particular attention.

I very much wished to preserve this creature alive, that I might try
and tame him. In this, however, I was destined to be disappointed; for
what with the beating I was obliged to give him to keep him quiet, and
the savage attack of the dog, he died just as we came within sight of
the clearing. When we skinned him, we found his side much lacerated
where the dog had bitten him. From the exaggerated description Dennis
had given me of his size, I fully expected to find him as big as a
bullock. He, however, only weighed a hundred and fifty-seven pounds,
which, for a bear of two years old, which appeared to be his age, is, I
believe, the average weight.

The summer of 1825 was warm, even for Canada, where this season is
always hot. The thermometer often ranged above 90 degrees in the shade.
Such weather would be quite unbearable, were it not for a fine breeze
which almost invariably springs up from the westward between ten and
eleven o'clock in the forenoon, and continues till sunset.

The nights are cooler in proportion to the heat of the day, than in
England.

This climate is subject to violent thunder-storms, accompanied by vivid
forked lightning and heavy rain, which greatly tend to cool the air and
make the country more healthy. Fatal accidents, however, sometimes
occur, and houses and barns are burnt down by the electric fluid, and I
have no doubt that, were it not for the proximity of the woods, a great
deal more damage would be done.

The lofty trees serve as conductors, particularly the pine and hemlock,
the former, from its great height above all the other trees of the
forest, being much more likely to be struck by the lightning than any
other. It is a curious fact that the electric fluid invariably follows
the grain the wood. I have often noticed in pines which had been
struck, that the fluid had followed the grain in a spiral form,
encircling the tree three or four times in its descent to the earth. I
have myself witnessed some extraordinary effects produced by lightning.
I remember that, not more than two years since, I had occasion to go
out into the township of Douro to attend the sitting of the Council of
which I was then a member, and I had, on my way, to pass through a
small clearing occupied by an Irish settler, one James Lynch.

This man, to save trouble, had left several large hemlock trees near
his house. These trees had been dead for some years, consequently the
wood was to