Down North and Up Along 
waters spread are level plains of great fertility, 
for the spade of the dike-maker has been at 
work, and the chastened Habitant is now a 
narrow stream, its winding course bordered by 
a narrow green embankment that in the dis- 
tance looks like a line of raised embroidery 
traversing some gigantic pattern. Beyond the 
Habitant lie the reclaimed meadow-lands now 
dotted with haystacks. 
Beyond the meadows is a lovely stretch of 
highlands, the termination of South Mountain. 
This was our first view of the dike-lands, and 
it took some time to realise the magnitude of 
what has been accomplished. In fact, it cannot 
be understood at this point. 
The Habitant is a deep gully of red and 
shining mud as we saw it at low tide. Two 
or three small sail-boats were lying up high 
and dry on its rim. There was but a thread 
of muddy water stealing seaward, along the 
bottom of the gully, soon to be met and 
turned back by the incoming tide of Minas 
Basin, that twice every day fills the doomed 
Habitant, at its departure leaving another 
layer of the red ooze which is slowly but 
surely obliterating the channel of the river. 
38 
