IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I !f ilM IIIIIM ■^ IM ill 2.2 ^ 1^ IIIIIM 1.8 11.25 i 1.4 lijli 1.6 V] % h / #// ^^^*' '» .■V' '/ yS^ Photographic Sciences Corporation 23 WeST MAIN STRiET WEBSTER, N.Y. 14S80 (716)872-4503 CIHM/ICMH Microfiche Series. CIHM/ICIVIH Collection de microfiches. Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions / Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiques The Institute has attempted to obtain the best original copy available for filming. Features of this copy which may be bibliographically unique, which may niter any of the images in the reproduction, or which may significantly change thr usual method of filming, are checlted below. □ Coloured covers/ Couverture de couleur □ Covers damaged/ Couverture endommagde □ Covers restored and/or laminated/ Couverture restaur6e et/ou pellicul6e Cover title missing/ Le titre de couverture manque □ Coloured maps/ Cartes g^ographiques en couleur □ Coloured ink (i.e. othjr than blue or black)/ Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) D D Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur Bound with other material/ Reli6 avec d'autres documents r~> Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion D D along interior margin/ La reliure serr6e peut causer de I'ombre ou de la distortion le long de la marge intdrieure Blank leaves added during restoration may appear within the text. Whenever possible, these have been omitted from filming/ II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajouties lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, mais, lorsque cela 6tait possible, ces pages n'ont pas 6x6 filmies. Additional comments:/ Commentaires supplimentaires: L'Institut a microfilm^ le meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Les details de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-dtre uniques du point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier une image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une modification dans la mithode normale de filmage sont indiqu6s ci-dessous. I I Coloured pages/ Th to Pages de couleur □ Pages damaged/ Pages endommagies n Pages restored and/or laminated/ Pages restaurdes et/ou pellicul^es D Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages d6color6es, tachet^es ou piqu6es rrif Pages detached/ Pages d6tach6es Showthrough/ Transparence Quality of prir Quality indgale de I'impression includes supplementary materii Comprend du materiel suppldmentaire r~~> Showthrough/ I I Quality of print varies/ I I includes supplementary material/ Til PC of fil Oi be th sit ot fir sit or Ti sh TI w M di er b( "1 re m D D Only edition available/ Seule Edition disponible Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata slips, tissues, etc., have been refilmed to ensure the best possible image/ Les pages totalement ou partiellement obscurcies par un feuiilet d'errata, une pelure, etc., ont 6t6 filmies d nouveau de faqon d obtsnir la meilieure image possible. This item is filmed at the reduction ratio checked below/ Ce document est film6 au taux de rMuction indiqu6 ci-dessous 10X 14X 18X 22X 2SX 30X V 12X 16X aOX 24X 28X 32X The copy filmed here has bean reproduced thanks to the generosity of: Thomas Fisher Rare Boolt Library, University of Toronto Library L'exemplaire film6 fut reproduit grfice A la g6n6rosit6 de: Thomas Fisher Rare Boole Library, University of Toronto Library The images appearing here are the best quality possible considering the condition and legibility of the original copy and in keeping with the filming contract specifications. Original copies in printed paper covers are filmed beginning with the front cover and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, or the back cover when appropriate. All other original copies are filmed beginning on the first page with a printed or illustrated impres- sion, and ending on the last page with a printed or illustrated impression. The last recorded frame on each microfiche shall contain the symbol -^ (meaning "CON- TINUED"), or the symbol V (meaning "END"), whichever applies. Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper leti hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les images suivantes ont 6t6 reproduites avec le plus grand soin, compte tenu de la condition at de la nettet6 de l'exemplaire film6, et en conformity avec les conditions du contrat de filmage. Les exemplaires originaux dont la couverture en papier est imprim6e sont filmds en commenpant par le premier plat et en terminant soit par la dernidre page qui comporte une emprainte d'impression ou d'illustration, soit par le second plat, selon le cas. Tous les autres exemplaires originaux sont film6s en commenpant par la premidre page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par la dernidre page qui comporte une telle empreinte. Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la dernidre image de chaciue microfiche, selon le cas: le symbols — ^ signifie "A SUIVRE", le symbols V signifie "FIN". Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre filmds d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul clichd, il est film6 d partir de Tangle supdrieur gauche, de gauche A droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la m6thode. 1 2 3 32X 1 2 3 4 5 6 • I iipiiiHipiii ^ Ji.i^f jii(|!i»|i!ii!iiiwjp!Pi}ijsiipi([« DESCRIPTIVE STATEMENT ii- OF THE GREAT WATER HIGHWAYS OF THE DOMINION OF CANADA. H Y D 1^.0 3^0 a Y OF THE 13 ASIN OF THE GULF AND RIVER ST. LAWRENCE, BY THE LATE T. E. BLACKWELL, Esq., C.E. W^ITH APPENDICES RELATING TO THE COMMERCE AND NAVIGATION OF CANADA, BY WM. J.^^PATTEBSON, Secretary of the Montreal Board of Trade, and of the Corn Exchange Association ; also of the Dominion Board of Trade. MONTREAL : PUBLISHED BY DAWSON BROTHERS; AND SOLD ALSO BY F. E. GRAFTON, and DRYSDALE & CO. 1874 ,?J HE 4-01 S3?3 G3G307 PRINTED BY T. & R. WHITE, AT THE GAZETTE PRINTING HOUSE, NEARLY OPrOSITE THE POST OFFICE. INTRODUOTIOJN. ST. LAWRENCE ROUTE FROM THE WES I ERN STATES TO THE OCEAN. iTi' a thread be stretched upon a Globe, from any point in the British Channel to Toledo, on Lake Erie, and arranged so as to be upon the shortest line, it will be found that the St. Lawrence dous not deviate at any point more than 30 miles, connecting^ in the shortest possible distance, with the most capacious, speedy and economical mode of co^nmunication^ the greatest food-consuming country in Europe, with the greatest food- producing country in America. — inhabited by the parent and offspring of the most favored race of men. The coast of British America is more than 1000 miles nearer to Britain than New York, — because every degree of longitude contains a less number of miles as we approach the poles. The comparative distances shew that Lake Erie is 548 miles nearer Liverpool, with a lockage of 158 feet less than by the Hudson ; the cost, charges, and time occupied, prove that the voyage may be performed at a saving of 10 cents per bushel of wheat, and in 9 to 17 days less time by the St. Lawrence than by New York. * The ocean freights between the Ports of Quebec or Montreal, and New York to Liverpool, from 1846 to 1864, are said to have been very largely in favor of New York. It is alleged that this striking difference is to be attributed to the closing of the St. Lawrence during the winter season, and the high price of insurance arising from the hazard thus increased. • A writer in the London (Eng.) Morning Chronicle, February, 1858, said :— The dis- tance from Quebec to Liverpool is 475 miles less than from New York to Liverpool. Kingston, at the foot of Lake Ontario, is 125 miles nearer Liverpool than New York. From Hamilton, at the head of Lake Ontario, is the same distance as from New York to Glasgow. From Lakes Ontario, Erie, and the southern point of Huron, is nearly a straight line to the ports of Great Britain, through the Straits of Belleisle. W. J. P. warn IV ' In the above statement there appears to be a double mistake : — (1.) The average date of first arrivals at Quebec is, say, 1st May — and their departure may be prolonged to the ist December. The average opening of the Erie Canal, at Buft'alo, is about the 25th April (10 or 12 days before a boat could reach Albany^ , and the close is about the 5th December. In point of time, then, the duration of navigation is equalized by both routes by water. (2.) By a comparative statement of actual losses on the coast of the United States and in the St. Lawrence, is shown a far greater number on the former. An