De Tocqueville's Journey into the Desert   { Return to De Tocqueville Assignments }  

It is not like France here,' said our host when be bad quietly listened to all our questions and snuffed the candle; 'With you labour is cheap and land is dear; here buying the land is nothing and men's labour is beyond price. I say that in order to make you understand that to settle in America, as in Europe, one needs some capital, although one uses it differently. For my part, I should not advise anyone to come and seek his fortune in our wilds, without t least having at his disposal a sum of one hundred and fifty to two hundred dollars. An acre in Michigan never costs more than ten shillings when the land is still uncultivated. That is about the price of a day's labour. So a la- can earn enough in a day to buy an acre. But the purchase made, the difficulty begins. This is bow one generally sets about dealing with it. The pioneer comes to the place be has just bought with a few animals, a salted pig, boa barrels of flour, and some tea. If there is a cabin near, be goes there and is given temporary hospitality. If there is none, he puts up a tent in the middle (A the wood that is to be his filed. His first job is to cut down the nearest trees to build quickly a rough dwelling of the type you have already seen. With us, feeding the animals scarcely costs anything. The emigrant puts an iron bell on them and lets them run in the forest. It is very unusual for the animals left like that to themselves to leave the neighbour- of their home. The greatest expense is the clearing. If the pioneer comes into the wilds with a family able to help in the first work, his task is fairly easy. But that is generally not so. Usually the emigrant is young, and if he already has children, they are in infancy. Then he must either see to all the first needs of his family himself or hire the services of his neighbours. It Noll cost four to Eve dot lars to clear one acre. When die land is ready, the new owner puts down an acre under potatoes, and the rest under wheat and corn. Corn is providential in me wilds; it grows in the water of our marshes and pushes up under the foliage of the forests better than in the heat of the sun. It is corn that saves the emigrant's family from inevitable destruction if poverty, sickness or carelessness prevent him from making an adequate clearing in the first year. Nothing is harder to survive man me first years after the working of clearing. Later comes comfort and then wealth.,

That is what our host said, and we listened to these simple deals with almost as much interest as if we ourselves had wished to profit from them. When he had stopped talking, we asked: 'Generally the ground in all the forest left to itself is marshy and unhealthy; does the emigrant exposed to all me wretchedness of solitude, not also have reason to fear for his life?' 'Every clearing is a dangerous undertaking,' replied the American, 'and it hardly ever happens that the emigrant and his family escape from forest fever in the first year. Often when one is travelling in the autumn, one finds all the people in a cabin from the emigrant to his youngest son down with fever!'--'And what happens to these unfortunates when Providence strikes them like that?'--'They resign themselves and wait for a better fu- can they hope for any help from their fel- lows?'--'Hardly any.'--'But can they at least get the help of medicine?'--'The nearest doctor often lives 60 miles away. They do as do the Indians. They (he or get well as God wills.' We went on: 'Does the voice of religion sometimes reach them?'--'Very seldom; we have not yet been able to organise any provision for public worship in our forests. Almost every summer, it is true, some Methodist clergymen come and do a tour of the new settlements. The news of their coming spreads incredibly quickly from cabin to cabin; it is the day's great news. At the time fixed the emigrant, his wife and their children make their way through the almost untrodden paths of the forest to the agreed rendezvous. People come from 50 miles around. It is in no church that the faithful meet, but in the open air under the trees. A pulpit made of ill-shaped trunks and great trees cut down to serve as seats are all the orna- of this rustic church. The pioneers and their families camp in the surrounding woods; there for three days and three nights the crowd devotes itself to religious observances with but rare intervals. One needs to see how ardently they pray and with what attention they listen to the solemn vow of me priest. It is in the wilds that men are seen to hunger after last question. It is generally believed in Europe that the wilds of America are being peopled with the help of emigration from Europe. How then does it happen that since we have been in me forest we have not met a single European?' A smile of condescension and satisfied pride spread over our host's face as he heard this question. 