Page:New Brunswick Magazine Issue 1.djvu/371

Mr. Simonds had no claim to the lands other than the promise of a grant from the government of 5,000 acres in such part of Nova Scotia as he might choose. He continued to cut hay and make improvements on the marsh from time to time, and occasionally speaks of operations carried on there in his correspondence. For example, in June, 1768, he wrote to Mr. Hazen, "Please send half a dozen Salem scythes," adding, with a touch of the dry humor that often crops out in his letters, "Haskel's tools are entirely out of credit here; it would be a sufficient excuse for a hired man to do but half a day's work in a day if he was furnished with an axe or scythe of that stamp."

The first grant included so insignificant a part of the marsh that a further grant of lands adjoining was obtained May 1, 1770. This grant was made in response to a memorial of James Simonds, which was duly considered by the Governor and Council of Nova Scotia, December 18, 1769, setting forth that in conjunction with Richard Simonds and James White he had obtained a grant of 2,000 acres of mountainous and broken land at the mouth of the River Saint John in the year 1765, which had been improved by building houses, a saw mill and lime kiln, and the partners had settled upwards of thirty persons on it, who were employed in carrying on those two branches of business, but that the wood and timber so necessary for them was all consumed, therefore praying that 2,000 acres more adjoining this tract might be granted to the said James Simonds.

It requires a considerable stretch of the imagination to believe that all the wood north of the city of St. John to the Kennebeccasis river had been consumed during the five years of the company's operations at Portland Point. But probably the supply of lumber in the immediate vicinity of the saw mill, as well as the