extensive ship-owning house, who are their own insurers, only lost two out of 406 vessels employed in the Quebec trade during 11 years. The chief cause of the difference is, however, that steamers and sailing vessels to New York now carry the greater part of the emigration and freight to that port ; this cause will, it is hoped, soon be removed, by the employment of a larger number of screw steamers in the St. Lawrence trade, which will consequently tend to bring a more extensive emigration and freight by that route, which must be found to be the shortest, the cheapest, and the safest, between the West and Europe. A supply of large first-class propellers can at any time be found for the inland traffic above Quebec. The great and leading object, to secure the carrying trade between the West and Europe, is cheap ocean-freights, every other advantage being in favor of the St. Lawrence route. the la I am indebted to a friend for the foregoing statement, — (written about twenty years ago,) — by the late John Bruce, Esq., at one time Comptroller of H. M, Customs at Quebec, and subsequently Secretary of the Board of Trade of that city, Mr. Brucc's paragraphs are given without emenda- tion, — rather as a text, than a dissertation ; and they are made, not inappropriately it is believed, to introduce a more elaborate, but still exceedingly popular account of the Great Water Highways of the Dominion. Anything like a general idea of the route of the River St. Lawrence, ought to embrace a description of the natural features of the vast area of arable, mineral, and timber-lands, to which it stands in the relation of an highway. Such a description, involving great labor and expense, was prepared by nistake : — Maj — and le average (10 or 12 ut the 5th 3 equalized of actual D, is shown ing house, m])loyed in and sailing ration and ed, bj the Lawrence emigration ortest, the )]y of large iflSc above le between advantage itten about Comptroller the Board it emenda- made, not , but still ys of the Lawrence, - of arable, highway. spared by the late T. E. Blackwoll, Esq., C.E., and some time Managing Director' of the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada, in a paper read before a meeting of the American Philosophical Society, at Philadelphia, in March, 1866, and subsequently published in the transactions of that Society. The opinion having been expressed, that it was a pity Mr. Blackwell's interesting treatise should remain in the archives of a Society in the United States, unknown to the general public in Canada, I have risked an humble attempt to give it greater publicity. But for the additional pecuniary outlay that would have been incurred, I would gladly have arranged for the republication of the entire document, — with all the accompanying illustrations. The present publication, therefore, consists: (1.) of Mr. Blackwell's very popular and instructive treatise, slightly abridged, — its unity remain- ing unbroken, a few changes rendered necessary by lapse cf time being given within brackets [ ] ; and (2.) of a series of Appendices, elucidating many of the points referred to by him, — the whole forming a comprehensive, and, it is hoped, an interesting descriptive statement of commercial progress in the Great St. Lawience Valley. The various statements in the Appendix may not coincide exactly with all the conclusions arrived at by Mr. Bruce ; nevertheless, his gen- eral accuracy is quite remarkable, when it is recollected that he could not have had at hand such variety and details of information as are now accessible. It may be remarked, that, while a good deal of the information in the Appendices, has been specially prepared for this work, a portion of the matter has been reproduced from some of the earlier numbers of the Annual Reports compiled by me, and published at the instance of the Montreal Board of Trade, and Corn Exchange Association, — some infor- mation being also taken from the Report of the Canal Commission, 1871. The attention of the reader is requested to statements contained in Appen- dices No. V. and VI., on pp. 67-69, — relating to the Flour and Grain Trade of Canada, since 1793, — also respecting the Grain Trade of this City from 1845, — with comparative rates of freight, &c., &c. The movement of vegetable food from West to East, by rail and water, through the State of yi New York, during a series of years, is also presented in tabular form. An important letter from Hon, John Young, Chairman of the Montreal Board of Harbour Commissioners, is printed in Appendix No, VII., — see p. 70. The accompanying skeleton map is merely intended to show compar- ative distances by various ocean routes. An examination of the exceed- ingly useful map of Canada, prepared by T. C. Keofer, Esq., C.E., for the Paris Exhibition of 1855, (with subsequent additions.) — will show that the shortest line that may bo drawn from New Orleans to Glasgow touches the Province of Quebec, passing through Miramichi in New Bruns- wick. A straight line from San Francisco to Cape Canso in Nova Scotia, passes through Sault St, Marie and (north of Montreal) through the city of Quebec, The shortest route from St. Louis to Liverpool would pass far to the north of this city ; and it would, therefore, appear that all that part of North America west of St. Louis, will find the shortest, and other- wise most available route for exporting to, or importing from Europe, to be that which is afforded by the River St. Lawrence. It would have been easy to expand this pamphlet by adding state- ments regarding the British American route to Japan and China, when the Canadian trans-continental railway is built. The locations of a few cities are given in the Map, — Montreal being more particularly referred to, on account of its intermediary position between ocean and inland navi- gation. But the main object of the present publication is to supply for easy reference, in a convenient and concise form, information principally in the interest of European, and especially of British merchants, that they may be able to appreciate more fully that the River St. Lawrence is the most available highway for their commercial intercourse with the interior of North America. BYD Montreal, SOth November^ 1874. WM. J. PATTERSON. form. An trcal Board -sec p. 70. ow compar- the exceed- ., C.R, for - will show Glasgow few Bruns- )va Scotia, ^h the city kvould pass at all that and other- luropo, to ing state- ina, when of a few T referred land navi- lupply for rincipally that they ce is the B interior CONTENTS. BYDJIOLOGY OF THE BASIN OF THE GULF AND BIVEll ST. LAWRENCE. PAOK. Topography 9 — U St. Lawrence River IT — 22 St. Clair flats 22—23 Ico 23—27 Winter and Lumbering 27 Meteorology 28 — 29 Floods 29—30 Fluctuations of level in the elevation of the surfaces in the great Lakes 30 — 32 The Ottawa 32—35 Canals of Canada 35 — 40 Improvements to the navigation of the inland waters of the Newcastle district. 40 APPENDICES. Appendix No. 1 41 — 46 Length of Gulf, River, and Inland Navigation 41 Depth of water in the harbors of the Inland Lakes , . 42 — 43 Inland Navigation — from Chicago to Atlantic Ports 43 Opening and closing of navigation at Quebec, and at Montreal for fifteen years , 44 First arrivals from Sta, at the ports of Quebec and Montreal, from 1831 to 1874 45 Sea-going Tonnage at Montreal 46 Atlantic winter ports of the Dominion 46 Appendix No. II 47 — 51 The Canal system of Canada 47 — 49 Dimension of the Canals of the Dominion 49 Opening and closing of Canal Navigation from 1850 to 1874 50 Proposed Canal Improvements 51 Appendix No. Ill 82 56 Marine disasters on inland waters — with tabular statements of classifica- tions of vessels disabled, months in which disasters occured, &c. . . 52 — 64 Statement of <9•••• 61 62 lur ;; 63 • • • • 63 64—69 6-1- -66 rt Col- and to 66 67 G8 ik, via igston. 