44 NOTES TAKEN. 
bushels of grain to the acre; this season being unprecedently 
wet, the prospects were not so good. - 
Coal is found here in abundance, very bituminous, but: used 
only by the few blacksmiths who live along the road. 
A curious spectacle presented itself this morning, on our 
road. The whole surface of the ground, for more than a mile, 
was covered with the army worm, passing from one scene of 
devastation to another. They are about three inches long, 
white in colour, and lozenge shaped, travel slowly, but are a 
great scourge to the farmer, destroying—when they come in 
such hosts—in a night the labours of the season. N othing 
but fire, I understand, has been able to check their ravages, 
and it is said that by burning off a narrow strip around a crop, 
it can be saved, as they will not cross burnt ground. My own 
impressions are, that as the larve are deposited by the insect 
after passing the chrysalis state, no means will be effectual, 
except they can be destroyed in the egg. This farmers North 
and East do, in case of the cutworm, by ploughing their land 
and subjecting it to the action of the weather. 
June 12th.—At daylight we were on the sad, and com- 
menced passing through a more broken, but still well eulti- 
vated and flourishing country, as there is quite a settlement— 
- if distances of from ten to fifteen miles can be called a settle- 
ment—of white men with squaw wives. An old Indian of 
some note also lived on this road. He was rich in cattle and 
horses, but, like his fellows, cultivated the soil to a very 
limited extent. We stopped for the night near a place where, 
