24 .S‘mx'mzs' 0/1 l/I(’ [fr/gt 
     
    
   
   
    
       
     
    
   
   
    
     terminate at Nail l’ond, near one end of the Irish 
     
     Settlement. In so doing, it opened up to colonization a great 
     
     deal of wilderness land on the west or Northumberland 
     
     Strait side of the Island. This was to prove a blessing, since 
     
     both Irish and Acadians needed land for the next 
     
     generation. It also explains why there was no serious land 
     
     shortage in the area as there was to be around Rustico 
     
     for example, where the shortage was so acute by 1859 
     
     that some families eventually emigrated to eastern New 
     
     Brunswick. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Meanwhile more and more land was cleared west 
     
     of the original homesteads in the Tignish area, but not as 
     
     far as the Western Road. By 1826, the nucleus of a Village 
     
     was growing up around the site of the second church. It 
     
     was situated a little inland at the junction of a road going 
     
     northwest and the shorter road to the shore. The progress 
     
     the settlements had made by 1826 is illustrated by the of 
     
     size and the materials used to construct the second 
     
     church, which was started that year; in contrast to the 
     
     original little building, it was two stories high, more than 
     
     sixty feet by forty-five, and was finished on the exterior 
     
     with clapboard. Furthermore a Frenchman from the Gaspé 
     
     Peninsula, William Harper, did the interior finishing and 
     
     decorating. He subsequently settled in Ti gnish and opened 
     
     one of the first stores there in 1837. 
     
    
   
   
    
     By the mid—18405, people were occupying land on 
     
     a new road parallel to the northwest one mentioned above 
     
     and just a short distance from the Great Western Road. 
     
     This new road was to become the one along which the 
     
     third church was built, and a hundred years later became 
     
     part of the Trans-Canada Highway. It was also to become 
     
     one of the main thoroughfares of the new village site, which 
     
     began to form after the church was built ir. 1856-60. The 
     
     "new” Tignish was sufficiently large and central to its 
     
     surrounding area to become the railway terminus in 1875.