68 69 69 70 -71 sioneri 1 ade, — ents.. 70 —71 HYDROLOGY OF THE BASIN OF THE RIVER £AINT LAWRENCE. TOPOGRAPHY. The Lydrographical basin of the St. Lawrence is divisible by geographical lines and geographical features into six basins. The first embraces the Gulf and the lower river as high as Three Jfivers, and includes the tidal estuary of the Saguenay as high as Chicoutimi, seventy miles above its mouth. The second is the basin of the St. Lawrence proper, embracing the river between Three Rivers and the Thousand Islands, a distance of two hundred miles; together with the Ottawa River, between Montreal and the Lac des Chats, a distance of one hundred and twenty miles; the St. Maurice, from its mouth to the entrance of the mountains, thirty miles ; and on the other, or southern side, the valley of the Chaudiere, and the St. Francis, the plain of the Richelieu, and the valley of Lake Champlain and Lake George. From the head of Lake George to the mouth of the Richelieu, is one hutidred and ninety miles. The third basin embraces Lake Ontario, with its so\ithern tributary, the Genesee River, descending from the table-lands of Pennsylvania, through Western New York, and its northern tributary, the Trent and Otonabee, meandering through a labyrinth of lakes which dot the uneven table-land between the shore and the foot of the Northern mountains; the principal, taken in a west-east order, being Scugog, Balsam, Camerons, Sturgeon, Pigeon, Buck- horn, Mud, Salmon, Trout, Rice, Stoney, White, Belmont, and Marmora Lakes. . The fourth basin is that of three upper great lakes, embracing Lakes Erie and St. Clair, Lake Huron and its Georgian Bay, with Lakes Sinicoe, Nepes- sing, and Tamagamingue, Lake Michigan and its Green Bay, together with a narrow fringe of short affluents, draining small areas in Northwestern Ohio, Northern Indiana, and Eastern Wisconsin, as well as the two principal peninsulas •of Michigan and Upper Canada. 10 The fifth is the basin of Lake Superior, separated from the other great lakes by the Sault Ste. Marie, and fed by the smaller lakes and rivers from the unexplored lands beyond. The sixth is the great general basin of the North ; a country of unknown extent, studded with lakes, and traversed by the mighty branches of the Ottawa, by the St. Maurice, and by the rivers flowing from all sides into the Lake St. John, and Saguenay. * The first, or tidal basin, of the Gulf and Lower St. Lawrence, is in fact a prolongation of the basin of the St. Lawrence proper, eastward, beyond Three Bivers, and differs from it no otherwise than in being tid.il, and therefore, also, of greater breadth. As it is of no particular interest in the discussion of the hydrography of the flowing, waters of Canada, and as its limits are also prolong- ations of the limiting mountain ranges of the basin of the St. Lawrence lliver proper, no further notice of it seems necessary, than to mention that the influence of the tide is felt upon the surface of Lake St. Peter, a broad expanse of the river, beyond the stated head of tide at Three Rivers. The St. Maurice Eiver enters the St. Lawrence not far below this lake, its embouchure being nearly on the boundary between the two first basins. This point is ninety miles above Quebec, where the lower river, as it is callui , commences. The Saguenay comes into it one hundred and len miles below Quebec ; and one hundred and twenty miles still further down, at Point des Monts, the estuary, widening suddenly on the north, may be considered as merging in the Gulf, but the south shore moves forward in an unbroken curve for one hundred and thirty miles more to Cape Gaspe. The whole length of the tidal basin may be therefore called four hundred and fifty miles. The basin of the St. Lawrence proper is limited, both on the northwest and on the southeast, by mountain ranges. That on the north is called the range of the Laurentide Mountains. That on the south is called by various local names, but may be termed the range of the Green Mountains. The Laurentide Mountains begin in Labrador, at the Straits of Belleisle, and run on in a southwest direction parallel in several instances, spreading out southwards so as to form bold bluffs and mountains close to the water's edge, as at Cape Tourment, which is sixteen hundred feet high ; tlicy range at an average distance back from the Gulf and river from twelve to fifty miles ; across the Saguenay and behind Quebec, across the St. Maurice and behind Montreal, up the Ottawa to the Lac des Chats, a distance of at least seven hundred miles. They form the northern background to all the pictures of the river scenery. They are composed of the oldest rocks known to geological science, and spread themselves at an average elevation of about two thousand feet above the sea, back from the front line just described, over a table land of forests and lakes, far towards the waters flowing into Hudson's Bay ; westward, beyond Lakes Huron and Superior; and southward, across the * For details of Gulf and Inland Navigation, see App. No. I. 11 Ottawa to the foot of Lake Ontario, and across the St. Lawrence at its outlet from the lake, into Northern New York, filling up the country west of Luke Champlain with mountains, some of which exceed five thousand feet in height above the sea. The western or head line limit of the St. Lawrence River basin is at the foot of the Laurentian rocks, from Lac des Chats on the Ottawa, to the Thousand Islands on the St. Lawrence. Its northern border is formed by the Laurontide Mountains north of the Ottawa, and its southern by the Laurentian Adirondack Mountains of New York, along the Canada Boundary Line. The triangular space between the Ottawa and the St. Lawrence, with its apex at Montreal, is a great plain of almost horizontal lower Silurian rocks, covered with variable depths of post-tertiary clays, showing themselves in remarkable terraces around the border lines, at an average elevation of two hundred feet above the plain. Five or six masses of trap form as many isolated mountains, from six hundred to twelve hundred feet high, standing upon the plain like stranded slups upon a beach. One of these is the mountain of Mont Royale. Around tlicse island-mountains the terraces of post-tertiary clay are visible. The plain, however, is not confined to the triangular space between the two great rivers ; it spreads on eastward, past the Richelieu and Lake Cham- plain, to the foot of the Green Mountains, next to l>e described, and so along the range past the Yamaska and St. Francis, in a long and narrow belt, even to Quebec. The whole area of this plain thus described contains about eighteen hundred square miles, the most of which is fertile arable land, well watered and level, through the midst of which flow the two great rivers named. The only important adjunct of the basin of the St, Lawrence proper is to be found in the extension of this lower Silurian plain soutnwardup the Vermont, or eastern shore of Lake Champlain, the western or New York shore of which rises at once into the Adirondack heights. Starting from the head of Lake Champlain, a narrow winding gorge between high mountains of Laurentian rocks terminates in Lijke George .(so famous among tourists), the upper end of which is separated only by seven miles from one of the principal head rivers of the Hudson, the dift'erence of elevation, however, in favor of Schroen River being at least five hundred feet. We must now describe the eastern portion of the southern barrier of the St. Lawrence basim It has no conncclion whatever with the western portion already described. Lake Champlain, with its side plain of lower Silurian rocks, opening up a great highway between Canada and the Atlantic Slates, isolates the Adiron- dack Mountains on its western shore from the Green Mountain range, from which its eastern aflfluents descend. Unlike the Laurentide Mountains on the north, the southern limit of the basin is a corrugated plateau or chain of parallel ridges of quartzite, slate, and limestone rocks, of lower Silurian age, about fifteen hundred feet high, upon the top of which rise to a still loftier elevation the Sohick-Sbock, and other isolated groups of synclinal lower Silurian mountains, probably connected geologically with the Kalahdin Mountains of Maine, and the 12 "Wbite Mountains of New Hampshire. Commencing at Cape Gasp6, this harrier ranges along the southern shore of the Gulf and Estuary, in a graceful curve, three hundred miles, to the neighhorhood of Quebec, where it leaves the river, by slowly diminishing the radius of its curve, towards the south. Crossing the Chaudiere and St. Francis, the waters of which drain back valleys, it skirts the great plain, and enters the State of Vermont, which it traverses under the name of the Green Mountains, three thousand feet high. It is continued as the Berk- shire Hills in Western Massachusetts, and as the Taconic Hills in Eastern New York ; crosses the Hudson as the Highlands of West Point, and the Delaware as the Durham, or Easton Hills. Lost for a few miles between the Schuylkill and the Susquehanna at Harrisburg, it re-emerges from beneath the New Eed plain as the chain of the South Mountains of Southern Pennsylvania. In Maryland, it crosses the Potomac at