MILITARY AND CIVIL. 39

consequences if they do so, as there is not a house for to put their heads into, and if they do not bring provisions to serve them until next June; they must absolutely starve for there is not one loaf of bread, nor flower to make one, to be bought on the Island.

I have the honor to be, with the greatest respect, my lord, your lordship’s most faithful, most obedient and very humble servant,

WALTER PATTERSON. To the Earl of Hillsborough, &c.

In I772, the first Mass said in the colony by a priest from Great Britain, was offered up at Scotch Fort, by the Rev. James MacDonald, who for many years devoted himself to missionary labors in the Island.

During the summer of that year a large number of emigrants arrived here from the bonny shores of Scotland, in order to settle the MacDonald estate on Township No. 36. They landed from the vessel that carried them here, on the north shore of the Hillsborough River, some nine miles from Charlottetown. From here they crossed northwards through the woods to the bounds of their destination where rude huts were erected. Then commenced the hardships of clearing the wilderness, and then, too, the settlement of Tracadie started into being.

Emigrants on their arrival here settled upon lease-holdings in the midst of the woods. A site having been selected where- on to put up a hut,- the settler proceeded axe in hand to cut down and junk up into equal lengths a number of logs Sufficient to raise four walls to the height of some six feet, the ends of these were then dovetailed, which being thus prepared, the fourwallswerethen raised log upon log, then the rough frame- work of a gabled roof was erected. Light poles were attached to this, and these were covered with a thatch of birch-bark. At one end of the structure a wide fire-place of sandstone or mud was placed, and this was surmounted by an ample chimney, composed of mud and sticks. The chinks between the logs having been filled with moss, the but was consxdered ready for habitation during the summer season. By degrees floor and loft were added. Then the clearing of a patch of ground for the raising of potatoes, wheat or oats; while the Intrusion of the black bear, wild cat, or the fox, were the only