THE SOURCE-BOOK:

EARLY DESCRIPTIONS OF THE FORESTS OF PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND :

THE FRENCH PERIOD — 1534 - 1758

The following pages contain extracts from sixty-nine historical documents from the period of French rule on Prince Edward Island each of which contains material relevant to the island’s forests. Each is presented in its original French followed by an English translation.

In the French extract l have reproduced the original spelling — which often differs from twentieth century French, especially in the use or non—use of accents. l have also, as far as possible, used the original punctuation. l have, however, separated any words that had been run together by the author in the original hand-writing.

For the English translation my procedure has been to render into English the exact meaning of the extract without straying too far from the original French word—order, unless that should reSult in awkward phrasing in English. Where words have presented special difficulties in translating l have included the French word in square brackets. l have also in the translations re-punctuated to aid clarity, and have standardised the spelling of the names of persons and places.

I have translated French units of measurement using the equivalent English measure, where one exists — for example ’pied’ to ’foot’, but one must be aware that the French foot, as well as other measurements, were not equal in length to the corresponding English measures. l have thus included in Table 2 (p. 35) the metric conversion values, as well as the relationship between French monetary units and their conversion value to sterling.

There has been a particular problem with some of the French names used in the eighteenth century for the trees, mammals and birds of the island. This is a complicated subject area in which previous translators into English have made serious errors in the past. For the rationale behind my identifications and translations see Appendix 1 for trees and Appendix 2 for mammals and birds.

For each of the twenty-eight recorders a short biographical sketch is included that assesses their prior experience of the North American continent, and at the same time provides a brief evaluation of the forest-related material in the extracts.

The location of all of the historical French place-names mentioned in the extracts is shown

on the map in Figure 4 (p. 36), while any modern place-names referred to anywhere in this report are shown in Figure 1 (p. vii).

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