'It is only Americans,' he answered emphatically, 'who could have the courage to submit to such trials and who know how to purchase comfort at such a price. The emigrant from Europe stops at the great cities of the coast or in their neighbourbood. There he becomes a craftsman, a farm labourer or a valet. He leads an easier life than in Europe and feels satisfied to leave the same heritage to his children. The American, on the other hand, gets bold of some land and seeks by that means to carve himself a great future.' When he had said those last words our host stopped. He blew out a huge column of smoke from his mouth and seemed ready to hear what we had to tell him about our plans. First we thanked him for his valuable information and wise advice, from which we said that we would certainly profit one day, and we added: 'Before settling in your district, my dear host, we intend to Ask Saginaw and want to consult you about that.' At the mention of Saginaw there was a strange and sudden change in the American's expression; it would seem that we were dragging him off violently from the real world into the realms of imagina- lit eyes grew wide and his mouth opened and every feature indicated the greatest astonishment: 'You want to go to Saginaw,' he cried out, 'to Saginaw Bay. Two rational men, two well educated foreigners want to go to Saginaw Bay? The story is hardly credible.'--'And why not, then?' we replied. 'But do you really understand,' our host replied, 'what you are undertaking? Do you know that Saginaw is the last inhabited point until you come to the Pacific Ocean? Do you know that from here to Saginaw you find hardly anything but wilds and untrod solitude- Have you thought that the woods are full of Indians and mosquitoes? That anyhow you will have to sleep at least one night in the damp forest shade? Have you thought about fever? Will you be able to manage for yourselves in the wilds and recognise your path in the labyrinth of our forests?' After that tirade he paused to judge be impression he had made. We answered: "All that may he true. But we are leaving tomorrow morning for Saginaw Bay.' Our host reflected a moment, shook his head, and said in slow, decided tones: 'Only some great advantage could lead two foreigners into such. an undertaking; no doubt you have calculated, very mistakenly, that it is best to settle ha be most distant place far from any competition.' We did not answer at all. He went on: 'Perhaps also the Canadian fur company has asked you to establish contacts with the Indian tribes on their frontier?' Silence again. Our host had come to the end of his guesses and kept silent, but continued in deep meditation on me strangeness of our plan. 'Have you, then, never been at Saginaw?' we asked. 'I,' he answered, 'for my sins I have been there five or six times, but I had something to gain by doing it, and I cannot discover that you have anything to gain.'--'But do not forget, my worthy host, that we are not asking you whether we ought to go to Saginaw, but only how we can most easily do so.' Brought back like that to the question, our American regained all his sang-froid and clarity of vision. In few words and with admirable practical good sense he explained how we should set about crossing the wilds, went into the smallest details and anticipated even unlikely accidents. When he had come to an end of his recommendations, he again paused to see if we would finally disclose the mystery of our journey, and seeing that neither of us had any more to say, he took the candle up again, showed us to a room, and when we bad very democratically shaken bands, he went back to finish the evening in be public room. We got up at daybreak and got ready to go. Our host too was soon up. The night had not helped him to discover what made us behave in a way so extraordinary in his eyes. However, as we seemed completely decided to act against his advice, he did not like to return to the charge, but kept continually fussing around us. From time to time he would mutter under his breath: 'I find it hard to understand what could induce two foreigners to go to Saginaw.' He repeated that phrase several times, until at last I said as I put my foot into the stirrup: 'There are a great many reasons that take us there, my dear host.' He stopped short on hearing those words, and looking me in the face for the first time, seemed to get ready to hear be revelation of a great mystery. But 1, quietly mounting my horse, ended the matter with no more than a gesture of friendship and went off at a fast trot. When I turned my head fifty paces on, I saw him planted like a stack of hay in front of his door. A little afterwards he went into his house shaking his head. I suppose he was still saying: 'I can hardly understand what two foreigners are going to do at Saginaw.' We had been advised to call on a Mr. Williams, who, since he had long been trading with the Chippewa Indians and had a son settled at Saginaw, could give us useful information. When we had already gone several miles into the forest and were beginning to be afraid that we might have missed our man's house, we met an old man busy working in a small garden. We went up to him. It was Mr. Williams himself. He received us with great kindness and gave us a letter for his son. We asked him if we had anything to fear from the Indian tribes whose territory we were going to cross. Mr. Williams rejected that suggestion with something like indignation: 'No! no!' he said, 'you can go forward without fear. For my part, I should sleep more soundly surrounded by Indians than by whites.' I note this as the first favourable view of the In- that I have heard since coming to America. In thickly populated parts of the country men only speak of them with a mixture of fear and scorn, and I think that there they do in