Harper's Ferry, to form the Blue Ridge of Virginia, and the Smoky Mountains which divide Tennessee from North Carolina ; where the Black Mountain group, a little east of the line, attains elevations ranging between six and seven thousand feet above the sea. Traversing Georgia, the chain sinks beneath the Cretaceous plain of Middle Alabama, and is seen no more, after having a geographical range of not less than sixteen hundred miles. The geological cause for the shape and position of the estuary and lower river of the St. Lawrence must not be overlooked. It is to be found in the presence of a remarkable fault or fissure in the crust of the earth, running close along the southern shore from Gaspe to Quebec, thence through the middle of the plain up the east shore of Lake Champlain, and down the Hudson River into New Jersey. All the rock formations on the northern and western side of this fault, both in Canada and in New York, are thrown down to a depth varying from five to ten thousand feet. The top of the lower Silurian system in the west wall of the fault, is brought down to a level with the bottom of the same system in the east wall. In these soft Hudson Eiver slates, as they are called, have therefore been excavated, all along on the west side of the fault, the estuary of the St. Lawrence, the Lakes St. Peter and Champlain, and the Hudson River valley ; for the same agency brings abruptly to an end in the Catskill Mountain, three thousand feet high, on the west bank of the Hudson River, the Alleghany Mouc- tain system coming up from the southwest through Middle and Northern Pennsylvania. Passing now to a description of the basin of Lake Ontario, its limits are of quite another order. Its eastern end abuts against the Laurentian rocks of the Adirondack Mountains of New York, and its outlet is over the low and narrow barrier of the same forming the Thousand Islands. The lake itself is excavated out of the soft lower Silurian rocks described. The northern limit of the basin is an east and west line, about fifty miles back from the northern shore ; the western continuation of the Laurentide Mountains in their course from the Thousand Islands to the foot of Lake Simcoe. Its southern limit is made by three remarkable escarpments, ranging in parallel east and west lines from the f / 13 ? Hudson River to Lake Erie, caused by the broad outspread and almost imper- ceptible southern dip of the whole Palaeozoic system, from the Potsdam sandstone at the bottom of the Silurian, to the coal beds at the bottom of the Carboni- ferous rocks. This dip being towards the south, and away from the great lakes, the basset edges of the formations necessarily front the north, and form a series of steps or terraces facing the north, while down the southern slope of these strata flow all northern subsidiaries of the Delaware, Susquehanna, and Ohio Bivers, almost from the margins of the lakes themselves. The lowest escarpment is that of the Niagara or Middle Silurian Formation, which commences at a slight elevation between Albany and Utica, along the south side of the Mohawk Valley, and crosses the Niagara Eiver at Lewiston. Back of this runs the escarpment of the Helderberg or Lower Devonian lime- stones, forming high hills south of the Mohawk, but dying away as it approaches Lake Erie. Still further south, and at a still higher elevation runs the high escarpment of the upper Devonian sandstone, from the base of Catskill Mountain, on the Hudson, to Lake Erie, along the southern shore of which it ranges away beyond Cleveland into South-western Ohio. On the summit of this uppermost platform, and at an elevation of fifteen hundred feet above the sea, and one thousand feet above Lake Erie, lie outspread the broad, flat shallow basins of the bituminous coal field of Pennsylvania and Ohio, constitutiug the great Appalachian coal basin. From the northern part of this coal field the Genesee Eiver cuts down through all the escarpments into Lake Ontario. Across the soft Lower Devonian terrace between the middle and upper escarpments, lie in parallel north and south, cut valleys, the deep and narrow lakes Canandaigua, Cayuga, Seneca, Crooked Lake, Auburn, and Skaneateles, all of them, with Lake Oneida at the foot of the lowest escarpment, drained by the Oswego River into Lake Ontario. But the principal drainage of Southern New York, even from the edge of the Niagara escarpment, is the other way southward, through the upper escarpment, and by deep gorges in the Alleghany Mountains of Pennsylvania, by the Susquehanna River and Chesapeake Bay, into the Atlantic. In Western New York, the same set of the waters away from Lake Erie carries the drainage into the Alleghany, the Beaver, and other affluents of the Ohio, the head waters of which, therefore, overlook Lake Erie, a thousand feet, from a distance of scarce a dozen miles. There is one spot in Potter County, Pennsyl- vania, where the same cloud will shed its waters by the Genesee into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, by the Susquehanna into the Cheapeake Bay, and by the Alle- ghany into the Gulf of Mexico. Following the lowest or middle Silurian escarp- ment across the Niagara River, we see it become the constant limit of the basin of Lake Ontario. At Lewiston Heights it is three hundred and sixty feet above the lake. Rising slowly as it enters Upper Canada, it sweeps close around the head of the lake, runs northward, and then northwest along the southwest shore of Georgian Bay, and projects into Lake Huron at Cape Hurd ; casting off southwestward 14 all the way of the waters of the peninsula into Lakes Erie, St. Clair, and Huron, and forming a well-defined barrier for a separate water-basin between three hundred and four hundred feet above that of Lake Ontario. On the top or back of the escarpment, south of Georgian Bay, are piled upper Silurian strata to an eleva- tion fifteen hundred feet above the sea, in what ai-e called the JMue Mountains. By the run of the escarpment, Georgian Bay would seem to be excluded from the region of the upper lakes?, and to belong properly to the area of Lake On- tario. It and Lake Simcoe, in fact, lie in uu excavation of the same lower Silurian rocks with the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Lake Champlaiu, and Lake Ontario, and in the prolongation of the belt of small lakes to the north of Lake Ontario. A water communication by these larger lakes and the streams which connect them, has been, in fact, accomplished by means of a system of canals, which has replaced the old portages or carrying places where no navigable water passages existed. Yet in spite of this geological and commercial connection, Georgian Bay is an arm of Lake Huron, and at a level above Lake Ontario of three hundred and forty-four feet, while Lake Simcoe, which communicates with it, lies one hundred and thirty-three feet higher. The explanation of this anomaly is to bo found in the rise of the surface of the lower Silurian rocks in that direction, the whole broad outcrop being covered over with a sloping plain of northern drift, among the hillocks and ridges of which lie tlie smaller lakes, and a barrier of which effectually cuts off all hydrographic connection between Lake Ontario and Georgian Bay. Excavated, as has been said, in the same soft rocks of the lower Silurian system, in which Lake Champlain and the Gulf of St. Lawrence have been excavated, Lake Ontario would form part of the same water-basin with them, were it not for the intervention of the Laurentian rock barrier at the Thousand Islands. There was a time, no one doubts, and tliat in recent geological days (when tliis part of the continent was submerged from three hundred to four hundred feet beneath the present ocean level), that two broad estuary connections were established between it and the ocean ; the one round the Adirondack Mountains to the north, over the plain of Montreal, the other to the south, through the valley of the Mohawk. At that time, of course, North- ern New York was one island, and Vermont and Western Massachusetts was another ; while the north shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence extended up along the foot of the Laurentide Mountains to the Lac des Chats. The basin of the Devonian lakes, as they are called, is now to be described. The Niagara barrier seems to end at Cape Ilurd, the north of Georgian Bay, but is, in fact, continued as the Manitoulin Islands around the head of Lake Huron, and the foot of Lake Michigan, through the Straits of Mackinaw, and forms those