A PLAGUE OF MICE 155 The town seems to loll rather haphazardly around its principal street and water front. The sand has choked up the mouth of the harbour in its own obstructing way, as if trying to make an inland sea of the banana-shaped bay. The village's name commemorates the life of the Comte de St. Pierre, who at one time owned the whole island and a few others adjacent to it. But he failed to fulfil the terms of his agreement—and lost Prince Edward Island . St. Peter 's developed as if by accident. Probably, though, some one would have discovered its immense possibilities later, and would have founded a settlement here. However, it remained for several dripping passengers of a French boat to found the town. Four leagues off the shore, their vessel was lost. Several, by clinging to debris, managed to get ashore. There, these cold, water-soaked mortals, stripped of all their worldly goods, but thankful enough even to be alive, established themselves in the woods of St. Peter 's. The hardships and sufferings they underwent have not been recorded. Surely they must have met with kindness from the Indians, and other poverty-stricken settlers along that northern shore. How, otherwise, could they have existed, deprived as they were of all necessities, in this harsh colonial land? Or did their chests, as adventure stories generally relate, drift ashore with everything needful inside, completely dry? Undoubtedly, they were hardy people, and, I suppose, they took this blow of fortune with a customary shrug of the shoulders, and then set themselves to work felling trees, building homes, and boats. Brave, hardy pioneers! So developed St. Peter 's. . . .