fact give cause for these two feelings. One can see above what I thought myself when I met the fist of them at IRWIN As you go on in this diary and fol- me going among the European population on the frontiers and among the Indian tribes themselves, you will get both a more worthy and a fairer conception of the first inhabitants of America When we had left Mr. Williams we went on our way through the forests. From time to time a little lake (the district is full of them) appeared like a silver sheet beneath the leaves of the forest. It is difficult to conceive of the charm pervading these pretty places where man has not yet come to live and where profound, uninterrupted silence reigns. I have been through terrifying solitudes in the Alps, where nature rejects the work of man, and where even in its very horror die sheer grandeur of the scene has something that transports one's soul with excitement. Here the solitude is as profound but does not bring the same sensations to birth. All that one feels in passing through these flowery wildernesses where everything, as in Milton's Paradise, is ready to receive man is a quiet admiration, a gentle melancholy sense, and a vague distaste for civilised life, a sort of primitive instinct that makes one think with sadness that soon this delightful solitude will have changed its looks. In fact, already the white race is advancing across the forest that surrounds it, and in but few years the European will have cut the trees that are now reflected in the limpid waters of the lake and forced the animals that live on its banks to retreat to new wildernesses. Always keeping on our way, we came to a district of a different aspect. The ground was no longer level, lout cut by hills and valleys. Some of these hills have the wildest possible look. It was in one of these picturesque spots, when we bad suddenly turned round to admire the imposing sight behind us, that we saw to our great surprise close to our horses' cruppers an Indian who seemed to be following on our tracks. He was a man of about thirty, large and wonderfully well proportioned as they almost all are. His shining black hair fell along his shoulders except for two tresses fixed on top of his head. His face was striped with black and red. He was dressed in a sort of very short blue blouse. He wore red mittas--they are a sort of trousers that only come to the thighs-and his feet Were clad in moccasins. A knife hung at his side. In his right hand he held a long carbine, and in his left two birds that be had just killed. The first sight of this Indian made no agreeable impression on us. The place was ill-chosen to resist an attack: on our right a pine forest rose to immense heights, and on our left a deep ravine led down to a stream that flowed over rocks hidden by the dense foliage, towards which we were descending like blind men! It was the matter of a moment to put our hands on our rifles, turn round and face the Indian across the road. He stopped too. We stayed half a minute in silence. His face had all the characteristic traits that distinguish the Indian race from all others. In his black eyes shone that savage fire which still lights up the eyes of half-castes and is not lost until the second or third generation of white blood. His nose was arched in the middle a& slightly blunt at the tip, his cheekbones were very high, and his well defined mouth exposed two rows of shining white teeth which proved well enough that the savage, cleaner than his American neighbour, did not spend his day chewing tobacco leaves. I have said that when we turned and put our rifles at the ready, the Indian bad halted. As we quickly looked him over, he remained completely impassive, with steady, unmoved gaze. When he saw that we had no hostile feeling on our side, be began to smile; probably he saw that he had frightened us. That was the first time that I had seen how completely gaiety changes the physiognomy of these savage men. I have later noticed the same a hundred times. An Indian in serious mood and an Indian smiling are two entirely different beings. There is something of savage majesty in the immobility of the former which, against one's will, inspires fear. When the same man breaks into a smile, his whole face assumes an expression of naiveté and goodwill that gives it real charm. When we saw our man had cheered up, we spoke to him in English lie let us talk on undisturbed, and then made a sign that he did not understand a word. We offered him a little brandy, which he accepted at once and without thanks. Still talking in sign language we asked for his birds, which he gave in exchange for a small piece of money. Having made his acquaintance like that, we gave him a wave and went at at a fast trot. After a quarter of an hour's rapid going, when I turned again, I was amazed to see the Indian. He moved with the agility of a wild animal, without uttering a single word or seeming to quicken his pace. We stopped, he stopped. We went on again, he went on again. We broke into a full gallop. Our horses brought up in the wilderness went over all obstacles. The Indian broke into a double; I saw him sometimes to the right, sometimes to the left of my horse, leaping over the bushes and landing again noiselessly. One would say it was one of those wolves of Northern Europe who follow riders in the hope that they will fall from their horses and be the