two remarkable promontory peninsulas which almost isolate Green Bay from Lake Michigan, in the same way as the escarpment isolates the Geor- gian Bay from Lake Huron. Geologically considered, Green Bay is yet another of the lower Silurian lakes ; while hydrographically, it is but an arm of Lake Michigan. The Niagara barrier, much attenuated, and therefore low, continues \ 15 south-ward to the head of Lake Michigan, obliging the waters of Wisconsin to feed Green Bay before they can enter Lake Michigan. Curving round the head of Lake Michigan, the Niagara rocks sweep east- ward in a narrow belt to the head of Lake Eric, thus closing a hydrographio, as well as a geological circle, around the great peninsula of Michigan, with its isolated coal basin in its centre. In troughs hollowed out of the concentric belt of soft Devonian shales, just inside this circle of Niagara rocks, lie Lakes Mi- chigan and Huron ; and in a third trough excavated from the same shales, thrown eastward by the great Detroit and Cincinnati anticlinal, lies Lake Brie, also. This anticlinal is a swell of the earth's crust, separating the Appalachian coal area of Eastern Kentucky and Tennessee from the coal area of Western Kentucky and Illinois, and casting off the rock-dips gently east and west from its broad back. Commencing in Tennessee, it crosses the Ohio in the region of Cincinnati, and the head of Lake Erie into Upper Canada. But for this anti- clinal Lake Erie would have had no existence ; and the other two lakes must then have emptied their waters by way of Georgian Bay into Lake Ontario. The escarpment, limiting Lake Erie on the south, has already been described, and the dispositiv^n of the head waters of the Ohio to form along its summit and flow south. In like manner, but in a more remarkable degree, the belt of Niagara rocks, circling around the head of Lake Michigan, cuts off the drainage into it. The head waters of the Illinois, a tributary of the Missis- sippi, and of the Wabash, a tributary of the Ohio, start close to its margin on their long career to the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, there is a marsh but five miles back of Chicago, only seventeen feet above the level of the lake, and in wet seasons its waters flow partly into the laki and partly down the Illinois. Only at the head of Lake Erie can drainage be S'vid to enter, in any abundance, the Canadian Basin. Here the Miami brings in the waters of a belt of Lower Devonian country of no great size, lying along the anticlinal in Northern Indiana. The basin of LaJce Superior lies apart from the other great lakes, at the extreme north-west limits of the formations which have been described. Its immense area, and profound trough, nearly eight hundred feet deep, excite new interest by their surroundings. Hollowed out in part from the lowest Silurian rocks, it is the highest of the lakes. Its mineral resources, copper and iron, belong to still older formations, which surround it on all sides except the south. Laurentian and Huronian mountains support a back country of forests and lakes of great extent, which pour their waters into all its shores, and offer commerce with the unknown regions of the interior of the continent ; in fact, the western end of the great northern basin drained by the Ottawa, St. Maurice, and Sague- nay. All that can be said of this northern basin ia, that it is a wilderness of small lakes, the areas of which, if summed together, would make a water surface nearly, if not quite, as extensive as lake Ontario, and of rivers rivalling in magnitude the largest affluents of the St. Lawrence. ■^ 16 The Ottawa, by which the waters of this region find their way out of the Laurentian mountains, at the Lac des Chats, upon the plain of Montreal, is so- copious of flood, that it colors with its brown waters the north side of the cur- rent of the St. Lawrence Kiver as far down as Lake St. Peter ; just as the turbid waters of the Missouri color the west side of the Mississippi far below St. Louis, Large as the St. Maurice River is, it is not larger than the Gatineau, one of the northern branches of the Ottawa. The Saguenay is but a tidal estuary arm of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the outlet of Lake St. John ; but into this also flows from all sides the drainage of another section of the same area. Reviewing, then, the narrow southern and western border, and feeble tributaries of the chain of great lakes, and the small rain areas of the peninsulas of Michigan and Upper Canada inclosed between them ; and on the other 1 ind, the great outspread of the northern basin, its many large rivers and standing lakes, it may be justly said that the basin of the St. Lawrence is the basin of Canada ; that it belongs almost wholly to the North, and finds its grandest hydrographic traits of charac- ter in a country almost unexplored. Its whole area Sir William Logan has stated at five hundred and thirty thousand square miles, more than eight- tenths of which he says belongs to Canada, and the residue to the United States. Its chief peculiarity lies in the reservoirs of water, great and small, scattered over almost its entire surface, protecting its rivers from those disastrous floods which desolate the river banks of other regions of the world, especially the neighboring valleys of the Western States. So effectual is this protection, that the total variation of the level of the St. Lawrence River, due to excessive rains or melt- ing snows, and exclusive of the local influence of the ice-gorges at its narrows, does not exceed three to four feet ; whereas the Ohio River at Cincinnati has been known to rise sixty feet in as many hours. Having described the leading features of the topography of the basin, and shown how this must depend so largely upon the geological features of the whole district, it is further to be remarked that sheets of water, besides the larger lakes, the names of which have frequently occurred in this description, are very numerous, and that they are found extending over a vast area of country princi- pally on the north side of the longitudinal axis of the basin. It may be said that ail the largest of these lakes are hollowed out in the old Laurentian formation, and in its bands of limestone ] and, as has been mentioned, similar depressions occur in the azoic rock of the Adirondack country. The smaller lakes occur, also, to a very large extent, in drift on both sides of the axis of the valley ; and of these we may mention the series lying upon the course of the Otonabee and the Trent, on the north side of Lake Ontario. But the most extensive development of these small surfaces of water occurs in that flat region of country forming the great southern peninsula of Michigan, which is generally described as covered with a great thickness of drift. In the course of the Michigan survey, the topographers have already laid down on the maps fourteen hundred and twenty-five lakes, occupying areas of » f .* 17 from one thousand to three thousand five hundred acres, which would be in the proportion of one acre of water to thirty-nine acres of land. We cannot properly pass from this subject without referring to Lake St. Clair, which is only a shallow depression in the drift. It consists of an expan- sion of the straits leading down from Lake Huron to Erie, and may be assumed as twenty-one miles in length, by eighteen and a half in width. Its depth is only twenty feet, and Lake Erie, which does not exceed eighty-four feet, is the recipient of the alluvial deposits of the rivers which flow into it. The inlet to Lake St. Clair is an interesting delta, and islands of alluvium are constantly forming, which tend to choke up its numerous channels. Although the average depth of Lake St. Clair is about twenty feet, the navigation through it has to pass a channel which is naturally about ten feet. A moderate gale of wind soon raises a sea in this shallow lake, causes the whole to become turbid, and tends thus to distribute the detrital matter, and to convey it through the Detroit straits into Lake Erie, where similar accumula- tions, on a larger scale, occur. The depth of Erie over its upper end scarcely averages eighty feet, its deepest part being near the east end, where it begins to narrow towards the outlet, in the direction of Niagara. Here, too, an ordinary storm raises a very heavy and somewhat dangerous sea, and soon disturbs the bottom, and favors the distribution of natural deposits which settle in calmer weather in the upper portion of this shallow