393 General Notes. [May, 



one side there was probably no house to be found. In one planta- 

 tion through which we passed there were but two families living. 

 There were but few houses along the road, yet one might almost 

 believe that a village would spring up some time in this untrodden 

 wilderness, whose tangled undergrowth makes it almost impene- 

 trable. The forests often look black with the Abies nigra (" Black 

 growth ") and the dead trees are oftentimes covered with long 

 green moss. We passed several cabins which are occupied by 

 the lumbermen during the winter months. Ashland is a small, 

 " finished " village, situated on the Aroostook river. The people 

 whom we met there are hospitable and refined. I added Arabis 

 perfoliata, A' to my list; also learned 



through Mrs. G. D. thai rows on their farm, but 



I was too late to procure it. This immediate region is said to be 

 rich in minerals. After another week profitably spent, we took 

 passage for Fort Kent, 48 miles due north, by a corduroy road. 

 The first day we passed at Portage Lake, a famous resort of fish- 

 ermen. We gathered some Potamogetons of great size, but they 

 were not in flower, and the day was productive of pleasure alone. 

 For miles the forests were burned and still smouldering, the work 

 of careless gunners, it is supposed. A dismal swamp, indeed ! 

 The two fire- weeds, Eree hthitt ;> hierarifolia and Epilobium angusti- 

 folinm, are found here as elsewhere on burnt ground, although I 

 have been told that the first named had never been found in the 

 county ; but it is quite abundant on the line of the railroad. The 

 country is decidedly mountainous ; the one, two and three mile 

 hills would have been decidedly monotonous but for the lovely 

 foliage and the frolicking brooks. In many places the road was 

 " repaired," and the ditches at the sides were frightful for hyper- 

 sensitive nerves to contemplate. Eagle lake was the great fea- 

 ture of the ride, it lays along the route for a distance of 5 % 

 miles. No part of the journey furnished excitement until the 

 driver took his pistol out to load it, saying that he should have 

 done so before starting ; that he had been fired upon twice in two 

 years, and might need to use it before reaching Fort Kent. He 

 also stated that a peddler who had left this place by that road was 

 never heard from and that his bones were probably bleaching in 

 the woods somewhere. Although we were on the qui vive all the 

 afternoon, we only saw the enemy, for whom he had prepared, 

 quietly standing in their doorways looking as demure as possible. 

 At 9.30 Saturday night we found ourselves in Major D.'s hospit- 

 able home, 200 miles due north of Bangor. Fort Kent may be 

 called properly a French town. It is situated on the Fish river 

 (its original name), which empties into the St. John river at this 

 place. Nature has done much for this section of the State. The 

 scenery is fine, the air is cool, and the people seem as happy twenty- 

 two miles removed from a railroad (Edmundston, on the Canada 

 side, being the nearest point), telegraph, doctor or drug store as 



