ed. In the winter it has ice communication with
Nova Scotia, from Cape Traverse to Cape Tormentine,--the route of the
submarine cable. The island is as flat from end to end as a floor. When
it surrendered its independent government and joined the Dominion, one
of the conditions of the union was that the government should build a
railway the whole length of it. This is in process of construction, and
the portion that is built affords great satisfaction to the islanders,
a railway being one of the necessary adjuncts of civilization; but that
there was great need of it, or that it would pay, we were unable to
learn.

We sailed through Hillsborough Bay and a narrow strait to Charlottetown,
the capital, which lies on a sandy spit of land between two rivers. Our
leisurely steamboat tied up here in the afternoon and spent the night,
giving the passengers an opportunity to make thorough acquaintance with
the town. It has the appearance of a place from which something has
departed; a wooden town, with wide and vacant streets, and the air of
waiting for something. Almost melancholy is the aspect of its freestone
colonial building, where once the colonial legislature held its
momentous sessions, and the colonial governor shed the delightful aroma
of royalty. The mansion of the governor--now vacant of pomp, because
that official does not exist--is a little withdrawn from the town,
secluded among trees by the water-side. It is dignified with a winding
approach, but is itself only a cheap and decaying house. On our way to
it we passed the drill-shed of the local cavalry, which we mistook for a
skating-rink, and thereby excited the contempt of an old lady of whom
we inquired. Tasteful residences we did not find, nor that attention
to flowers and gardens which the mild climate would suggest. Indeed,
we should describe Charlottetown as a place where the hollyhock in the
dooryard is considered an ornament. A conspicuous building is a large
market-house shingled all over (as many of the public buildings are),
and this and other cheap public edifices stand in the midst of a large
square, which is surrounded by shabby shops for the most part. The town
is laid out on a generous scale, and it is to be regretted that we could
not have seen it when it enjoyed the glory of a governor and court and
ministers of state, and all the paraphernalia of a royal parliament.
That the productive island, with its system of free schools, is about to
enter up