NE WFO UN D LAND. 47 



"in 1832. About a year after that Jane married a 

 " young merchant of St. John's, named Wood ; and 

 "Mary accepted one of the small merchants of Car- 

 "bonear, one Tom Gamble, in June, 1836." 

 What society Carbonear possessed was mainly to be 

 met with in the houses of the planters, several of whom 

 were wealthy and hospitable. The name "planter" needs 

 explanation. It had no connection with the cultivation of 

 the soil, although doubtless inherited from colonies where 

 it had that meaning. In Newfoundland the word de- 

 signated a man who owned a schooner, in which he pro- 

 secuted one or both of the two fisheries of the colony, 

 that for seals in spring and that for cod in winter. In 

 Carbonear, a town of some two thousand five hundred 

 inhabitants in 1828, there were about seventy planters, 

 whose dealings were distributed amongst the mercantile 

 houses of the place. Of these, about twenty-five were 

 fitted out by the firm in which my father was a clerk, that 

 of Messrs. Slade, Elson, and Co. In general, business was 

 carried on upon the following terms. The mercantile firm, 

 having a house in England as well as one in Newfound- 

 land, imported into the island, from various ports of Europe 

 and America, all supplies needful for local consumption 

 and for the prosecution of the fisheries, the colony itself 

 producing no provisions except fish, fresh meat, oats, and 

 a few vegetables. The planter was supplied by his mer- 

 chant, and always on credit, with everything requisite, the 

 whole produce of his voyage being bound to be delivered 

 to the house. The planter shipped a crew, averaging 

 about eighteen hands to each schooner, who (in the seal- 

 fishery) claimed one-half of the gross produce to be divided 

 among them ; the other half going to the owner, who in 

 most instances commanded his own vessel. The names 

 of the crew having been registered at the counting-house, 



