with the flames of some far off dwelling, whose inmates thus called for assistance; but long ere that assistance could be given, the fire would have done its worst of destruction, perhaps of death.  I have also heard it, when twilight gathered darkly o’er the earth, floating sad and mournfully since sun-set, from some dwelling in the forest’s depths, whose locality, but for the sounds, would not be known.  Some member of the family has been lost in the woods, and the horn is blown to guide him homewards through the trackless wilderness.  How sweet must those sounds be to the benighted wanderer, bearing, as they do, the voice of the heart, and telling of love and affectionate solicitude!  But Melancthon has driven his ox-team to the barn, and now, with the baby on his lap, which, like all the blue-noses, he loves to nurse, sits down to table, where we join him.  The dinner, as is often the case in the backwoods in summer, is “a regular pick-up one,” that is, composed of any thing and every thing.  People care little for meat in the hot weather; and, in fact, a new settler generally uses his allowance of beef and pork during the long winter, so that the provision for summer depends principally on fish, with which the country is amply supplied, and the produce of the dairy.  The present meal consists of fine trout from the adjoining stream, potatoes white as snow-balls, and, pulverising on the dish, some fried ham, and young French beans, which grow there in the greatest luxuriance, climbing to the top of their lofty poles till they can grow no higher.  I have often thought them scions of that illustrious bean-stalk owned by Jack in the fairy tale.  We have also a bowl of salad, and home-made vinegar prepared from maple sap, a large hot cake, made with Indian meal, and milk and dried blue-berries, an excellent substitute for currants.  Buscuits, of snow white Tenessee flour, raised with cream and sal-a-ratus.  This last article, which is used in place of yeast, or eggs, in compounding light cakes, can also be made at home from ley of the wood ashes, but it is mostly bought in town.  The quantity of this used is surprising, country “store-keepers” purchasing barrels to supply their customers.  A raspberry pie, and a splendid dish of strawberries and cream, with tea (the inseparable beverage of every meal in New Brunswick), forms our repast; and such would it be in ninety-nine houses out of a hundred of the class I am describing.  Many of the luxuries, and all the necessaries of life, can be raised at home, by those who are industrious and spirited enough to take advantage of their resources.  Melancthon this year expects to bread himself, as well as grow enough of hay to winter his stock.  Since he commenced farming he purchased what was not raised on the land by the sale of what was cut off it—­that is, by selling ash timber and cord-wood he procured what he required.  This, however, can only be done where there is water conveyance to market.