more easily devoured. The sight of this unchanging figure, who, sometimes lost in the darkness of the forest, sometimes appearing in broad daylight, seemed to hover at our side, ended by getting on our nerves. As we could not think what could induce this man to follow us at such a rate--and perhaps he had been doing so for a very long time before we first noticed him-it came into our heads that he might be leading us into an ambush. While worrying about that idea, we saw in the mood in front of us the muzzle of another carbine. Soon we came up to the man who carried it. At first we took him for an Indian. He was dressed in a sort of short frockcoat, which, fastened round his loins, outlined an upright, well made body; Its neck was bare and there were moccasins on his feet. When we got near and he raised his head, we saw at once that he was a European, and we stopped. He came up to us, shook hands warmly, and en- into conversation: 'Do you live in the wilderness?'-- there is my house,' he pointed through the leaves to a hut much more wretched than ordinary log-houses. 'Alone?'-'Alone.'--~And what, then, are you doing here?''I go through the forest and kill the game I meet to right and left of my path, but one does not get good shots now.' -'And you like this sort of life?'--'More than any other.''But are you not afraid of the Indians?'--'Afraid of the In- I would rather live among them than in the society of the whites. No! No! I am not afraid of the Indians. They are worth more than we, provided we have not brutalised them with our strong drinks, the poor creatures!' We then pointed out to our new acquaintance the man who was following us so persistently and who then had Hopped a few paces from us and stood as still as a milestone. 'He is a Chippewa,' said be, 'or as the French call them a Sauteur I bet he is coming back from Canada where he has received the yearly presents from the English. His family should not be far from here.' This said, the Ameri- made a sign to the Indian to come up and began to talk very fluently to him in Its language. It was strange 9) see what pleasure these two men, so different in birth and manners, took in exchanging ideas with one another. Clearly they were discussing the respective merits of their weapons. The white, having looked at the savage! rifle very carefully: 'There is a fine carbine,' said he. 'No doubt the English have given it to him to use against us, and be will not fail to do so as soon as there is a war. That is bow the Indians draw an their heads all The ills that weigh them down. But they know no better, the poor fellows.'--'Are the Indians skilled in using these long, heavy rifles?'There are no shots like the Indians,' our new friend answered warmly in tones of the greatest admiration. 'Look at the little birds be sold to you, sir. They are pierced by a shoe buIlet, and I am very sure that be only fired two shots to get them. Ohl' he added, 'there is nothing happier than an Indian in the country from which we have not yet driven the game. But the big animals sense our coming more than three hundred miles off, and as they retreat, they make as it were, a desert in front of us, in which the poor Indians cannot live unless they cultivate the ground.' As we started on our way again: When you pass this way again,' our new friend called out, 'knock on my door. It A a pleasure to see white faces in these parts.' I have recorded this conversation, which in itself has nothing remarkable in it, to introduce the reader to a type of man whom we met very frequently thereafter on the verge of the inhabited land. They are Europeans who, despite the habits of their youth, have ended up by finding inexpressible charm in the freedom of the wilderness. Taste and passion draw them to the solitudes of America, while their religion, principles and ideas attach them to Europe, so that they combine love of the savage life with the pride of civilisation and prefer the Indians to their compatriots, without, however, looking on them as their equals. So we went on our way again, and still making the same rapid progress, in half an hour we reached a pioneer's house. An Indian family had established their temporary dwelling in front of this cabin. An old woman, two young girls, and several children were crouched round a fire by whose heat the remains of a whole roebuck were cooking. On the grass a few paces away a stark naked Indian was basking in the sun, while a small child rolled in the dust near him. It was that that brought our silent companion to a halt; he left us without saying good-bye, and went to sit sedately down by his compatriots. What can have induced that man to follow our horses' tracks like that for two leagues? That is something we never could guess. After we had lunched in that place, we mounted our horses and went on our way through high but not dense forest trees. The copse had been burnt sometime before, as one could see by the charred remains of some trees lying on the ground. The soil is now covered with ferns, which stretched away as far as one could see under the foliage of the forest. A few leagues further on my horse cast a shoe, which caused us keen anxiety. Luckily, near there we found a planter who succeeded in shoeing it again. Had it not been for that meeting, I doubt if we could have gone any farther, as we were nearing the end of the clearings. This same