LISTLESSNESS OF SETTLERS SONS. 175 



cheered by increasing prosperity. But after he and his 

 sons have attained to competence, and the stimulus to 

 great exertion ceases, the progress is not so rapid, and 

 a man cannot himself, or through his sons, progress 

 indefinitely in wealth and station, as at home. At least 

 it is not done, and a kind of listlessness creeps over the 

 second or third generation the provincial-born which 

 has given rise to the no doubt well-founded remark to 

 which I have already adverted, that the new immigrants 

 are more energetic and industrious than the native pro 

 vincials. Why is it so ? One reason assigned here, as 

 in other places of which I have spoken, is that, so long 

 as you till your own land, or work at it along with the 

 two or three men you employ, the cultivation in the 

 Provinces, as in the States, is profitable ; but that, on a 

 larger scale, farming is not profitable. This is a very 

 general belief in north-eastern America, and, if true, 

 satisfactorily enough accounts for the greater industry 

 and energy of the poorest, and the slackened exertions 

 of the better off. But is the unprofitableness of more 

 extensive farming a necessary or unavoidable thing? 

 This question is a very important one, both to the colony 

 and to intending emigrants. I shall discuss it in the 

 succeeding chapter. 



Leaving the Harvey Settlement, on my way to Fre- 

 dericton, three or four miles of wilderness brought me 

 to the Acton Settlement, which is six years old, and 

 consists of twenty families of Irish. The front lots are 

 occupied by Cork men, Roman Catholics ; the rear lots 

 by Protestants. James Moodie, one of the latter, 

 described them as thriving and contented. He owned 

 three hundred acres. He wished to have farms for 

 each of his three sons, and as soon as they saved 15 

 among them, he bought another one hundred-acre lot. 



On a ridge to the right is the Cork Settlement, six 

 miles from that of Harvey. It consists entirely of Cork 



