140 HISTORY OF PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND. accepted in the spirit by which they wore animated, and followed by practical legislation, the colony would start for¬ ward with renewed energy, dating a new era from the year 1861. In such an event, the British government would have nobly atoned for any errors in its past policy, the legislature would no longer be distracted with efforts to close the courts upon proprietors, or to tamper with the currency of the island ; the cry of tenant-rights would cease to disguise the want of practical statesmanship, or to over¬ awe the local administration; men who had hated and disturbed each other would- be reconciled, and pursue their common interests in mutual co-operation; roads would be levelled, breakwaters built, the river-beds dredged, new fertilizers applied to a soil annually drained of its vitality ; emigration would cease, and population attracted to the wild lauds would enter upon their cultivation, unembarrassed by the causes which perplexed the early settlers. Weighed down by the burden of the investigation, the commissioners had sometimes felt doubtful of any bene¬ ficial results ; but they now, at the close of their labors, indulged the hope that, if their suggestions were adopted, enfranchised and disenthralled from the poisoned garments that enfolded her, Prince Edward Island would yet become the Barbadoes of the Saint Lawrence. Our limits will not admit of a more extended account of the commissioners' report, which constitutes a most im¬ portant portion of the annals of the island. We hope we have succeeded in giving the kernel of it. It is impossible :for any candid person to rise from the perusal of the docu¬ ment, as well as of the voluminous body of facts and evidence on which it is based, without the conviction that the work was committed to men whose experience and acquirements eminently fitted them for the onerous duty