man who thus enabled us to go on our way advised us to press our pace, as the sun was beginning to sink and there were two good leagues between us and Flint River, where we intended to pass the night. Soon, in fact, we began to be enveloped in deep darkness. We had to keep going. The night was clear, but freezing. So deep a silence, so complete a calm prevailed in these forests that one might say that all the forces of nature were, as it were, paralysed. One could only bear the unwelcome buzz of mosquitoes and the noise of our horses' hoofs. From time to time one could see an Indian fire with an austere, unmoving profile outlined against the smoke. At the end of an hour we came to a place where the road forked. Two paths opened there. Which to choose? The choice was crucial. One of them led to a stream the depth of which we did not know, the other to a glade; Ile moon, which was then coming up, showed us a valley full of debris. Farther on we saw two houses. It was so important not to lose our way in such a place at such an hour that we decided to make inquiries before going any farther. My companion stayed to look after the horses, and 1, throwing my rifle over my shoulder, went down the valley. Soon I realised that I was coming into quite a recent clearing; immense trees with their branches still on them covered the ground. Jumping from one to another, I succeeded in getting close to the houses fairly quickly, but the same stream we had seen before came between me and them. Luckily its course was blocked at this spot by huge oaks, felled no doubt by the pioneer's axe. I managed to slide along these trees and reach the other bank at last. I moved cautiously up to the two houses, being afraid that they might be Indian wigwams. They were still not yet finished; I found the doors open, and no one answered my voice. I came back to the banks of the stream and could not forbear stopping a few minutes in admiration of the sublime horror of the scene. This valley was shaped like an immense arena, and like it black drapery; the foliage of the woods surrounded it on all sides, while in the middle the moonlight breaking through formed the shadows into a thousand fantastic shapes dancing in silence over the brush of the forest. No other sound whatsoever, no breath of life, broke the silence of this solitude. At length I thought about my companion and called him at the top of my voice to tell him the result of my search and get him to cross the stream and come and join me. My voice long re-echoed in the surrounding soli- But I got no answer. I shouted again and listened again. The same silence of the dead reigned in the forest. I became anxious and ran along the stream to find the way across it lower down. When I got there I beard the horses' hoofs in the distance and soon after Beaumont himself appeared. Surprised at my long absence, be had decided to come down to the stream; he had already got into the shallows when I called him. My voice could not reach him then. He told me that he too had made every effort to make himself heard, and, like me, had got frightened at not receiving any answer. Without the ford that served as a meeting place, perhaps we should have spent a great part of the night looking for one another. We set out once more on our way, promising each other Brady that we would not separate again, and three-quarters of an hour on from there at last we saw a clearing, two or three cabins, and what gave us greatest pleasure, a light. The stream, that ran like a violet thread along the bottom of the valley, sufficed to prove that we had arrived at Flint River. Soon the barking of dogs echoed through the wood, and we found ourselves opposite a log-house and only separated from it by a fence. Just as we were getting ready to get over it, the moon revealed a great black bear on the other side, which, standing upright on its haunches and dragging its chain, made as clear as it could its intention of giving us a fraternal welcome. 'What a devil of a country is this,' I said, 'where one has bears for watch dogs.'--'We must call out,' said my companion. 'If we try to pass the fence, we shall have difficulty in making the porter listen to reason.' So we shouted our beads off so successfully that at last a man appeared at the window. Having looked at us in the moonlight, he said, 'Come in, gentlemen. Trinc, go to bed. To your kennel, I tell you. Those are not robbers.' The bear went waddling back, and we went in. We were half dead with fatigue. We asked our host if we could have some oats. 'Certainly,' he answered; and at once started mowing the nearest field with complete American calm, and just as if he were doing it in the very middle of the day. In the meanwhile we dismounted and, for want of stables, tied our horses to the fence over which we had just passed. Having thus taken thought for the companions of our journey, we thought about our own sleeping arrangements. There was only one bed in the house. Beaumont having won the toss for it, I wrapped myself in my cloak, and lying down on the floor, fell into the deep sleep. befitting a man who has done fifteen leagues on horseback. On the next day, July 25, our first care was to ask for a guide. Fifteen leagues of wilderness came between Flint Rock and Saginaw, and the road leading there is a narrow path that the eye can hardly see. Our host approved our plan and soon