EPISODES 435 



pleasure each wild inhabitant of the forest seizes his 

 stick, the squaws and younglings following with similar 

 weapons! Look at them rushing on their prey, falling 

 on the disabled birds, and smashing them with their cud- 

 gels, until all are destroyed! In this manner upwards of 

 five hundred wild fowls have often been procured in a 

 few hours. 



Three pleasant days were spent at Point Lepreaux, 

 when the " Fancy " spread her wings to the breeze. In 

 one harbor we fished for shells with a capital dredge, and 

 in another searched along the shore for eggs. The Pas- 

 samaquoddy chief is seen gliding swiftly over the deep 

 in his fragile bark. He has observed a porpoise breath- 

 ing. Watch him, for now he is close upon the unsuspect- 

 ing dolphin. He rises erect, aims his musket; smoke 

 rises curling from the pan, and rushes from the iron tube, 

 when soon after the report comes on the ear. Meantime 

 the porpoise has suddenly turned back downwards, — it is 

 dead. The body weighs a hundred pounds or more, but 

 this to the tough-fibred son of the woods is nothing; he 

 reaches it with his muscular arms, and at a single jerk, 

 while with his legs he dexterously steadies the canoe, he 

 throws it lengthwise at his feet. Amidst the highest 

 waves of the Bay of Fundy, these feats are performed by 

 the Indians during the whole of the season when the por- 

 poises resort thither. 



You have often, no doubt, heard of the extraordinary 

 tides of this bay ; so had I, but, like others, I was loath 

 to believe the reports were strictly true. So I went to 

 the pretty town of Windsor in Nova Scotia, to judge for 

 myself. But let us leave the " Fancy " for a while, and 

 imagine ourselves at Windsor. Late one day in August 

 my companions and I were seated on the grasjsy and ele- 

 vated bank of the river, about eighty feet or so above its 

 bed, which was almost dry, and extended for nine miles 

 below like a sandy wilderness. Many vessels lay on 



