Publisher's Synopsis
Prince Edward Island is situated in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. It lies between 46 and 47 7' north latitude, and 62 and 64 27' longitude west, from Greenwich. As viewed from the north-east, it presents the form of a crescent. Its length, in a course through the centre of the Island, is about one hundred and forty miles, and its breadth, in the widest part, which is from Beacon Point to East Point, towards its eastern extremity, thirty-four miles. It is separated from Nova Scotia by the Strait of Northumberland, which is only nine miles broad between Cape Traverse and Cape Tormentine. From the Island of Cape Breton it is distant twenty-seven miles, and from the nearest point of Newfoundland one hundred and twenty-five miles.
The Island was amongst the first discoveries of the celebrated navigator, Cabot, who named it Saint John, as indicative of the day of its discovery. Britain failing to lay claim to it, the French afterwards assumed it as part of the discoveries made by Verazani in 1523. In 1663 it was granted, with other Islands, by the Company of New France, to the Sieur Doublet, a captain in the French navy, with whom were associated two adventurers who established a few fishing stations, but who did not reside permanently on the island.