brought along two Indians in whom, be assured us, we could place entire trust. One was a child thirteen or fourteen years old. The other a young man of eighteen. The latter's body, though it had not yet acquired the full vigour of ripe manhood, nonetheless gave an imof agility combined with strength. He was of medium height, his body was upright and slender, his limbs supple and well proportioned. Long tresses fell from his bare head. Besides, he had been at pains to paint his face as symmetrically as possible with black and red lines. A ring through his nose, a necklace, and ear-rings completed his attire. His warlike gear was equally remarkable. At one side a battle axe, one of the celebrated tomahawks; at the other a long, sharp knife with which the savages cut off the scalps of the defeated. Round his neck was hung a bull's born that served him as powder-flask and he held a rifle in his right hand. As is usual with most Indians, his gaze was fierce and his smile kind. By his side, to complete the picture, went a dog with ears pricked up and a long muzzle, more like a fox than any other sort of animal, and whose fierce appearance was in perfect harmony with the countenance of his leader. When we had looked at our new companion with an attention which he did not for a moment seem to notice, we asked him how much he wanted to be paid for the service he was going to do for us. The Indian answered a few words in his language, and the American quickly said that what the savage asked could be valued at two dollars. 'As these poor Indians,' our host kindly added, 'do not know the value of money, you, give me the dollars and I will gladly see to getting him the equivalent.' I was curious to see what the good man considered the equivalent of two dollars and quietly followed him to the place where the deal was done. I saw him give our guide a pair of moccasins and a pocket handkerchief, objects whose total value certainly did not amount to half that sum. The Indian went back thoroughly satisfied, and I escaped noiselessly, saying to myself like La Fontaine: 'Ah! if lions knew how to paint!' Besides, it is not only the Indians whom the pioneers make thew dupes. We ourselves were daily victims of their extreme greediness for gain. It is very true that they do not rob at all. They are too enlightened to do anything so imprudent, but otherwise 1 have never seen a hotel-keeper in a great city overcharge more impudently than these dwellers in the wilderness among whom I expected to find the primitive honesty and simplicity of a patriarchal way of lif e. Everything was ready; we mounted, and passing by a ford across the stream that forms the ultimate boundary between civilisation and the wilderness, we went in earnest into solitude. Our two guides walked, or rather jumped, like wild cats over all me obstacles in me way. If we came across a tree blown over, a stream or a marsh, they pointed a finger to show the best path, went across and never turned to see how we got through the difficult place; accustomed to rely on himself, the Indian Ends it hard to conceive that anyone needs help. If needs be, he knows how to do you a service, but no one has yet taught him to add to is value by obligingness and taking trouble. At other times we would have protested on our side at this way of behaving, but it was impossible for us to make our companions understand a single word. And besides, we felt ourselves completely in their power. There, in fact, the order was reversed; plunged into deep darkness, reduced to his own resources, the civilised man walked like the blind, incapable not only of being his own guide in the labyrinth that surrounded him, but even of finding the means to sustain life. It is in the heart of the same difficulties that the savage triumphs; for him the forest obscured nothing; be felt at home there; be walked with his head high, guided by an instinct more sure than the navigator's compass. In the tops of the high- trees, under the densest foliage, his eye could see the prey dose to which the European had passed and repassed a hundred times in vain. From time to time our Indians halted; they put their fingers to their lips to show that we must keep silence and signalled to us to get off our horses. Led by them, we came to a place where one could see the game. It was a strange sight to see the scornful smile with which they took us by the hand like children and led us at last close to the object that they bad seen a long time ago. Now, as we advanced farther the last signs of man disappeared. Soon there was nothing even to indicate the presence of savages, and we had before us the spectacle which we bad been so long pursuing, the depths of a virgin forest. Through undergrowth that was not thick and across which one could see objects at a considerable distance, the high forest rose straightway, composed entirely of pines and oaks. Forced to grow in a narrowly limited area and almost entirely bidden from the light of the sun, each tree grows quickly upwards, looking for air and light. Straight as a ship's mast, it soon rises above everything surrounding A. It is then, when it gets into this higher region, that it quietly spreads its branches and envelopes itself in their shade. Others soon follow it in this high sphere, and they all, interlacing their branches, form, as it were, a huge dais above the ground that bears