oat her out to
sea, after which she proceeds to Boston or New York, or some other of our
large seaports to do her part in carrying on the commerce of the world."

I learned that the ship-builders of Maine purchase large tracts of forest
in Virginia and other states of the south, for their supply of timber.
They obtain their oaks from the Virginia shore, their hard pine from North
Carolina; the coverings of the deck and the smaller timbers of the large
vessels are furnished by Maine. They take to the south cargoes of lime and
other products of Maine, and bring back the huge trunks produced in that
region. The larger trees on the banks of the navigable rivers of Maine
were long ago wrought into the keels of vessels.

It was not far from Bath, and a considerable distance from the open sea,
that we saw a large seal on a rock in the river. He turned his head slowly
from side to side as we passed, without allowing himself to be disturbed
by the noise we made, and kept his place as long as the eye could
distinguish him. The presence of an animal always associated in the
imagination with uninhabited coasts of the ocean, made us feel that we
were advancing into a thinly or at least a newly peopled country.

Above Bath, the channel of the Kennebeck widens into what is called
Merrymeeting Bay. Here the great Androscoggin brings in its waters from
the southwest, and various other small streams from different quarters
enter the bay, making it a kind of Congress of Rivers. It is full of
wooded islands and rocky promontories projecting into the water and
overshading it with their trees. As we passed up we saw, from time to
time, farms pleasantly situated on the islands or the borders of the
river, where a soil more genial or more easily tilled had tempted the
settler to fix himself. At length we approached Gardiner, a flourishing
village, beautifully situated among the hills on the right bank of the
Kennebeck. All traces of sterility had already disappeared from the
country; the shores of the river were no longer rock-bound, but disposed
in green terraces, with woody eminences behind them. Leaving Gardiner
behind us, we went on to Hallowell, a village bearing similar marks of
prosperity, where we landed, and were taken in carriages to Augusta, the
seat of government, three or four miles beyond.

Augusta is a pretty village, seated on green and apparently fertile
eminences that overlook the Kennebeck, and itself overlooked by still