Though there are, who having remain’d some time, and been concern’d in those Parts, affirm the Soil of _New England_ to be nothing so fruitful as it is believ’d and commonly deliver’d to be, yet we think it not improper to give a brief account of the Trees and other Plants; also the Beasts, Birds, Fishes, and other Commodities which most Writers will have to be the production of this Countrey, especially since we find them compactly summ’d up by an unknown Writer in the Language of the _Muses_. The recital of the Plants and Trees, which (excepting the Cedar, _Sassafras_, and Dyers _Sumach_) are all of the same kind with those that grow in _Europe_, onely differing in nature, according as the Epithets of many of them declare, is as follows: _Trees both in Hills and Plains in plenty be; The long-liv’d Oak, and mournful Cypress Tree; Skie-towring Pines, and Chesnuts coated rough; The lasting Cedar, with the Walnut tough; The Rozen-dropping Fir, for Mast in use; The Boat-men seek for Oars light, neat grown Sprewse; The brittle Ash, the ever-trembling Asps; The broad-spread Elm, whose Concave harbors Wasps; The Water-spungy Alder, good for nought; Small Eldern by the_ Indian _Fletchers sought; The knotty Maple, pallid Birch, Hawthorns; The Horn-bound Tree, that to be cloven scorns; Which from the tender Vine oft takes his Spouse, Who twines embracing Arms about his Boughs. Within this_ Indian _Orchard Fruits be some; The ruddy Cherry, and the jetty Plumb; Snake-murthering Hazle, with sweet Saxafrage, Whose Leaves in Beer allay hot Feavers rage; The Dyers Shumach, with more Trees there be, That are both good to use, and rare to see_. [Sidenote: Beasts.] The Beasts peculiar to this Countrey are the _Moose_, the _Rackoon_, and the _Musquash_; the two first Land-Animals, the last Amphibious, which with others common to them with us, are thus versifi’d by the abovesaid Author: _The Kingly Lyon, and the strong-arm’d Bear; The large limb’d Mooses, with the tripping Deer; Quill-darting Porcupines, that Rackoons be Castled ith’ hollow of an aged Tree; The skipping Squirrel, Rabbet, purblind Hare, Immured in the self-same Castle are, Lest red-ey’d Ferrets, wily Foxes should, Them undermine, if Ramper’d but with Mold; The grim-fac’d Ounce, and rav’nous howling Wolf, Whose meagre Paunch sucks like a swallowing Gulph; Black glittering Otters, and rich Coated Beaver; The Civet-scented Musquash smelling ever._ Of such of these as are altogether unknown to us, take these brief Descriptions. [Sidenote: The _Moose_.]