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St. Andrews Bay Pilot May 30, 1878Standing at the upper end of the town, and just where Harriet Street coyly touches Water Street, we look away down Water Street, taking into view as best we can its length and its breadth. One mile long it is said to be, by actual measurement. The statement is accepted. Here, at our starting point, a look in the opposite direction sees a dilapidated building—grim and war-like-looking, even in its antiquity. It bears the name of "Block House." "It cants its head towards"—well, the East. Whatever service it may have rendered in the past—it promises none in the present or the future. Now, on each side of the Street, here at the Harriet Junction, are private residences. Those on the water side are not so cozy-looking as their opposites—neither have they fine garden plots as have the others. A few rods bring us to a vacant water lot—and here, some 40 years ago, James Rait, Esq., carried on a great trade as Merchant and Shipbuilder. The buildings were capacious, and in keeping with his very extensive business. Those were the times when grumbling over "hard times" were at a discount. The wail of "no work" was drowned by the busy hum of business on the shore, and the cheery "yo-heave-ho," of the gallant tars in the harbor. Farmers, too, rattling along the streets with the rural products, found ready prices. The wharves presented a lively scene, and prosperity smiled upon St. Andrews. A sigh of regret escaped many a lip when the active business man, James Rait, left St. Andrews for Jamaica. His enterprise was not confined to the town of St. Andrews, only; it was felt in the Parish of Pennfield; and "Rait's Mills" at Beaver Harbor will always be a household word. Nor there alone—out in the Bay on Grand Manan, his enterprise extended itself, as did also that of John Wilson, Esq., of Chamcook; (of whom we will have something to say hereafter) and many an old "saw log" can yet be seen imbedded in the island soil, that escaped the teeth of the . . . ill saw. Those whose memories can carry them back 40 years or more, may remember Mr. Rait as being in personal appearance of splendid physique—tall and portly—pleasing expression of features, and engaging in his manners, the true type of a gentleman-merchant; he was calculated to win esteem, and he did. He died on the island of Jamaica in the year 1842, where his remains are interred. One can hardly pass along from this vacant lot, the former site of "Rait's Store," without a brief delay, as the feeling spontaneously wells up to moralise on the brevity of life—its shifting scenes—its vicissitudes—its joys, its sorrows, it entrees and its exits!