basin. Eeflecting upon the relative levels of these upper lakes, and the peculiar character of the water-shed which limits the basin on the west side of Lake Mi- chigan, it appears that if the barrier now regulating the discharge through the Niagara Eiver were lifted to the extent of about thirty feet, the whole of the great lakes would be converted into one vast sea, on a uniform level, which, while placing under water from eight to nine thousand square miles in Western Canada and Michigan, and the other borders of the lakes, would determine the direction of the outlet of this great basin towards the Mississippi, and place the present dividing ridge from seven to eight feet below the surface of this expanded sheet of water. RIVER ST. LAWRENCE. • The whole of the River St. Lawrence, from its entrance at Pointe des Monts to Montreal, has been elaborately surveyed by Admiral Bayfield ; and the charts and sailing directions which are published by the Admiralty are so extensive and so well known, that it is deemed wholly unnecessary to make any statements with respect to the navigation of the tidal part of the river. The tides at Quebec range, upon the gauge which is there fixed, from eighteen feet at spring tides to thirteen feet at neaps. Unusually high spring * See App. No. I. for a number of interesting particulars relative to opening and closing of navigation, &c., at Quebec and Montreal. T 18 tides, accompanied with gales of wind from the northeast, occasionally give from two to two-and-a-half feet more at high water, and a smaller range towards low water, but the mean for all practical purposes may be taken at seventeen feet. At neaps the tides range about eleven and a half feet, the low-water level both at spring and neaps, rarely varying more than eighteen inches. Spring tides are felt up the river as far as the entrance into Lake St. Peter, which for all hydro- graphical purposes may be described as the head of tidal navigation. From this point onwards the river has for some years past been the object of constant su- perintendence ; and works of considerable magnitude have been carried out for improving this navigation, together with that of the river up to Montreal. The depth of water existing on the Flats of St. Peter in 1845, is i-eported by the authorities as only capable of passing vessels drawing not more than eleven feet at low stages of the river, and other impediments existed in the river above. But under the direction of the Harbor Commissioners of Montreal, a general deepening of the whole of the fairway of the navigation, wherever necessary, is being carried out. The works consist of a channel dredged out of the clay and mud bottom of Lake St. Peter, three hundred feet wide, and is intended to aflFord a depth of water, when completed, of twenty-one [24] feet at low water. [Lake St. Peter is 21 miles long. The improvement of its navigation was first suggested about the year 1836, — the work on the '* straight channel " being commenced in 1844, but abandoned in 1847, after an expenditure of $300,000. Operations were begun on the natural channel on 12th June, 1857, and con- tinued, with some interruptions, until now that the dredged channel is Hi miles long, 300 feet wide, and 9 feet deep, at an expense of $1,250,000, — admitting of the large steamships of the mail line coming up to the wharves at Montreal. The quantity of silt taken up and deposited on the flats at more than a mile from the dredged channel, was about 4,500,000 cubic yards. A further deepen- ing has been determined upon, so as to give a depth of 22 feet (and ultimately 25 feet or more) at low water, to admit of the largest steamships coming up to the wharves without lighterage.] From this point to Montreal the general course of the river is direct, although the fairway of the channel is somewhat tortuous, and there are many islands of alluvium which divert the direction of the fairway, but all the courses are duly marked and lighted, and no diflBloulty is felt in clearing vessels through the improved channel between Montreal and Quebec* The slope on the surface of the river from the head of Lake St. Peter to the foot of St. Mary's current (a small rapid at the lower end of the harbor of Montreal), is about two and three-quarter inches per mile, and the average velocity is one and a quarter miles per hour in the fairway channel. The rapid last mentioned is formed in a con- tracted part of the river between St. Helen's Island and the north shore, which * See App. No. III. for statements of disasters and wrecks on Lake and Biver navigation. 19 is here about t\^o thousand feet across. The current through the rapid in ordi- nary stages of the water, is about four and three-quarter miles per hour, but occa- sionally reaches from five to five and a quarter miles per hour. [The harbor of Montreal has wharf accommodation for a large and increas- ing trade, — the ocean vessels visiting the port in 1873 representing 413,4*78 tons, and the river and inland craft 933,462 tons. This accommodation has been obtained by building wharves of crib-work out into the stream of the River St. Lawrence, and by dredging out a suitable depth for vessels to lie alongside. The existing wharfage measures 17,140 lineal feet, or say 3J miles. There are 4,450 feet of wharf room in 10 feet depth of water ; 11,090 feet in 20 feet; and 1000 feet in 24 feet ; there being 3,700 feet more under contract in 24 feet, and 1,800 feet in 10 feet of water, — with contemplated additions of 11,700 feet, which will make a total lineal extent of Q>\ miles of wharf-room. The increased capacity of ships coming up to Montreal is indicated by the following memo- randa from the Harbor Master's Register, — showing the draught of water of vessels clearing at the Custom House during the past six seasons : — IS ft and over. 19 ft and over. 20 ft and over. •21 ft and over. 22 ft and over. Total draw- ing 18 ft to 23 ft. No of vessels in 1869 41 68 97 95 86 73 26 48 47 63 52 39 38 17 18 21 30 29 14 5 7 4 17 18 6 none. 2 2 7 12 125 « « « 1870 138 « " " 1871.... 171 «< " « 1872 185 « « « 1873 192 « « « 1874 171 In the season of 1873, four vessels cleared from Montreal drawing 23 feet ; in 1874, one vessel cleared drawing 23 feet, another 23^- feet, but the re- turns were not complete at time of going to press.] * This harbor was, until the construction of the canals, the head of navigation for sea-going craft ; and until the commencement of the canal system, the real difficulties of the navigation of the river began at this point. It was a great thing to witness a river, rarely less than two miles in width, gradually extending to twenty miles, flowing for five hundred miles of its course ■with great regularity for eight months in the year, and affording accommodations for square-rigged ships of six hundred tons, which then reached Montreal ; it was another thing to attempt the movement of freight from this point upwards. The work up the Valley for the first ten miles above Montreal, was performed either by the Portage Road, so called, or by dragging up by the sides of the rapid cur- rent, with long teams of oxen or horses, sometimes in, sometimes out, of the water ; and such portages as these occurred at nine distinct points between • See a very important Letter from Hon. John Young, Chairman Board of Harbour Commissioners, in Appendix No. VII. y^ Montreal and Kingston, and similar portages were also necessary on the Ottawa. N^ The work was chiefly done by canoes or large bateaux, which rarely ex- ceeded twenty-five tons burthen ; and it may readily be understood how the freights and charges, for the movement of goods and passengers, acted as a most formidable barrier to progress in the settlement of the country ; and as move- ments over the deep alluvial soil of the valley, in a state of nature, could only be undertaken either in the driest season of the year, or in sleighs over the snow, it is not surprising that forty [fifty] years ago, the settlements of Canada con- sisted only of a few villages and farms fringing the most favorable sites on the banks of the river and Lake Ontario. Still more difficult of access was the country, and more sparse the population of those then remote regions on the border of the upper lakes. The Niagara Portage was, however, established early in the f /esent century,, and assumed a great importance up to the time of the completion of the Welland Canal. While up the Ottawa, the country at the beginning of the present cen- tury, on both sides of the river, could have advanced but