Succession after fire.

Fireweed.

P/oughing among the stumps.

lnexp erience with the axe.

running into the forest among the growing wood which it will often do at this time of year, and kill the timber for many miles; many people will be apt to suppose that this may be an advantage and aid in clearing the country, but that is by no means the case, as in general it only scorches the trees or burns them so little that by far the greatest part of them is left standing, and become so hard as to make it more difficult and laborious to cut them down than if they were still growing; and if the land is good and not brought into cultivation soon, a growth of young timber will spring up in a few years among the dead trees that will soon render such land more difficult to clear, than that whereon the original growth is still intire: the first year after fire has run over a piece of land and killed the timber, if it is not cultivated, a very large annual weed called fire weed, springs up spontaneously; this plant has a large succulent stalk, and long jagged leaves, it grows the height of four, five, and six feet according to the strength of the soil, it bears a white stinking flower and disappears after the second year which is very lucky, as it is a great exhauster and injures land much. Besides increasing the difficulties of clearing and bringing the land into cultivation, these fires often destroy a great deal of valuable timber which, if left growing would soon come into demand for exportation, and the want of which even for domestic purposes may become a serious loss, for though the trees will stand many years after they are killed, all except the pines soon become unfit for use, upon the whole I am persuaded that no man who understands the proper management of wood lands will ever wish to see the timber on them killed by fire until he has a prospect, of being able to bring them into cultivation.

After the operation of burning a piece of new land is completed, expert cultivators manage to plough among the stumps, this is done with a short one-handled plough, with the share and coulter strongly locked together, and drawn by a pair of stout oxen; they dont pretend to make a straight furrow, the object is to stir as much of the surface as possible, they are often stopped by the roots, some of which the plough will break, others they are obliged to cut with an axe, which must always be on hand on these occasions; in some lands this method of ploughing at first is impracticable, from the roots of the trees running so much along the surface: such land must be stirred with hoes, first sowing the seed on the burnt surface; in other places after what is called a good burn, the surface will sometimes become so soft and mellow, that the seed may be covered by means of triangular harrows with wooden tines

People unacquainted with clearing woodlands, are apt to be frightened with the apparent difficulty, and an idea has been propagated, that Europeans who are mostly unused to the axe in their native country, seldom make good axe—men, and no doubt some continue long aukward, and so they would at any other employment to which they were not early accustomed; but so far from that being generally the case, that I have seen many young men from Scotland on this Island, who would lay wagers before the end of the first winter with the most expert axe-men in their neighbourhood, and before they were two years on the Island, would earn as much money at clearing woodland, as any American in the country. It is this terror of encountering with the supposed difficulties of clearing woodland that induces so many people from Great Britain and Ireland, to prefer the American states to our own colonies in America, expecting from the more advanced state of improvement and settlement in the former that they will be able to get into lands already cleared and cultivated; but for such lands they will pay very high, and will often find them worn out, and not worth occupying; so perfectly is this understood among them, that it is generally accounted more profitable for a young farmer settling in life to go upon new, than to remain upon old cultivated lands, and this change they are frequently enabled to make to great advantage, by the avidity of Europeans for old cultivated in preference to forest lands; [pp. 137-143]

85