OUR ISLAND STORY THE FOURTH CHAPTER Labors , Pleasures, Privations and Progress of Early Settlers. To first of all "Clear the Land" was the arduous task of the early settlers in Prince Edward Island . This was necessarily a process that was slow and laborious. The forest primeval was, for the most part, dense. Huge trees, many of them three to four feet in diameter, had to be cut down, prepared for the building of houses and barns and for the market as timber or lumber; and a thick undergrowth of smaller trees or brush wood had to be cut down and hauled away or burned. Settlers who had learned to use the axe and the saw worked in the woods throughout each winter. The timber they cut and hewed was transported to ship¬ yards, soon established at various points along the coast, or made ready for shipment in the new vessels as they were built. Then, in the early spring and at intervals throughout each summer, the brushwood was cleared away, some of the stumps were uprooted, and the land planted with seed potatoes by means of a hoe; or wheat barley or oats were sown, where the plough and harrow could be used. Concurrently, each year, the land that had been cleared in the previous years was cultivated, and food was obtained for the sustenance of the pioneer farmers and their families, for the oxen and horses, by which they were assisted, and for the cows, sheep, hogs, poultry, etc., by the produce of which they were nour¬ ished and clothed. Industry, continuous and persevering, was essential to life and progress on every farm and in every home. On those farms and in those homes where thrift accompan¬ ied industry, comfort was ere long obtained, and prosperity fol¬ lowed in due course. The soil was found to be warm and fertile. There were usually large returns of grain and roots from the seed