7< i PAST AND PRESENT OE town Harbour. Several important indus¬ tries have sprung up in this town recently. It does the largest export trade in farm pro¬ duce of any port in the province. During the last year (1905) a branch was built con¬ necting this center with the main line of the Prince Edward Island Railway . There are many important settlements in the county, a few of which are deserving of particular mention. East Point was settled early by people of Highland descent, as well as the localities of Brown's Creek and Glen Martin and Dundas and vicinity. St. Peter 's is an old settlement with an industrious popu¬ lation engaged in farming and fishing. New Perth , a fine farming settlement, is where the first government experimental cheese factory was established in the province. St. Mary's Road , Sparrow's Road and Baldwin's Road are settled by people of Irish descent. In 1788 Murray Harbour was settled. On the north side they are chiefly of Scotch descent, while on the south side man}- of the settlers came from the and settled in the place called " Guernsey Cove ." In Murray Harbour there is the only Marconi wireless telegraph station in the province. One of the most historic places in the county is Point—a promontory formed at the confluence of the Montague and Cardigan rivers. Its settlement dates back to the time of the French occupation of the province. In 1732 granted a charter to a company for the purpose of carrying! on fishing and trading operations on the eastern coast of the Island. On this point the company erected buildings and stores and carried on a business of general trading. De Roma, who oppears to have been the head of the company, was a very energetic and enterprising man. He not only established a flourishing business but also built public roads from this place to Mon¬ tague, Cardigan and La Joie ( lottetown). After the fall of an armed cruiser appeared before the trading port, landed a body of men, plundered and pillaged the place and afterward burned it to the ground. In the autumn of 1803 there arrived at Brudenell river some twenty-three persons, consisting of the families of James McLaren , and his sons-in-law, Donald Gordon and James Stewart , natives of Perthshire, Scot¬ land, who had sailed from Glasgow in the ship "Commerce." They settled on the north bank of the river upon land purchased from the Earl of Selkirk , who in the same year sent out the historic ship "Polly," with settlers for the district of Belfast . Notwithstanding their arrival at so early a period in the history of the province they found themselves preceded by a compatriot named John McDonald , a native of , one of the western islands of Scotland , the date of whose arrival is unfortunately lost. This man's experience in the ways of the new country proved of inestimable value to the new settlers, as he taught them the arts of woodcraft and boat building, thus enabling them to traverse the pathless forests and navigate unknown rivers and streams. This man was familiarly known to his new friends as " Ian Dearg " or red John," from his ruddy complexion. Becoming tired of the province he eventually sold his land and removed with his family to the neighboring island of Breton, but his memory is still held in grate¬ ful remembrance by the descendants of those whom he so greatly befriended, namely, the McLarens, Gordons, Stewarts, McFarlanes and their connections that now constitute a large part of the population of Brudenell and the surrounding district. A large business