however, of pushing their railway system to connect Europe with America, and to connect themselves with the Canadian and American railways, and thereby with a restless, active, trading population of more than thirty millions, the most travelling people in the world, the Nova Scotians and New Brunswickers have looked chiefly to their slight internal trade, in planning their railways. The consequences are that last year in Nova Scotia the total proceeds from the railway were about £2000 short of the working expenses, and the Government is now making a desperate effort, by sweeping reductions of the salaries of subordinates, to preserve for their railway the decent appearance of paying at least the cost of working it; in New Brunswick one principal railway was not working at all, being at a dead stand, the chief sign of life about it being the mansion of the manager, who had little or nothing to manage, at the terminus, the largest and most stylishlooking house in the village; while the traveller who desires to pass between Halifax and Canada, or the United States, must be subjected to a tedious and dangerous voyage, and the Canadian visiting Europe, during six months of the year, must pass through a foreign country, and embark and disembark at a foreign port-Portland, in

the United States. It appears surprising that lines of communication so obviously wanted as from Halifax to Canada and the United States, have not been accomplished yet. The colonies seem to have exhausted themselves on lines of but secondary importance, fifty years in advance of trade and population, and to be waiting for assistance from England. One cannot avoid wondering that countries so lightly taxed, and with such a thriving population, should look for aid to the British, who are so heavily taxed, and are oppressed by so fearful an amount of pauperism. But the colonies are ever crying for "more."

In the middle of April, 1859, I set out from Halifax by railway for Windsor, on the Bay of Fundy coast, a distance of about fortyfive miles. The railway is a single line, constructed for the Government, and, like many railways in America, exhibits marks of haste and scanty means. The banks are steep, and the curves many and sharp; and, as if sharp bends are not of themselves sufficiently objectionable, one of these is placed where the line crosses a deep lake, or, rather, arm of the sea, so that if by any accident the train runs off the line at the sudden turn it is plunged into deep water, and the passengers are sure to be drowned

if they escape being knocked to pieces. One feels a little nervous at this dangerous pass, and as I had to go through it rather frequently, I may perhaps be excused for having a lively recollection of it.

Another alarming looking railway drive is that between Philadelphia and Baltimore, where the line crosses some inlets of Chesapeake Bay. It is laid upon piles, which scarcely rise above the water, and the train seems to be skimming over the surface without any solid bottom to support it. The engineers may be satisfied, but to the uninitiated it looks very unstable and somewhat alarming. For about twenty miles from Halifax the country is rocky and barren, everywhere the ground is covered with huge stones, masses of granite, or of the metamorphic sandstone, which extends along the whole Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia. Although it was the middle of April the lakes were still frozen, there were yet no symptoms of reviving vegetation, and what with the stones thickly strewed over the soil, the stumps of trees in some places, in others tall bare trunks, remains of forest conflagrations, and the chilly aspect of the frozen lakes, I have seldom witnessed such a scene of desolation. With frosts and heavy snows from November to March, and a cold

ungenial spring in April and May, one cannot but sympathize with the brave and hardy pioneers of civilization settled in this wilderness. Towards the Bay of Fundy coast there is much alluvial deposit and disintegrated trap; the soil is rich and fertile, and this side of the peninsula is usually described as the garden of Nova Scotia. The north side, also, adjoining the Gulf of St. Lawrence, is more productive and enriched by mines of good coal near Pictou. In the north-east of the province, at Sydney, in Cape Breton Isle, there is a very fine coal, which, as well as that from Pictou, is largely exported to Halifax and other places in British America, and to the United States.

Windsor is a small village, situated on the estuary of the Avon; a narrow channel, up which we may see the famous Bay of Fundy tide rushing with a furious rapidity that appears very striking to one accustomed to the gentle rise of the tide on most of the British coasts, and in remarkable contrast with the tide at Halifax, on the opposite side of the peninsula, which rises and falls only from five to seven feet, its movements being almost imperceptible. At Windsor, the rise of the tide is about forty feet; but it reaches upwards of sixty feet in some places on the Bay of Fundy. There are large quarries

of gypsum, or plaster, as it is usually called, at Windsor; from which about 57,000 tons, valued at £11,200 are exported yearly to the United States, partly for manure, partly for stucco. The other exports from this little village are potatoes, some hides, cattle and sheep, and considerable quantities of the fish called shad, and halibut, also sent chiefly to the United States.

In America we are often agreeably surprised at meeting familiar sounds, reminding us of home, in the names of rivers, counties, towns, etc., as Windsor, the Avon, the Trent, the Mersey, the Thames, the Clyde-tokens of the early settlers' cherished recollections of their native land. But the traveller is more pleased still when he meets the names given to the rivers, hills, etc., by the aborigines, which are often retained; those strange combinations of sounds that bespeak, as surely as face or form, another race that possessed the land before the intruding Caucasian. In Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, the land of the Mic-mac and Millicete Indians, we find many picturesque native names still preserved, with sh of very frequent occurrence, as Mush-a-mush, Shubenacadie, Missaguash, Musquodoboit, Musquash, Digdeguash, Magagaudewek, Washademoak, Oro