1858 NOVA SCOTIA POSTAL AFFAIRS, ROADS, CANALS, AND OTHER PUBLIC WORKS

1858 NOVA SCOTIA POSTAL AFFAIRS, ROADS, CANALS, AND OTHER PUBLIC WORKS

~POST-OFFICE~

----Nova-Scotia is well provided with postal facilities ; and the post-office department being subject to the control of the provincial Legislature, these facilities are rapidly enlarged and extended as the wants of the country increase. A daily postal communication is kept up between Halifax and Yarmouth to the westward, Pictou to the eastward, and the principal intermediate places. Mails are received and despatched, at least three times per week, at all the most important villages and settlements in the province ; and there is no place which can properly be called a " settlement " which does not enjoy that advantage once, or twice, per week. Besides the overland mails which run between Nova-Scotia and the neighbouring provinces of New Brunswick and Canada and the United States, there is a direct communication with the latter country ever j fortnight, by means of the Cunard steamers ; and a more frequent regular communication is maintained, between various ports in Nova-Scotia and in the United States by several lines of steamers and sailing . packets. The mail communication with England direct is carried on through the Cunard steamers which, in their fortnightly trips each way between Boston and Liverpool, touch at Halifax. By branch steam packets belonging to the same company a fortnightly mail communication is kept up between Halifax and Newfoundland, and Halifax and Bermuda, from which latter place it is extended to the West Indies.

----According to the report of the Post-master General for the year ending 5th October, 1856, there were at the close of that year, in the province, 66 permanently established post-offices, 277 branch offices, or " way offices," and 3,879 miles of mail communication. There is now an established uniform rate of postage throughout the North American continental provinces ; and threepence, Halifax currency — the lowest rate — carries a letter of half an ounce in weight to any part of those provinces. Newspapers are transmitted free of postage.
# **~COMMON ROADS~**

----The roads of Nova-Scotia compare favourably with those in the Northern States. The country being yet new, these means of communication are being rapidly extended every year. The cost of opening new roads is defrayed in part by legislative grant applied directly to that purpose, and in part by sums granted out of the treasury of the county in, or through, which the road is made. The County Treasuries contain the proceeds of a few inconsiderable taxes levied and appropriated by the Court of Sessions. To these means of opening up new lines of road may also be added the voluntary aid of the people immediately interested, which is often contributed cheer- fully and with highly profitable results to themselves. Roads are kept in repair by means of legislative grants, and by a tax, payable in labour, but which may be com- muted for money, levied upon all able-bodied men between the ages of 16 and 60, according to a scale in which their ages, means, and some other circumstances are taken into consideration. Small county appropriations are sometimes made for the same purpose. The annual Legislative grant to the road and bridge service, has gradually increased in proportion to the increase in the revenues of the province. In 1856, it amounted to 45,000. Toll-bars are unknown on the roads of Nova- Scotia ; and there are but two or three bridges in the province, built by companies, at which tolls are taken from passengers.
# **~RAILROADS~**

---Nova-Scotia has somewhat extensive works of this kind now in course of construction. It was determined by the Legislature, during the session of 1854, to commence, as a provincial work, certain lines of railway, to connect Halifax with the interior of the province. Provision has been made for procuring the necessary funds by the sale of provincial debentures in the English money market ; and the works were actually commenced in May, 1854. The lines, so far as already decided upon by the Board of Railway Commissioners, consist of a trunk-line to extend from Halifax to Truro, a distance of about sixty miles, together with two branches ; one extending westwardly to Windsor, about thirty-three miles in length ; the other, eastwardly to Pictou, a distance from the trunk, at Truro, of rather more than forty miles. But it is also expected that the trunk-line will be extended to the New Brunswick frontier — upwards of sixty miles beyond Truro — as soon as a similar work, to be constructed by that province, shall be brought up to the frontier and New Brunswick is already fully committed and actually engaged upon the work which is to cause this extension of the Nova-Scotian lines.

----Of the lines referred to above, there were, on the 1st of June, 1857, but ninety- two miles located and in course of construction or finished. This comprised a part of the trunk extending from Halifax to Truro, and the whole of the Windsor branch. Of this, twenty-two and a half miles only, upon the trunk, was completed and in operation.
# **~CANALS~**

----There is not a finished canal in Nova-Scotia ; but there are two now in course of construction. As early as 1825, operations were commenced for connecting the harbour of Halifax with Cobequid Bay. by means of the waters of the Shubenacadie River, the Dartmouth Lakes, and the " Shubenacadie Canal. " These works were continued for some time, and at a pretty large expenditure of money, but were at length abandoned whilst still incomplete. A new company was incorporated, by Act of the Provincial Parliament, in 1853, to resume and complete the works thus commenced, with some modifications of the original plan. Early in the following year, operations upon the " Shubenacadie Canal " were recommenced. When completed, locomotion is to be aided upon this canal by means of a series of locks and two inclined planes, one of 1,320 feet, and the other of 500 feet in length, to be worked upon by means of water-power machinery. There are to be eight locks only, each of which will be in length 67 feet ; in breadth, 17 feet ; and to have 5 feet depth of water. They are intended to afford locomotion to boats of 100 tons burthen.

----The " St. Peter's Canal" was commenced in the autumn of 1854, as a provincial work. It is to connect the waters of St. Peter's Bay, on the Atlantic coast of the island of Cape Breton, with those of the Bras d'Or Lake ; and, when completed, will divide Cape Breton into two islands. This will be a work inconsiderable as to its- magnitude, but of great importance to the interests of the island of Cape Breton. It will open into the great Bras d'Or a safe and easy entrance, and one by which access to it will be sought much more frequently than through the natural outlet of that lake. The advantages expected to accrue from the completion of the work may be seen by a glance at a map of the country. The length of St. Peter's Canal will be only 2,300 feet; its breadth at water line, 50 feet; depth of water, 1 3 feet. It is intended to have one lock at the St. Peter's Bay termination, and a guard-gate at the Bras d'Or. The length of the lock will be 120 feet ; width of gates, 22 feet. These dimensions are expected to be sufficient to accommodate any coasting or fishing vessel frequenting the neighbouring waters.
# **~ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHS~**

----Every county in Nova-Scotia is connected with the provincial metropolis, and with the neighbouring provinces, and the United States, by lines of electric telegraph. Those within Nova-Scotia are owned and worked by the " Nova-Scotia Electric Telegraph Company." They extend over a distance of 1,124 miles ; and there are thirty-six telegraph offices in the province. The tolls for messages upon these lines are low, being at the rate of sixpence sterling per ten words, for distances not exceeding sixty miles, with proportionable increase for additional words and for greater distances. During the summer of 1856, the " New York, Newfoundland, and London Telegraph Company," succeeded in submerging a cable, by which the Nova-Scotian lines were put in connection with St. St. John's, in Newfoundland. In the Provincial Legislature, during the session of 1857, a bill was passed giving to the " Great Atlantic Telegraph Company ' the exclusive right, for twenty-five years, to land upon the coast of Nova-Scotia a submarine cable, connecting that province with the British Islands.