it is theoretically possible for someone in the future to construct such maps, though the process would require a great deal of painstaking archival research into land ownership, via deeds and leases, and even with this information, the result would still be of a much cruder nature than the Holland and Chalmers maps. This is because the data on the amount of cleared land on each farm that would be needed to construct such maps, was either never put on paper, or where it was (as in the various censuses of the nineteenth century) most has not survived. Even so, of some use in such mappings are the estimates of the total amount of ’arable’ land on each township, which were compiled in the censuses, though unfortunately we are unable to tell which parts of each township were under arable, and the reliability of the data obtained from each census would need to be assessed.200

Even though at the present time such maps do not exist, before I go on in the next section to examine what the sources tell us about the methods used in the clearance of the forests, I think it is useful to outline briefly the various factors likely to have influenced the spatial and temporal pattern of forest destruction by clearance. Such factors can be divided into two broad types: firstly, intrinsic or natural factors that are related to the natural ecology and geography of the forests and soils of the island; secondly, factors — both geographical, and economic and social — associated with the human population. Both of these groups of factors will have interacted with each other in a complex way to determine the pattern of forest clearance.

Natural or intrinsic factors.

The natural forest cover — As noted earlier, it was widely recognized that lands suitable for clearance for farmland were identifiable from the type of forest they carried: it was the upland hardwood

century, the first of which, in 1935, has been published (Glen 1997).

2°° William Glen has assembled in a table (unpublished) the number of “arable acres" in each of the 67 townships and three royalties as reported in the censuses of 1827, 1833, 1841, 1848, 1855, 1861 and 1871; and in another printed report (Glen 1995), he presents in tabular and graphical form the number of “improved acres" in each township based on the censuses of 1881 and 1891, as well as in the twentieth century (unfortunately the 1901 census did not provide a breakdown of the amount of improved land by township). Some of this same census data was used by Clark (1959) to construct his whole-island maps that show the acreage of arable or improved land by township (see his Figures 30, 54, 55, 89, 93, 94, 95 and 96).

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forests of the island, signaling the presence of well-drained and more fertile soils, that were cleared in preference to areas under conifer forest, or under the 'swamps’ and the ’barrens'. These three latter forest—types were either entirely avoided, or only cleared when there were no hardwood sites at hand. Thus the spatial distribution of forest clearance, as shown in a map, would be strongly influenced by the distribution of the natural forest—types of the island.

Nearness to water - A second intrinsic factor determining the geographical pattern of forest destruction through agricultural clearance was the closeness of suitable hardwood sites to the coast of the island or to its rivers and estuaries. In the early years what were called ’front lands’ were always chosen in preference to 'back lands’ because of their easy accessibility by means of a boat in summer or over the ice in winter.201 This was especially important in the early colonial period when the coast and waterways of the island provided the principal means of travel. Such sites would also have the foreseeable advantage of having an easier access in the future to supplies of off-farm necessities, and to markets for the sale of farm produce. Thus upland hardwood forests near the coasts and rivers were under pressure decades before the equivalent forests inland.2°2

Nearness to salt-marshes — A third natural factor determining the susceptibility of hardwood forests to clearance was their nearness to salt-marshes. Marshes were extremely important, especially in the early period of settlement, as a source of hay for over-wintering cattle and other livestock. As a result, suitable hardwood sites in the vicinity of salt-marshes were likely to be cleared the earliest of all.203

20‘ Johnstone (1822) stated that “front lands [i.e. fronting on a

river or the coast] have been always most prized by the first settlers", and he went on to give a number of reasons for this; Lawson (1851) said that “the early settlers were always desirous of having fronts on the sea-coast, the only highways then in existence". Selkirk (1803) (p. 16, not extracted) also recorded the use of the term “front lands” for farms with a water frontage, and “back lands" for those without. He also used the term "inland lands" for the interior of the island (p. 21, extracted), and noted that, with the exception of “Mr. Cambridge" [see Cambridge (1796?) for further information on this proprietor], most proprietors did not reckon such lands of any value.

202 See Hatvany (1996) (pp. 142, 144) for further comment on this preference for ‘front-lands‘.

203 See Hatvany (2001) for the importance of salt-marshes in the nineteenth century farming economy of Prince Edward Island. For

an extensive early account of their importance see Captain John