240 
THE MAINE WOODS. 
that the usual way was, when you came near a house, to 
go to it, and tell the inhabitants what you had seen or 
heard, and then they tell you what they had seen ; but 
we laughed, and said that we had had enough of houses 
for the present, and had come here partly to avoid them. 
In the mean while, the wind, increasing, blew down the 
Indian’s birch and created such a sea that we found our¬ 
selves prisoners on the island, the nearest shore, which 
was the western, being perhaps a mile distant, and we 
took the canoe out to prevent its drifting away. We did 
not know but we should be compelled to spend the rest of 
the day and the night there. At any rate, the Indian went 
to sleep again in the shade of his birch, my companion 
busied himself drying his plants, and I rambled along the 
shore westward, which was quite stony, and obstructed 
with fallen bleached or drifted trees for four or five rods 
in w r idth. I found growing on this broad rocky and 
gravelly shore the Salix rostrata , discolor, and lucida , 
Ranunculus recurvatus , Potentilla Norvegica , Scutellaria 
lateriflora , Eupatorium purpureum , Aster Tradescanti , 
Mentha Canadensis , Epilobium angustifolium , abundant. 
Lycopus minatus , Solidago lanceolata , Spircea solid - 
folia , Antennaria margaraticea , Prunella , Rumex aceto- 
sella , Raspberries, Wool-grass, Onoclea , &c. The nearest 
trees were Betula papyracea and excelsa , and Populus 
tremuloides . I give these names because it w T as my 
farthest northern point* 
Our Indian said that he was a doctor, and could tell 
me some medicinal use for every plant I could show him. 
I immediately tried him. He said that the inner bark 
of the aspen (. Populus tremuloides') was good for sore 
eyes; and so with various other plants, proving himself 
as good as his word. According to his account, he had 
