172 HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF NEWFOUNDLAND 



sixteen miles in length and was considered in 1840 'the 

 longest piece of road in the island '.' 



which After roads came horses. ' They are making roads in 



'horses' 1 Newfoundland,' said Peter Ougier, ' next thing they will be 

 which \having carriages and driving about.' In 1840 horses were 

 oats and ''- J ust cormn g mto general use in the neighbourhood of St. John's 

 hay and and were supplanting dogs. But horses required oats and 

 'do^f 16 I hay. Consequently the incipient roads were lined with oat- 

 :' fields and hayfields. Cattle and sheep began to increase ; in 

 I 1849 tne Governor and the Agricultural Society which was 

 formed in 1841 under the auspices of the Governor and with 

 a Stale subsidy imported a man and woman to teach 

 spinning and weaving, and an Ayrshire bull and two cows ; 

 but owing to the dog-pest there were only seven sheep to ten 

 kinc at that date. When horses came in and dogs went out 

 sheep were to kine as ten to seven (1869), or ten to live 

 (1881), and after the massacre of the guilty dogs, ten to four. 

 The same Society introduced ' ploughs, harrows, and agri- 

 cultural implements ' (1848) which were at that dale 'little 

 known ' near the capital, and unknown elsewhere. 2 



Military officers who can be named used lo farm within 



'agriculture reacl1 of thcir Barracks. 3 Then prominent settlers like 



here and Dr. William Carson, Sir J. Pearl, H. P. Thomas, Robert Pack, 



and Mackinson followed suit in the immediate neighbourhood 



of St. John's, Carbonear, and Brigus. 1 On isolated points on 



the coast between Trepassey and St. Mary Bay, and between 



Placentia and Fortune Bays, there was open ground, with 



cattle-stations of fifty or sixty cattle apiece in 1842.'' In 1828 



fresh meat had just fallen from two or three shillings a pound 



lo sixpence or sevenpence a pound ; and in 1841 we are told 



] Jukes, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 70; E. Gosse, Life of P. Gosse, 1890, 

 p. 68. 



'-' Sit Sir G. Le Marchant, 1^49. '' Ante, p. 151. 



1 Patrick Morris, Short Review of the History of Newfoundland, 

 1847, p. 71. 



Sir R. Bonnycastle, op. cil., vol. ii, p. 28 and map ; Jukes, op, cit., 

 vol. i, p. 88 ; Captain Loch's Report, 1849, ^- 3 2 7- 



