Berries and curran ts.

Ground plan ts.

Forest birds.

Mammals.

Exports include lumber.

French cleared land reverted to woods.

Saw mil/s.

The Shrubs indigenous in this Island are Wild Cherries, Gooseberries, Raspberries. Currents & Cranberries. The last abundant and producing the finest fruit. There are also Brambles and Dew Berries, to these may be added Juniper, Willows and the shrub called Indian Tea.

The Native Plants are not very numerous. Of the Grasses, there are Meadow and Scutch Grasses everywhere & a fine Carpet of White Clover, Lamb's Quarters or Wild Spinach, Arum (different Species), Wood Sorrell, Valerian, Maidenhair, Ragweed, Sootwort, Daisies, the plant called Everlasting Golden Wire, Sarsparilla, & Gingsing. Golden Wire is a creeping Plant with a leaf like Trefoil. Its root is extremely slender like gold wire and of a fine bitter, it seems to be a species of the Serpenteria. The Sarsparilla is found in the Woods in abundance. This is a late Plant producing large Cuspid form leaves from three Stems. The flower or fruit I have not seen. The Roots are as good as that from Carolina. The Gingsing is also frequently met with but not so abundant as the other. It is a tall plant, 2 feet high, with a very slender stem. About the Middle there is a Tuft of 8 leaves and at the top a Tuft of 3 leaves on which is the capsule of the seed vessel & 3 Pistils. The root is very white, tastes when fresh like Orchis root or Saleb.

Wildlife

The Birds of this Country are Partridges, larger than those of Europe, with a beautiful grey Plumage full of Pheasant Eyes. There are two kinds, one which feeds on the cones of the Spruce & whose flesh tastes of Spruce, the other feeds on berries and is better flavoured. Both kinds perch on Trees & are such foolish birds that a whole Covey made be shot one after the other. The Natives take them by a noose fixed to a tall slender wand which they slip over the Birds head & so pull it down from its perch. Plovers & Snipes in abundance, both large and excellent. A species of Thrush with a red Breast which on account of its familiarity is called a Robin, Black Birds, Snow Birds & Humming Birds, Flocks of Wild Pigeons and of Birds of Prey there are Black and Grey Eagles, Kites, Hawks, Owls, Rookes, Crows Jays & Wood Peckers.

The Quadrupeds are; Bears, Foxes (Red, silver, grey, & black), Otters, Polecats, Wildcats, Martins, Musk rats, rats & quantities of Mice, several kinds of squirrels, Hares smaller than those of Europe, which turn White in Winter. There are Snakes but none venomous. [p. 11]

Observations

The Commerce of this Island [includes] the Exportation of Lumber, Oil, Skins and Furs to England, but the export of the last three are as yet, inconsiderable. lp. 12]

the Landholders receive no income from their possessions which for the greater part remain in their primitive wild & desert state. Nay, there are several large Tracts of the best Land, which had been cleared and cultivated by the French Colonists, but which now from that absurd policy [i.e. of absentee landlords] have relapsed into a

Wilderness and are as thickly covered with wood as grounds which have never been cleared.

There are 7 flower and 5 Saw Mills at present established. Formerly there were twice as many. [p. 131

(from: Holman (1984), The Island Magazine, 15: 9-13]

64