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The foregoing pages contain
an account of the principal Scottish Catholic settlements, formed
throughout Prince Edward Island in the early days of the Colony. It would
be impossible within the limits of this small Volume to enter into the
history of the various families, or to delineate the details of the
various happenings, that marked their evolution from poor and obscure
beginnings to the religious and civil development, that challenges our
admiration at the present day. But if we listen to the echoes of the past,
each settlement will tell its story of determination and endurance on the
part of the devoted people, who, exiled from their Motherland for
conscience sake, crossed the stormy ocean and forced the wilds of Prince
Edward Island to lay aside their terrors, and yield up a home and a living
to these hardy adventurers.
Could the screen artist of
the present day go back one hundred and fifty years and reproduce the
scenes, that met their gaze on their arrival on Prince Edward Island;
could he picture their landing at Scotchfort amid the gloom and loneliness
that surrounded them ; could he show us the pioneers of Prince County
making their way westward, the speaking stillness of the primeval forest
beckoning them farther and still farther into its disheartening obscurity:
above all could he make those actors speak and tell us what were the
feelings that welled up within them, what were their misgivings, their
doubts, their anxieties and fears, whilst every hill and brook and tree
seemed to speak of hardships and toil and want to be endured even until
death: and all this not for their own sake but for the sake of their
descendants, that peace and plenty and comfort might be their birthright
in the land of their adoption: what a glorious panorama he would unfold.
What a sermon more eloquent than the most thrilling passage of the world's
greatest orators. What a story he would tell of unswerving attachment to
parental duty, of keen appreciation of holy religion, of unselfish
devotion to God and Country, virtues stamped over the entire face of
Prince Edward Island, by the martyr-like devotedness and heroic tenacity
of purpose, that characterized its Scottish Catholic Pioneers. |
