230 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



a fleet of schooners was kept busy carrying out the directions of the 

 busiest man in the county of Lennox and Addington. 



There was apparently no limit to his activity and the scope of his 

 undertakings. With all his other interests upon his hands, we find 

 him the successful tenderer for a portion of the construction work upon 

 the Grand Trunk Railway. For several months this important work 

 called for his personal supervision. Later on we find him negotiating 

 for and securing a contract for utilizing the convict labor of the pene- 

 tentiary and, so successful was he in this new venture, that he crossed 

 the line and performed a similar service for the state of New York by 

 turning to good account the prison labor of that state. 



Later on in life he took in hand a languishing brush factory in 

 Napanee and under the most adverse conditions placed it upon a 

 sound business footing. He organized and operated successfully a 

 piano factory in Kingston and dealt extensively in real estate in the 

 northern townships where he had carried on his lumbering operations. 

 In fact, nearly all of the lands handled by him were originally purchased 

 as timber berths and, when he had no further use for them, he placed 

 them upon the market as farm lands and the title to many a good farm 

 in the townships of Portland and Hinchinbrooke may be traced back 

 to John Stevenson as the original owner. 



About the time he moved to Napanee he was appointed a Justice 

 of the Peace. It could not have been with a view of providing himself 

 with some congenial occupation that he accepted the commission, as 

 at no time in his history did he appear to have an idle moment. He 

 entered actively upon his magisterial duties and it was not long before 

 Squire Stevenson became a terror to the evildoers of the town and 

 surrounding country. The records of many of the cases tried before 

 him and other associate justices of the period are still preserved. These 

 are written in a clear round hand and are in keeping with the regular 

 system used by him in everything he undertook. In perusing the 

 evidence taken down in several cases tried before him for infractions 

 of the liquor licence laws I observe that the character of the testimony 

 in such cases has undergone no change during the past sixty years. 

 Witness after witness was called. They all admitted they had been 

 frequently upon the premises in question, had seen some sort of liquor 

 sold over the bar ; but their feelings were hurt when it was insinuated 

 that it was intoxicating liquor or that they might reasonably be ex- 

 pected to know what it was. The justices appear to have had a proper 

 conception of the weight to be attached to such evidence and invariably 

 convicted in all liquor cases. 



In the month of June 1860 the Magistrates' Court, over which 

 Mr. Stevenson presided, was forcibly reminded that it was not always 



