narrowness of the river. Wave action may also explain the disappearance of 
     
     dikes in some parts of the river below Mt. Stewart. 
     
    

    
     Cattle have sometimes erased evidence with 
     
     their cloven hooves. Heavy vegetation such as 
     
     giant reed grass (Phragmites), cattail (Typha), 
     
     or burr-reeds (Sparganium sp.) sometimes mask the 
     
     evidence. 
     
    

    
     It is 234 years since the dikes have seen 
     
     any maintenance by their builders. 
     
    

    
     Mr. J.A. Macdonald of Cherry Hill whose 
     
     ancestors came to the Cherry Hill area in 1772 
     
     (oral) told Kent and Steves, that the dikes had 
     
     been maintained by the early settlers of the 
     
     English period but by 1900 they had been 
     
     completely abandoned. He explained that a large 
     
     abideau was incorporated in the Mt. Stewart 
     
     bridge about 1900. This made maintenance of the 
     
    

    
     Phragmites dikes unnecessary. 
     
    

    
     The Acadians constructed a system of dikes above Mt. Stewart that 
     
     stretched for four and a quarter miles. I would not care to estimate the miles 
     
     of ditches they dug. The dikes ran from the railroad bridge to the lower side 
     
     of the big S on the north side of the river and from the railroad bridge to the 
     
     upper side of the big 8 on the south side of the river. They also ran in the 
     
     larger tidal creeks a certain distance. These creeks were situated on the 
     
     first mile of river above the railroad bridge. Starting at the railroad bridge 
     
     on the north side of the river the list starts with the Mill creek then Muddy 
     
     creek, Bambrick creek, and St. Andrews creek, with Allisary creek on the south 
     
     side. 
     
    
   
   
    
       
     
    
   
   
    
     Why did they go no further with the dikes than the big S on the main 
     
     river? This is a good question. The marsh was ditched beyond these points . 
     
     Possibly they were interrupted by the conquest, but a description of their 
     
     methods states they built the dikes before they had done any ditching. 
     
    

    
     The large creek above there is the Tannery creek, that has its headwaters 
     
     at the medicinal spring, the Grande Source of the Acadians. When Colonel Louis 
     
     Franquet arrived by boat in front of the Tannery creek in 1751 he gave us an 
     
     eyewitness account of what he saw. 
     
    

    
     "A house that assumed the duties of an inn because of its 
     
    

    
     location was run by the Widow Gentile" , 
     
    

    
     (Spelled the Widow Genty in the_l772 census of the Island.). The house was 
     
     located on the banks of the Tannery creek which he described 
     
    

    
     "Immediately under the dwelling in a miniature estuary, through 
     
    

    
     which when the tide was low, in a bed worn in the slime, ran 
     
    

    
     the limpid waters of a great spring that lay at some distance 
     
    

    
     in the woods". 
     
    

    
     The next day before resuming his journey he admired the grains growing on the 
     
     cleared upland surrounding the marsh. The road to St. Peters Harbour, his 
     
     destination, was so rough that no one would ride the old fashioned choutte 
     
     dragged along by two stout oxen. They would rather walk, only venturing on the 
     
     choutte to cross the unbridged creeks and streams. 
     
    

    
     The meager evidence surviving would seem to suggest the Acadians had 
     
     great respect for the volume of water flowing down the Tannery river from the 
     
     Grande Source. 
     
    

    
     Why were there no dikes here? At this late date we may never know. 
     
    

    
     While there are no dikes here on the edge of the marsh there is a 
     
     different structure. It is about a foot or so high and twelve feet wide. It 
     
    
   
   
    
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