them. Below this damp and unmoving vault the look of things changes and the scene takes on a new character. Majestic order reigns above your bead. But near the ground there is a general picture of confusion and chaos. Trunks that can no longer support the weight of their branches are split half-way up and left with pointed and torn tops. Others, long shaken by the wind, have been thrown all complete on the ground; torn out of the soil, their roots form so many natural ramparts behind which several men could easily take cover. Immense trees, held up by the surrounding branches, stay suspended in the air and fall to dust without touching the ground. With us there is no district so thinly populated and no forest so completely left to itself that the trees, when they have quietly come to an end of their days, fall at last from decay. It is man who strikes them down in the vigour of their maturity and rids the forest of their debris. In the solitudes of America nature in all her strength is the only instrument of ruin and also the only creative force. As in forests subject to man! control, death strikes continually here; but no one is concerned to clear the debris away. Every day adds to the number; they fall and pile up one on top of the other; time cannot reduce them quickly enough to dust and make fresh places ready. There many generations of the dead he side by side. Some that have come to the last stage of dissolution show as no more man a train of red dust along the grass. Others, already half consumed by time, still yet preserve their shape. Then there are those that, fallen yesterday, still stretch their long branches on the ground and hold the traveller up by an obstacle be bad not expected. In the midst of all this debris the work of new creation goes ceaselessly forward. Offshoots, creepers, and plants of every sort press across every obstacle to the light. They ramp along the trunks of fallen trees, they push their way into the rotten wood, and they lift and break the bark still covering them. Life and death meet here face to face, as if they wished to mingle and confuse their labours. We have often admired one of those calm and serene evenings on the ocean when the sails flap quietly by the mast, leaving the sailor doubtful whence the breeze will. rise. This repose of all nature is no less impressive in the solitudes of the New World than on the immensity of the sea. At midday, when the sun dons its beams on Ile for- one omen hears in its depths something like a long sigh, a plaintive cry lingering in the distance. it is the last stir of the dying wind. Then everything around you falls back into a silence so deep, a stillness so complete, that the soul is invaded by a kind of religious terror. The traveller halts and looks round; pressed one against the other and with their branches interlaced, the forest trees seem to form but one whole, an immense and indestructible edifice under whose vaults eternal darkness reigns. On whatever side he looks, he sees nothing but a field of violence and destruction. Broken trees and torn trunkseverything testifies that the elements are here perpetually at war. But the struggle is interrupted. One would say that at the behest of a supernatural power movement is suddenly halted. Half broken branches seem,, still held by secret ties to me trunks that no longer support them; up- trees have not yet had time to reach the ground, and stay suspended in the air. He listens and holds his breath in fear to better catch the least echo of life; no sound, no murmur, reaches him. More than once in Europe we have found ourselves lost deep in the woods, but always some sound of life came to reach our ears. Perhaps the distant tinkle of the nearest village bell, a traveller's footstep, me woodcutter! axe, a gunshot, the barking of a dog, or just that confused sound mat pervades a civilised country. Here not only is man lacking, but no sound can be heard from the animals either. The smallest of them have left these parts to come close to human habitations, and the largest have gone to get eon farther away. Those that remain stay hidden from the sun's rays. So all is still in the woods, all is silent under their leaves. One would say that for a moment the Creator had turned his face away and all the forces of nature are paralysed. But that is not the only occasion on which we noticed the strange analogy between the sight of the ocean and that of a wild forest. In both the one and the other you are assailed by a sense of immensity. The continuity and monotony of like scenes both astonish and overwhelm the imagination. Again in the solitudes of the New World we felt, perhaps more strongly and more poignantly, that sense of isolation and of abandonment that had weighed on us so heavily in the middle of the Atlantic. On the sea at least the traveller looks towards the vast horizon on which his eyes and hopes are set. But in this ocean of leaves, who could point out the way? Whither turn one's looks? In vain to climb to the top of very high trees, for others still higher surround you. It is useless to climb the bills, for everywhere the forest seems to walk in front of you, and this same forest stretches before your feet right up to the Arctic Pole and the Pacific Ocean. You can travel on for thousands of leagues under its shade, and you go forward the whole time without appearing to change place.