St. John River Rapids, after Twenty Minutes of Slack Water on Each Tide. bello, into Passamaquoddy Bay, which The waters of the Bay of Fundy thus wash the shores of two countries-the United States and Canada. It is perhaps curiously characteristic of these two countries, so near topographically but so widely separated politically, that, where the Bay beats against the shores of the Dominion it should awaken historical echoes, while, where its tide sweeps past the most easterly towns of the United States, it should have been made tributary to a thriving industrythe conversion of herring into sardines at the rate of nearly a billion a year. Statistics regarding the tides in the Bay of Fundy are so startling as to seem almost incredible. At Grand Manan the fall is from twelve to fifteen feet; at Lubec and Eastport, twenty feet; at St. John, from twenty-four to thirty feet; at Moncton, on the bend of the Petitcodiac, seventy feet; while the distance between high and low water mark on the Cobequid River is twelve miles— the river actually being twelve miles longer at high than at low water. Vessels can be run up so far on the flood, in this river and in the Avon, that the ebb will leave them high and dry for sixteen hours, so that they can be repaired between tides. I witnessed at Moncton one of the most striking phenomena of the tidal rise-the "bore." This is well worth seeing, but unfortunately the topography prevents the extraordinary rise of tide from becoming impressively manifest. It is as if nature, having bestowed the "bore" upon Moncton, had concluded that it had been lavish enough, and shut up its wonder-box. At low water broad stretches of ooze, known locally as the "flats" or "quicksands," extend on either side of the narrow channel. In places which are not always overflowed, a thin crust forms over which it is pos sible to drive or walk at a rapid gait. A person standing still, however, begins to sink in less than a minute, and the ooze beneath the crust is so sticky that, if he sinks even only above his ankles, it becomes a matter of great difficulty to extricate him. From these flats the solid land slopes up gradually, and as the wharves are far up on this, it is not necessary to build them very high. Therefore their height conveys no idea of the great rise of tide. Below the bend the river broadens out considerably, and the swiftly flowing tide sweeping out of this basin around the narrower curve, seems to become heaped up and advances in a muddy wave whose yellow crust overhangs but never breaks. As it swept past the wharf on which I stood it seemed at least four feet high, and I understand that on the neap tides it attains a height of six and even eight feet. It is usually followed by muddy undulations known as the " working of the quicksands." After the "bore" and the undulations have passed, the tide runs in smoothly but rapidly, and it is considered great sport along the river to launch a boat upon the wake of the bore and be carried up the river without any expenditure of energy other than for the steering, and then come down on the ebb, which, by the way, is not attended by any extraordinary manifestations. The force of the "bore" may be judged from an occurrence a few years ago. The vessels at the Moncton wharves tie up, so that the wharves protect them from the "bore." The stern of one vessel was, however, through carelessness, allowed to protrude beyond the wharf. The "bore," as it struck the stern, tore the vessel from her moorings, snapped her anchor-cable, smashed her bow out against one of the wharf buildings, and then carried her under the bridge above the town, breaking her masts; and this in a river which, but five minutes before, had been an expanse of mud flats. They tell in Moncton of a French Canadian who, in attempting to launch his boat upon the wake of the "bore," was upset, and who, although he could touch bottom, was carried five miles up the river before he could gain a firm footing. On a quiet moonlight night, especially during the neap tides, the "bore" rushes in with spectacular effect, its roar being heard long before it is sighted, and its crest glittering in the white light as it sweeps up the river. In the Maccan River, which flows from the east into Chignecto Bay, the tides, flooding the low shores and depositing upon them, during the slack, matter which they have gathered in their course up the river, gradually form embankments from ten to twenty feet high. The soil on these is very fertile, but unfortunately they are destroyed by the very agency which created them; and this even after they have been cultivated for several years. The tide, changing its course suddenly, will undermine the embankment, and large portions of it will fall into the river with a great noise; and so in a few days a fertile farm will be changed once more into a mud flat. The tide is absolutely lawless, building up and destroying where none may foresee. But the most picturesque, as well as the most striking, manifestation of the tidal rise and fall is at the mouth of the St. John River, at St. John, New Brunswick. Here may be witnessed on every tide a change of conditions as sudden and as complete as a quick change of scene in a drama; the beauty of the landscape, enhanced by the handiwork of man, adding greatly to the impressiveness of the phenomenon. This is locally known as the "reversible falls," although "reversible rapids" would be more appropriate. In a map of St. John and its environs, drawn in 1784 by an officer of the St. John's Loyalists, the matter is referred to in a marginal note : "The falls in this river are justly ranked among the curiosities of the world; they are at the mouth of the river, about one mile from the entrance, and are navigable four times in twentyfour hours, which commands great attention, as only a few minutes are required to pass in safety. "The tide rising from twenty to twenty-four feet at high-water, is six or eight feet higher than the river, which occasions a fall in the river as well as out, the whole water of the country having to pass between two rocks sixty yards distant." The scene of these rapids is a beautiful gorge, through which, in remote ages, the river appears to have forced its way. For twenty minutes, on each ebb and flood, the river here is as placid as a mountain lake on a tranquil day. Sud denly a streak of white spreads across the gorge, and in a few minutes the calm is succeeded by the turmoil of rushing, whirling waters. The reflections of the rocky shores and of the graceful outlines of the suspension and cantilever bridges which span the mouth of the gorge are obliterated as if a mirror had suddenly been ruthlessly shattered. The spectacle is grander on the ebb than on the flood. A few yards from the northern cliff, at the mouth of the gorge, a large rock juts out of the river, and the outward rushing waters being checked, spread out with a rise that resembles a bevelled cornice - an appearance that perhaps justifies the local appellation of "falls." The twenty minutes of tranquillity which occur two and a half hours before, and the same time after, high-water, are utilized by all shipping that is obliged to go up or down the river, sailing vessels being towed through the gorge by tugs. The velocity of the rapids has been estimated at twenty-five knots. Some years ago the harbor - master of St. John and the captain of a British war-ship ascended the gorge in a rowboat and made soundings. They found twenty-eight feet of water under the bridges and fourteen feet at the pitch. at the head of the gorge. On exceptionally high tides the duration of the slack cannot be accurately calculated, and navigation through the gorge is not attempted. Not far below the gorge lies Navy Island, and between this and the gorge the inrushing tide creates a whirlpool into which all the refuse floating matter of the harbor is gathered. The "reversible rapids" are caused by the fact that the natural level of the river above the gorge is some twelve feet lower than that of the harbor. The incoming tide rushes through the gorge until it has filled up the river to a level with the harbor, the flood then, as it were, heaping itself up upon the river waters. After the tide there is another period when river and harbor are on a level, and then, as the tide empties itself out of the harbor the accumulated waters of the river come down through the gorge with a rush. This difference in levels produces a singular freak in the tides of the harbor. For two hours after high-water, and when the tide will have fallen four feet, or even more, in the harbor, nearly a hundred miles up the Bay, teems with High and Low Water at Eastport, Me. at the mouth of the gorge below the bridges is a small weir, stoutly built and very high. Yet at times the tide heaps itself up to such a height that it was found necessary to stretch a roof of netting over the weir to prevent the fish from being lifted out of the weir by the water. While at St. John, I inquired of the official in charge of the light-houses and buoys in the Bay of Fundy how many fathoms of cable were required to anchor the buoys in the deeper waters of the Bay. He informed me that it is necessary to use from sixty to one hundred fathoms. As a buoy swinging to such a long cable is apt to shift position considerably in the swiftly flowing tides, it is necessary to specify |