eady by September next, and hope to have it finished by the last of
that month."

[Illustration: ICE-JAM ABOVE GOVERNMENT HOUSE, FREDERICTON, MARCH, 1902.]

The store was built near the site of Government House and according to
Moses H. Perley it was carried away by one of those periodical
ice-jams for which the vicinity of St. Ann's Point has been noted from
time immemorial. See illustration on preceding page of a recent
ice-jam at this place.

Another store was built and Benjamin Atherton took charge of it. In
addition to trade with the Indians he did business with the white
settlers under the name and title of Atherton & Co. Furs and produce
were frequently transported to St. John from the post at St. Anns in
summer in gondolas and in the winter on ice by means of horses and
sleds.

The volume of business in the aggregate was quite large for those
days. In addition to the exportation of furs and peltry to the value
of $40,000, the company sent to New England and the West Indies large
quantities of pollock, mackerel and codfish taken in the Bay. The
gasperaux fishery at St. John was also an important factor in their
trade; in the seven years previous to the Revolutionary war Simonds &
White shipped to Boston 4,000 barrels of gasperaux valued at about
$12,000. They also shipped quantities of bass, shad, salmon and
sturgeon. Perhaps their profits would have been even greater had not
many of the men who were at other times in their employ engaged in
fishing on their own account. The community was not an ideal one for
Mr. Simonds writes: "In the spring we must go into the Weirs every
tide to keep our men from selling bait to the fishermen for rum, which
is not only attended with the loss of the fish so sold, but of the
men's time who would drink so to excess as not to be able to do
anything."

In the Champlain's map of St. John harbor and its surroundings a lake
or pond is shown at the spot where the Union depot and freight sheds
stand today. At the outlet of this pond a dam and tide mill were built
by Simonds and White in the year 1766. The mill was put in operation
the next season and from that day to this lumber has been one of St.
John's staple articles of export. Primitive as was this saw-mill some
difficulty was experienced in procuring proper hands to run it. James
Simonds in his letter of June 20, 1767, to Hazen & Jarvis writes:

"The sloop Bachelor did not return from up the River before this
morning.