152 NEWFOUNDLAND CARIBOU 



cultivation of the soil, and even against the erection of per- 

 manent dwellings, were enforced up to the beginning of the 

 last century. In 1790, Governor Millbanke proclaimed that 

 he was directed not to allow any right of private property 

 whatever in any land not actually employed in the fisheries." 

 In 1799, Governor Waldegrave ordered fences enclosing a 

 piece of ground in St. John's to be torn down, and pro- 

 hibited chimneys even in temporary sheds. Only in 1 8 1 1 

 were permanent buildings allowed, and two years more passed 

 before grants of land were issued. Not until 1825 '^^^ road- 

 making begun, though St. John's had then 12,000 people ; 

 and within twenty miles there were probably half as many 

 more. 



The next and perhaps the most really important develop- 

 ment was the building of the railway, begun in 1890, and 

 completed about seven years later by the late Sir Robert G. 

 Reid. With the completion of the railway from St. John's 

 in the east to Port-aux-Basques on the south-west, a regular 

 steamship service was inaugurated between the latter place 

 and North Sydney, Cape Breton, and also other coast 

 towns ; so that the island at last had a chance of develop- 

 ment. Here we will leave it, and go back to the original 

 inhabitants, on whom a few words may be of interest. 



Of these early people there is not a great deal known. 

 They were supposed to be a branch of the great Algon- 

 quins, and were called Beothics. That they lacked the 

 power and development of their mainland cousins seems 

 fairly certain, for they never made any serious or concerted 

 attempt to hold their own against the white man, or to 

 work with him ; and though at one time they appeared 

 to be on fairly friendly terms, they lost all faith after having 

 been once fired on by mistake. Later on, both the English 

 and the French made a warfare against them ; so did 



