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other one

ARTHER west are islands; among them six leagues in length, called by the savages, Manthane, south of which there are among the islands several good harbors for vessels." With this casual mention by Champlain in his description of his explorations in the Bay of Fundy in 1604-5, Grand Manan first appears upon the page of history.

Two years later the same explorer put in at this island and "anchored in a sandy cove, exposed to the sea and the south wind." Of his rough experience in this place, which could not have been one of the "several good harbors for vessels," he has left a graphic account. "The latter [the south wind]," he writes, "increased during the night to such impetuosity that we could not stand by our anchor, and were compelled without choice to go ashore, at the mercy of God and the waves. The latter were so heavy and furious that while we were attaching the buoy to the anchor, so as to cut the cable at the hawsehole, it did not give us time, but broke straightway of itself. The wind and

the sea cast us as the wave receded upon a little rock, and we awaited only the moment to see our bark break up, and to save ourselves if possible upon its fragments. In these desperate straits, after we had received several waves, there came one so large and fortunate for us that it carried us over the rock, and threw us on a little sandy beach, which insured us this time from shipwreck."

Whether or not the curious anchor found fifty years ago on the supposed scene of this narrow escape from shipwreck is the one that Champlain and his crew could not "stand by" can be only a matter of conjecture. Its appearance gives indubitable evidence of long exposure to the corrosion of the sea. With a shank eleven feet long and at one part seven inches in diameter, it must have weighed originally not less than fifteen hundred pounds; but when discovered in 1842 its weight had been reduced by rust to barely one-third of this. Would less than two hundred and fifty years have been required for the waves to eat away so much hard iron? But as to the anchor's being a token of

sea birds, has recorded a characteristic description. "We approached apace," he writes in his journal, "the island of Grand Manan, of which the stupendous cliffs gradually emerged from the deep with the majestic boldness of her noblest native chief. Soon our bark passed beneath its craggy head, covered with trees, which on account of the height seemed scarcely larger than shrubs. The prudent raven spread her pinions, launched. from the cliff, and flew away before us; the golden eagle, soaring aloft, moved majestically along in wide circles; the guillemonts sat on their eggs

would apply almost equally well today.

The island itself is about twentytwo miles long and from three to six miles wide. It lies in the mouth of the Bay of Fundy, anciently called Frenchman's Bay. The furious tide. for which this bay is distinguished sweeps by the shores with great force, rising eighteen feet on the west side and seventeen on the east.

The west coast of the island is lined with a succession of massive cliffs, which appear to on approaching from Eastport like a long and unbroken purple wall. These great

upon the shelvy precipices, or plunging into the water, dived, and rose again at a great distance; the broadbreasted eider duck covered her eggs among the grassy tufts; on a naked rock the seal lazily basked, its sleek sides glistening in the sunshine; while shoals of porpoises were swiftly gliding through the waters around us, showing by their gambols that although doomed to the deep, their life was not devoid of pleasure. Far away stood the bold shores of Nova Scotia, gradually fading in the distance, of which the gray tints beautifully relieved the wing-like sails of many a fishing bark." Although written so many years ago, this description

precipices are the loftiest at the northern end, where they rise four hundred feet, sinking down gradually as they extend toward the southern terminus, where they are three hundred feet high.

The only considerable break in this stupendous wall is Whale Cove, a broad bay in the shape of a horseshoe. Here the view is surpassingly fine. On one side, rising to a great height, is Fish Head, and on the other, the cliffs of Eel Brook and Northern Head, the latter extending out beyond its neighbors; and between, the blue water and sky. Back of the high shingle beach, which extends entirely across the bottom of the bay, is a

ened disaster already described. To be sure, it is on the west side of the island, but the explorer's map was so "oriented" that it would appear to be on the south.

The geological character of the Grand Manan cliffs is variable. A large portion of the rock shows signs of stratification, especially at one point where from their resemblance to courses of masonry the precipices have received the name of the Seven Days' Work. But there are also immense masses of trap-rock, a great

years ago, in a terrific gale and blinding snowstorm, and out of a crew of twenty-nine men all but eight perished. In the little graveyard at Flagg's Cove, twenty-one of the lost seamen sleep in one long grave. A lettered board over the enclosure reads: "Here lie the remains of 21 seamen of the ship Lord Ashburton, drowned 19th Jan., 1857."

Near the scene of this tragedy, a fog horn, operated by steam, now gives warning to passing vessels whenever the fog, darkness or storm

On the eastern side of the mountain-like Northern Head, a detached mass of rock bears a curious resemblance to a tonsured monk sitting in a chair. This has long been honored with the name Bishop's Head.

One of the two lighthouses on the island is at Swallow Tail, a picturesque, fan-shaped promontory a short distance east from Northern Head. Of the scene from this spot on a stormy day, Leavitt gives a striking picture in one of his poems:

"The picture view! That wild sublimity.Omnipotence has waked and hurled the storm,

Tossing the deep to tumult round that tower,

Rising defiant on its ocean rock,

feet, giving, ordinarily, a depth of from five to nine fathoms. Vessels can enter the harbor at about two hours from high water and lie in perfect safety. This is a station for catching, smoking and packing herring, and has but a small group of buildings. A path leads through the woods to Money Cove, which tradition has invested with wild stories of Captain Kidd and his buried treasure.

But interesting and picturesque as are all parts of Grand Manan, the climax of solitary wildness and grandeur is to be found, as a traveller wrote long ago, "only in the Great Cliffs at Southern Head." "We emerge from the shrubbery," he continues, "to find ourselves on the top of Hay Point,