Method of forest 
     
     clearance. 
     
    
   
   
    
     The effects 
     
     of fire. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Success/on 
     
     after fire. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Forest fires 
     
     in action. 
     
    
   
   
    
     The timber trade: 
     
     bad effects. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Building ships for 
     
     Newfoundland. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Ship-building for 
     
     the British 
     
     market. 
     
    
   
   
    
     doubtful. [p.44] 
     
    
   
   
    
     CHAPTER V. Agriculture. lpp. 56-58] 
     
    
   
   
    
     It is extremely interesting to observe the progress a new settler makes in clearing and 
     
     cultivating a wood farm. The first object is to cut down the trees which is done by 
     
     cutting with an axe a notch into each side of the tree, about two feet above the 
     
     ground, and rather more than half through on the side it is intended the tree should 
     
     fall. The lower sides of these notches are horizontal, the upper makes angles of 
     
     about 60° with the ground. The trees are felled in the same direction, and after 
     
     lopping off the principal branches cut into twelve or fifteen feet lengths. The whole 
     
     is left in this state until the proper season for burning arrives, generally in May, when 
     
     it is set on fire, which consumes all the branches and small wood. The large logs are 
     
     then either piled in heaps and burnt, or rolled away for fencing stuff: some use oxen 
     
     to haul them off. The surface of the ground after burning the wood on it, is quite 
     
     black and charred; 
     
    
   
   
    
     The roots of the spruce, beech, birch, and maple, will decay sufficiently for taking out 
     
     the stumps in four or five years. The decay of pine and hemlock requires a much 
     
     longer time. After the stumps are removed, the plough is used, and the same system 
     
     of husbandry is followed as is most approved of in Great Britain. Great and serious 
     
     injury to the country, and loss to individuals, have been caused by allowing fires to 
     
     spread through the woods: whole forests on thousands of acres have been in this 
     
     manner destroyed; and the land by remaining uncultivated is impoverished by heavy 
     
     crops of tall herbs, (called fire weeds.) with white, yellow, and lilac flowers, which 
     
     spring up the first and second years after the woods are burnt, and exhaust the soil 
     
     more than two crops of wheat would. Wild raspberries and bramble bushes spring 
     
     up also and cover the ground, after the second and third years. as well as young 
     
     birches and other trees. These fires present at times the most sublime and grand, 
     
     though terrific and destructive appearance. The flames are seen rushing up the tops 
     
     of the trees, and ascending an immense height among the tremendous clouds of black 
     
     smoke, arising from a whole forest on fire; the falling trees come down every moment 
     
     with a tremendous crash, while the sparks are flying and crackling, and the flames 
     
     extending to every combustible substance, until it be quenched by rain, or until it has 
     
     devoured every thing between it and the cleared lands, the sea, or some river. 
     
    
   
   
    
     CHAPTER Vl. Trade [pp. 63—64] 
     
    

    
     The timber trade has been for many years of considerable importance, in employing 
     
     a number of ships and men; but as far as regarded the prosperity of the colony, it 
     
     might be considered rather as an impediment to its improvement, than any advantage, 
     
     by diverting the attention of the inhabitants from agriculture, and enabling them also 
     
     to obtain ardent spirits with facility, which generally produce demoralization and 
     
     drunken habits, with consequent poverty and loss of health. A trade from which 
     
     the island has, and will likely derive considerable benefit, is carried on with 
     
     Newfoundland, by building vessels for the seal and cod fisheries established there, 
     
    
   
   
    
     The branch of trade in which the largest capital has been invested, and that which 
     
     has given employment to the greatest number of men, while it has at the same time 
     
     been also of considerable benefit to the colony, until the late depression in the value 
     
     of shipping, is the building of vessels for the British market. Upwards of a hundred 
     
     brigs and ships registering from 140 to 550 tons each, have been built in different 
     
     parts of the island within the last few years. It must be allowed that many of these 
     
     ships have been built by careless and unprincipled workmen, and such vessels are of 
     
     an inferior description; but a great number are fine substantial stately ships, sailing 
     
     now principally from the Ports of London, Liverpool, Bristol and Plymouth. The wood 
     
    
   
   
    
     116