. Not long afterwards Mr. Simonds built here two tide
saw-mills. These were not a profitable investment, and in 1812 one had
fallen into total decay while the other was so much out of repair as
to be of little benefit to its owner.

After the first Marsh Bridge had been in existence about twenty-five
years there arose a controversy as to what proportion of the cost of
repairs should be borne respectively by the province, the City of St.
John and the proprietors of the marsh. This controversy has continued
to crop up at regular intervals during the last century and the end is
not yet.

When the Loyalists arrived in 1783 the dyked marsh lands produced
about 400 tons of hay, but it was said that "if tilled and ditched
they would produce much more." Today the marsh raises at least four
times the quantity of hay named above.

After building the first running dyke in 1769, Hazen, Simonds and
White continued to devote considerable attention to the task of
reclaiming and improving the marsh. In order to have ready access a
road was laid out running back of Fort Howe hill and along Mount
Pleasant to the marsh. Not far from the present station at Coldbrook
they built a house with hovels for cattle and put up fences and
settled a family there. A few years later they built two more houses
and settled two more families there, each with a stock of cattle. The
first tenants on the marsh were Stephen Dow, Silas Parker and Jabez
Salisbury. The houses built for their accommodation cost from L15 to
L20 apiece. About this time or a little later a small grist mill was
built at the outlet of Lily Lake.

One of the inducements that led James Simonds to fix upon the harbor
of St. John as a place of settlement was the abundance and excellent
quality of the limestone there and its convenience for shipment. The
license of occupation given under the hand of Governor Montagu Wilmot
on the 8th of February, 1764, was in the terms following:

"License is hereby granted to James Simonds to occupy a tract or point
on the north side of St. John's River, opposite Fort Frederick, for
carrying on a fishery and for burning limestone, the said tract or
point containing by estimation ten acres." Soon after the formation of
the trading company in the course of the same year, the manufacture of
lime became an object of consideration. Some reference has been made
already in these chapters to the progress of the industry.

The company had four lime kilns, t