23
the ensuing spring, foreshadows a policy calculated to effect results of great public as well as private utility. The purpose is to form extensive manufacturing establishments upon this territory, and to confer on the operatives the privilege of purchasing small parcels of land, at moderate rates, for their own cultivation. Steam will always readily and cheaply supply the motive power to any extent, for such institutions. I can only thus glance at the scheme, but its importance to individuals and the immense augmentation of the business and wealth of the Island it would promote, must commend it to the earnest consideration of every intelligent mind.
I have, in the preceding pages traced, with a rapid hand, the views I have embraced, after a careful examination of these plains in their various aspects, and all the reflection I have been able to give to the subject. In revolving the different topics I have discussed in my own mind, and comparing these views with the opinions of intelligent and practical men who are familiar with the question, I can discern no cause to doubt the general justness and accuracy of my conclusions.
Possibly, my judgment may be influenced by an undue enthusiasm, but my imagination, penetrating the vista of a few approaching years, perceives culture and beauty succeeding the desolation that now mars and disfigures the scene and revolts the eye; I see a vast champaign, unsurpassed in beauty and luxuriance, spreading over an area of sixty miles in length, adorned by the villa and cottage, redolent with the golden harvest, embellished by gardens and orchards, teeming with flocks and herds, and animated by the clangor of machinery and the pulsations of industry. When this fancy shall, as it must, have acquired the tangible form of the actuality, there will be revealed in this territory to the delighted vision, a scene of beauty, of rural wealth and attractiveness, that will be surpassed in no section of our land.