little in material pros- perity and settlement since the time when the Jesuits narrated (in their most interesting letters written one hundred and fifty years before), their occasional visits to these regions. There are, however, two periods which we must now mark, as the first great steps towards the real progress of the country ; and one of these which has only fulfilled in American waters what has been the result in all others, is that of the commencement of steam navigation ; the other is the establishment of the canal Bystem. It is an agreeable fa.ct to state that on the River St. Lawrence, and on Lake Champlain, almost the first successful attempt was made to employ steam for the propulsion of vessels ; and the following narrative, drawn up by a local committee, will be read with some interest by engineers : — * " In 1807, Fulton first launched his first steamer on the Hudson. In 1809, his example was followed on Lake Champlain and the St. Lawrence. " The first movement towards the steam navigation of the St. Lawrence was • The following facts in the history of steam navigation, may be noted here : — In the year 1831, the steamer " Koyal William," built at Quebec by a ship-builder named Black, — (it has been stated that Mr. J. S. Campbell was the builder,) — was finished on 15th July, and registered 363 tons at the Custom-house in that City, on 22nd August. This ship was owned by Messrs Finlay, Walker, and Leaycroft^- Trusteea for the Quebec and Halifax. Steam Navigation Company. The "Boyal William" appears to have plied between Quebec and Halifax until 1833; and in that year she made the first trip across the Atlantic that had been accomplished entirely by steam propulsion. She was cleared at the Custom-house in Quebec, on 3rd August, 1833, — McDougall master; — sailed &om that port for London, on Mondaj morning, 6th August, at 5 o'clock, and (having called at Pictou, N.S.) made the passage in 25 days.— W. J. P. m 21 made by the late Hon. John Molson, in conjunction with David Bruce, a ship- builder, and John Jackson, an engineer. " The vessel built by them was the * Accommodation ; ' she was but a small boat, seventy-two feet in length, with sixteen feet beam, propelled by an engine constructed by Mr. Jackson, of not much exceeding six horse power. " It required no ordinary courage and enterprise on the part of these pioneers, to undertake the difficult task which they thus essayed. But all the difficulties encountered were successfully overcome, and on All Saint's Eve, 1809, the steamer started on her first voyage to Quebec. As she passed after nightfall some of the settlements, going without sails against an easterly wind, the sparks flying out in a continuous stream from her funnels, as has been the case elsewhere, the consternation of the inhabitants residing along the bunks of the river, at the unwonted sight, must have been very great ; and we can easily suppose that it might well be taken for some phantom ship, or other fearful ap- parition. It was held dangerous to continue their progress through the night, and three days were consumed in the downward trip of one hundred and eighty miles to, and four days in the upward one from, Quebec. Therefore it was, that those who had to reach Quebec either by the tedious land route or the more uncertain transport of sailing craft upon the river, hailed the prospect of this more swift and certain steam navigation with satisfaction. The experiment proved a failure. The engine was, of course, too weak, and of imperfect con- struction. " Yet notwithstanding the lack of immediate success, and the money lost by the first attempt, Mr. Molson did not abandon the enterprise. His practical mind saw, even in that failure, the certainty of a final success, which he lived to realize. He went to England, and there contracted with the firm of Bolton & Watt, for the engine of a larger boat, some of the^castings and rougher parts of which were made in Lower Canada. The London engine builders could build the engine, but they knew nothing of the appliances by which it was adapted to navigation : these required to be furnished here, "In 1811, the new vessel, the ' Swiftsure,' was launched and at work, and ic. 1812, did ' the state some service ' in the transport of troops and stores during tlie unhappy interruption of our relations with the United States. This boat had nearly five times the power of the ' Accommodation.' Her length was one hundred and twenty feet, her beam twenty-four feet, the engine was rated at twenty-eight horse power, and she was fitted up and equipped in all respects in a superior manner. " The * Malsham ' was the next boat placed on the line, still superior to the * Swiftsure ; ' and after her the * Lady Sherbrooke,' vessels at that time of very considerable tonnage and power. " At this period the river was not lighted and buoyed as at present : it was, therefore, thought unsafe to run after dark. The pilots, too, were less experienced than at present : it was, therefore, usual to anchor at night. Frequent and expensive delays were also caused by strong southerly winds in getting up the current St. Mary, more especially when the boats were heavily loaded, as they generally were at that time. Oxen and horses were sometimes employed to tow the vessels up this very powerful current. " In a few years later than the period referred to, we find the St. Lawrence Steamboat Company, and their competitors (afterwards their coadjutors) the Montreal Towboat Company, running their boats during the night with perfect safety, and ascending the current in any state of the wind, triumphing over all the former difficulties of the navigation. J\ 22 " To the Into founder of the St. Lawrence Company, the lion. John Molson, the celebrity of bcinf^ the first to establish steam traffic on our noble river must be accorded, — a traffic which, by the enterprise of Upper Canada and that of our neighbors in the adjoin in<^ States, is now made to enter from Superior City, on Lake Superior, and Chicago, on Lake Michigan, to the ocean, — aye, and across the ocean, also. " To the lute Robert Hamilton, Esq., Upper Canada is indebted for the first steamer on Lake Ontario, the engine of whose boat was constructed from the model of the ' Malsham's ' eng'ne. " In contrast with the dimensions, power, and speed, of the little * Accom- modation,' we subjoin those oi'thc ' John Munu,' the largest steamer now (185G) plying between this city and Quebec : Length, 312 feet. Breadth of beam,... 29 « Cylinder 72 inches'. Stroke, 11 foet. " She made the downward trip easily enough in ten hours, and the upward in from eleven to twelve hours." In 1819, ^'' the canal system was begun in the construction of the Lachine Canal, and following this, other works of the same nature, for the improvement of the Ottawa and the St. Lawrence, which will hereafter be described. From Montreal up the natural course of the river, there is a series of rapids which give a high velocity to the water, in some cases not less than eighteen miles per hour, which give rise to a rapid turbulent stream, over a rocky bottom of an uncertain depth; alternated with lakes or wider stretches of the river, which have reduced the velocity to a minimum of half a mile per hour, in the centre of Lakes St. Louis and St. Francis. ST. CLAIR FLATS. Among the works undertaken on the line of inland navigation, is the deepen- ing of the St. Clair Flats, forming the delta at the head of the shallow lake elsewhere described. Up to the year 1856, great inconvenience was felt at this point, particularly at low stages of the western waters where there was barely six feet of water in some places ; and to escape the shoait. and shifting sands (which in rough weather were even dangerous), it was the common practice to lighten, at a considerable cost, a part of the cargoes of the ordinary lake schooners. The attention of the United States and Canadian legislatures was at length successfully drawn to the subject, and appropriation was made accordingly, to eflfect the clearing up, and buoying and lighting of a channel ; and since that time, viz., from and including the year 1857, to the end of 1858, the total quantity of dredgmg done was one hundred and fiftyjthousand seven hundred and sixty cubic yards, and the channel at the upper end was made two hundred feet wide, the average width being two hundred and seventy-five feet wide. The channel is now [1865] excavated to insure a minimum depth of twelve * See App. No. II. 23 foot throughout ; and in the middle of the channel, for