWERS. 



Lobelia Virgata ; Houstonia Purpurea ; Hypoxis Erecta ; 

 Gillenia Trifoliata ; 3 Gerardia's ; Asclepia Tuberosum ; 

 Ouercus Alba ; Rosa Lucida ; Polygala Seneca ; Laurus Sass- 

 afras, etc.. etc. 



