io Field and [Forest Rambles. 



Reference will also be made to the fertility of the 

 surfaces annually overflowed by the river. These islands and 

 river valley flats produce luxuriant hay crops, which are 

 stacked in barns placed on more elevated points, but which, 

 however, during the breaking up of the ice in spring, are some- 

 times carried off bodily, and go to form the heterogeneous 

 flotsam and debris observable on such occasions, drifting pell- 

 mell with the ice floes. During one such occurrence a large 

 shed-full of hay was seen passing Fredericton perched on the 

 shattered tops of a huge ice island,* when an adventurous person, 

 springing from berg to berg, managed to attach a rope to the 

 structure, which was eventually brought ashore. It takes two 

 or three days before the chief body of ice has run seaward, 

 whilst masses continue piled up along the banks for a few 

 weeks. By the end of April, the loud scream of the steamer's 

 whistle attracts every one to the landing, and, although not a 

 blade of grass has yet sprung, and not a bud opened out, yet 

 with all the mud and mire consequent on the thawing, we are 

 delighted to welcome back this harbinger of civilization, and 

 to look forward to six months of something like what we had 

 been accustomed to in old England. Looking at the above 

 phenomena as exponents of periods unrecorded, I must say 

 they are of intense value to the geologist, for granting they* 

 may be feeble in force, still, as I will attempt to point out in 

 the conclusion, they have important bearings, which he will, 

 always do well to study when attempting an interpretation of 

 far-back epochs in the earth's history. 



One of the most interesting and suggestive subjects in 

 connection with the natural history of this region, is that 

 referring to the early condition of the aborigines, and the 



* The St John, for reasons stated, cannot, of course, be a rapid river. 

 During the inundations, it has been roughly computed, by Dr. Jack, 

 LL.D., Principal of the University of New Brunswick, to flow at the 

 rate of about five miles an hour ; but subsequently, and when frozen 

 over, the velocity is very much less. 



