edge are more spongy and less impregnated with the gum that gives these masts their good quality, but those that will be obtained a little farther from the banks of rivers will be of a much better quality. All the Acadian charpentiers who have made use of them tell us of their marvels.

They then add that in compliance with the minister’s directive Mézy has already proceeded to consult possible contractors:

Monsieur de Mézy has spoken to several [of the Acadian charpentiers]. The one who has made him the best proposal is named LeComte who offers to supply him with two hundred masts from 8 to 18 inches in diameter, half to be made up of masts of 12 inches or less, and half greater, up to 18 and 20 inches which could come to about 7000 livres. We will not use the masts cut down previously, most of which are worm- eaten, and anyway belong to the Company of fie Saint-Jean.

The last comment presumably refers to the 300 logs that Saint-Ovide had seen the previous June. Given the arrival of the order from France late in the year it is likely that LeComte the charpentier was a Louisbourg resident.63

Though 7000 livres would only have bought five or six of the largest masts in the Riga market“, it was a lot of money in the Marine's budget for lle Royalle and would not have been allocated lightly.65 And in fact in the minister’s response to

‘33 In the census of lle Saint-Jean of two years later (1728) a ‘Louis

Lecomte, constructeur’ is listed at Port St. Pierre with his date of settlement given as 1728, while in a ‘rolles des habitants’ of the same year a ‘Louis LeComte' is listed at havre aux sauvages as a ‘Me. Charpenﬁer’ (i.e. ‘master carpenter‘) with place of origin as Normandy — undoubtedly both of these records must refer to our contractor. Presumably he had moved to the island to carry out work connected with the mast contract. [Transcripts of both censuses are found in Recensements de l71e Saint-Jean 1728-1758, a microﬁlm copy of which is in the UPEI Robertson Library (HA747. P7]. Ken Donovan (pers. comm), a historian with Parks Canada at Fortress Louisbourg, does not know of any Louis Lecomte at Louisbourg in the 17205; however a Jacques Lecomte, a native of Grandville in Normandy, was active from 1730 onward as a master boat-builder at Louisbourg. He considers that the difference in the name does not rule out the possibility that they are one and the same person.

3‘ Calculated from Bamford (1956) (p. 119).

85 The Marine had allocated only 8000 livres a year to larger expeditions in the St. Lawrence — see Bamford (1956) (p. 119). It should be noted that the whole government budget for lle Royale in 1726 was 295,701 livres, 150,000 of which was allocated to the fortiﬁcations (Moore 1979, p. 85). Thus 7000 livres would have comprised 4.8% of the budget — a substantial amount for one small- scale project.

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the proposed contract, written 10 June 1727“, he was entirely concerned with the costs, querying whether the estimate included the cost of the delivery of the logs to a place where they could be embarked for France. He also attached a price-list asking that Mézy get the best deal possible and he required that the final contract not be signed until he had given his approval.

And so it was that in the following July and August67 of 1727 we find the party led by Pensens and the younger Mézy examining pine trees near Savage Harbour. Our knowledge of that summer’s activity comes from two reports written by Jacques de Pensens: the first is a sworn affidavit dated 12 August, the second a more general letter on the mast resource of the island that Pensens wrote to the Count of Maurepas the following November.“

In the letter Pensens says that Savage Harbour — or havre Cadocpichs as he calls it — has the finest masts on the island. He also says that he has found a second harbour with fine mast trees: the havre a l’ours (i.e. ’Bear Harbour’) — a harbour that he says is full of sand bars, though with good steering a thirty ton vessel can be got in. (Samuel Holland was to re—name it Murray Harbour in 1765.“) However, he makes no mention of the pines at Trois Rivieres referred to two years before by Governor Saint-Ovide, and it would seem that he had not yet visited the western part of the island where five years later in 1732 he would report very fine pine stands at ‘Malpeck’7°.

Pensens then turned to the detailed survey of the trees at Savage Harbour, saying that he was attaching the report of the three inspectors — this does not appear to survive in the records, though its contents may have been similar to the sworn affidavit made at the site the previous summer71 which gives a detailed description of the trees:

Today 12 August 1727 -We [Jacques de Pensens] commandant of l/e Saint-Jean, and

Maurepas, 1727: 10 June, to Mézy.

Saint-Ovide, 1727: 10 November.

6“ Pensens, 1727: 12 August and 20 November.

69 Rayburn, p. 90.

Pensens, 1732: 5 March.

7‘ Pensens 1727: 12 August