60 FORESTS. BEARS. [CHAP. TV. 



the scenery. I had sometimes remarked in Norway that the 

 birch trees are so equally intermixed with dark pines, as to im 

 part, by the contrast of colors, a spotted appearance to the woods, 

 not always picturesque ; but here I saw the dark green hemlock 

 in one place, and the maples, with their brilliant autumnal foliage 

 in another, grouped in such masses on the steep slopes of the hills, 

 as to produce a most agreeable effect. There were many birch 

 trees, with their white bark, and oaks, with red autumnal tints, 

 and an undergrowth of kalmia out of flower, but still conspicuous 

 by its shining leaves. The sweet fern (Comptonia) no longer 

 appeared on this high ground, and was replaced by the true fern, 

 called here &quot; brake,&quot; being our common English species (Pteris 

 aquilind). On the low hills of granite were many huge angular 

 fragments of that rock, fifteen, and some of them twenty feet in 

 diameter, resting on heaps of sand. They were of a light gray 

 color, with large crystals of felspar, and reminded me of the 

 granite of Arran in Scotland. As we followed the windings of 

 the river Saco, I observed, in the bottom of the valley, alluvial 

 terraces, composed of clay, sand, gravel, and boulders, forming 

 flats at different elevations, as we see in many parts of Scotland, 

 and other mountain valleys in Europe. 



Although we heard much talk of the late frost, there were still 

 abundant signs of the sun s power, such as large grasshoppers, 

 with red wings, called here shakers, and tortoises ( Testudo picta) 

 wandering from one pond to another. In the retired paths many 

 squirrels allowed us to pass very near to them without being 

 alarmed. The bear once extended, like the beaver, over the 

 whole of New England ; but the beaver has been every where 

 extirpated, and the bear driven into^the mountains. From these 

 retreats they still make annual depredations on the fields of Indian 

 corn, and the farmers retaliate, not only by thinning them with 

 their rifles, but by taking what some sportsmen would consider 

 a very unfair advantage over them. On the first spring-like day, 

 Bruin, who has been hybernating for several months in a cave, 

 ventures out, before the snow has quite melted, to take a look at 

 the country ; then retires again to his hiding place, which the 

 hunter discovers by following his foot tracks on the snow, and 



