88 COURSE FOR A NEW SETTLER. 



and their descendants have since spread, and cleared 

 much land towards the interior. 



After baiting our horses on the Keswick, darkness 

 soon overtook us, so that the country became invisible 

 during the last ten miles of my ride to Fredericton, where 

 we arrived late at night after an absence of eight days. 



On this excursion I had seen many spots upon which a 

 British farmer, with a little capital, could settle com- 

 fortably, not with the prospect of becoming rich, but of 

 obtaining all necessary comforts, and of placing upon 

 farms of their own any number of sons. But the wise 

 and prudent course for a new settler to pursue is to 

 devote a few weeks to an examination of the country in 

 person, to look at it with an agricultural and practical 

 eye, to consult prudent persons long resident on the 

 spot as to the advantages or disadvantages of the various 

 farms which are to be purchased, and thus, with due 

 caution and deliberation, and after due inquiry, to come 

 to a determination. The emigrant and his family 

 will then easily adapt themselves to their new circum- 

 stances ; and, instead of a temporary resting-place, as so 

 many emigrants make of the first place they settle upon, 

 they will find at once a permanent family freehold and a 

 happy home. 



Aug. 24:th. — I remained at Fredericton only for a 

 single day, during which I visited, among others, the 

 farm of a young improver, Mr Beid, who was spending 

 his money in making land, I may call it, as courage- 

 ously as if he had been an unencumbered Inverness or 

 Aberdeenshire laird. The sloping upland along this 

 part of the river is covered with fragments of sandstone ; 

 but when these are removed from the surface, a soil 

 comparatively free from stones is found, for a depth of 

 from one to three or four feet. 



This is ascribed by some to the fact, sufficiently curious 

 and interesting in itself, that stones and other substances 