a width of two hundred and thirty feet, the depth is thirteen feet. * There are three main channels or passes through the delta, known as the North, Middle and South Passes, — the latter being the one selected for the oper- ations described, and forming the boundary line between Canada and the United States. ... ICE. The phenomena attending the formation of the ice, and its removal, which form the natural limits to all the economical operations of the people living within the district, deserve especial consideration. During the long winters, in the earlier periods of the history of the country, the people were driven to their homes, without much occupation beyond what was essential to the support of ex- istence. It was a period of four months, with a mean temperature of twelve degrees below the freezing point, — but with extreme fluctuations, of deep snows, — and durins which, if they could not obey the same instincts which led most ol the animals of this vast region to migrate, they would follow that of others which were fitted for hibernation. It is this curtailment, perhaps ot a third part of the year, which has encouraged — if it has not developed — that remarkable activity and change in habits (rapid as the changes of the temperature itself), observable in every person and in every operation, upon the opening of uavigation. Travelling through the Northern country, and the transportation of goodSy during the open seasons, since the discovery of Canada, were chiefly carried on through the lakes, rivers, and streams, in bateaux, or canoes hollowed out of pine logs, — or in the still more fragile craft, birch-bark canoes, — which were hauled out at rapids and falls, and carried around by the Portage roada to the navigable water above or below, as the case varied. These brought into action a peculiar class of hardy French-Canadians, with Indians and half-breeds, all known as " voyageurs," and ic is not to be wondered at that the opening of the long-frozen waters is hailed with pleasure, as the commencement of a new existence, in the interior of the country. The temperature of the lakes and rivers, and of the soil, has been referred to ; and the study of a sufficiant number of observations would probably enable us to define the general laws of cooling : but all the leading phenomena con- nected with the advent of winter, and with the well-established but slight moderation, known as the " January thaw,*' the mode and time of breaking up of the ice, have naturally been long and patiently watched and noted ; and as the variations of temperature and their effects on the streams and rivers are again and again repeated, with much general regularity, there is little room for error in taking only a few years' observations for the establishment of the leading general characteristics of a given locality ; and the uniformity of recur- See depth of water in inland harbors, in App. No. I. 24 rence in the phenomena under consideration is one of the most striking features of tie natural history of the country. The average number of days of closed navigation is :* At Quebec, At Montreal, 146 Of the St. Lawrence Canals, 135 Of the Ottawa, Of the Lake at Kingston, . , 90 Of Lake Erie, at Buffalo, . 130 Of the New York Canals, 134 Of the Welland Canal, 116 Of the Detroit River, 117 Of the Sault Ste. Marie Canal, 156 Of the Illinois and Michigan Canal, . . . . . . 118 The few frosts which occasionally occur early in October, and effect that remarkable change in the color of vegetation so often dwelt on by those who have resided in, or visited, during the " fall," the northeastern portion of the continent, are generally followed by unsettled weather, with occasional heavy rains, and a temperature corresponding to the mean of the year. This is suc- ceeded, early in November, by a slight flurry of snow, and then by a warm and genial season, with an increased d<^ree of moisture in the air, and a peculiar haze, much resembling our season of early October in the southern counties of England, and is called, in the transatlantic country, the "Indian Summer." This charming period is suddenly terminated by cold, clear weather, and by about the 25th of November the still waters become frozen on the surface. ■Generally by the 5th of the following month, there is a fall of more or less snow, which, while covering with a protective mantle, and retarding the cooling of the earth, aids the formation of the " ground ice," or " anchor ice," in the streams. The author, having attentively watched the formation of this description of ice, recognizes it as the precise repetition of the same phenomenon in the Thames and Kennet, of England. The results of his observations in England, on the rivers named, have been supported by similar observations in American rivers, and serve to show that the primitive crystals of ice formed first in contact with the cold air, at the surface of the streams, or derived from snow falling thereon, are carried down, by counter-currents and eddies, below the surface, where they become fastened to the best conducting media. Occasionally portions of the agglutinated mass are broken off by the force of the current, or by other causes, — among which majj be, and probably is, the change in the atmospheric pressure, and in the temperature of the stream, and consequent change ici specific gravity, which would induce the rising of the mass to the surface ; and in the large American rivers this soon takes effect, and the whole becomes frozen into a solid mass of field or surface * See opening and closing of navigation at the ports of Quebec and Montreal, also Jn the Canals, in Appendix Nos. I. and II. 25 features 45 35 90 L30 134 L16 117 156 118 ffect that hose who on of the aal heavy bis is suc- warm and aliar haze, ounties of Summer." r, and by le surface. ' less snow, ling of the le streams, icription of he Thames , have been [)W that the the surface [ down, by fastened to ed mass are ichmajf be, temperature ould induce ers this soon d or surface Montreal, also ice. Much of the ice, however, is for the time held to the bottom, by contact with stones or u rocky bed, and is then known as anchor-ice. Much travels, rolling slowly along on the bed, loaded with gravel or sand, which i ^creasing the specific gravity of the mass, prevents its rising to the surface. Soon the small bays and indentations of the banks fill up, and shallows become more effectual barriers to the stream, producing comparatively still waters, which, under the influence of thj all-pervading cold, with the increased falls of snow, augment the thickness and strength of the floating masses. Then begins an actual blockade, causing an increase in the height of the river, whi«h relieves, for the moment, some of the ice and the pent up water, which flows towards the next retarding point. In the large rivers this is particularly interesting, and some of its features are really imposing. At Montreal, for instance, the movements are possessed of a certain degree of grandeur. Here the current, before described, flowing between the northwest bank and St. Helen's Island, although the narrowest channel, soon becomes the master current ; for that which flows through the wider and shallow space, on the south side of the Island, although really in the most direct course to the lower reaches of the river, soon becomes almvet blocked up. The great discharge of the field-ice, broken up first in the Eapids of Lachine, is, to a partial extent, reset into floes in the Bay of Laprairie, above the Victoria Bridge, and approaches the St. Mary's current in such masses and quantity as soon to fill up the reaches below, which, by this time, are more or less blocked up by the accumulation of the solid field ice, which commences in Lake St. Feter, and extends for many miles upwards through the low islands and over the shallow rivers between Sorel and Berthier. The next blockade below the city forms at Boucher ville, where local circumstances favor its collection. The subsequent filling up of the whole surface of tae river, for about seven miles of its course, is rarely the work of three days. Now the most interesting feature begins to show itself. The ice continues to come' down in undiminished quantity and mass, and gradually reduces the channel of St. Mary's Eapid, which results in a rising of the surface to obtain the required discharge through the diminished cross section. Oflen temporary relief is obtained. The water falls suddenly, and rises again, for like reasons, until at length an uniform " regime " is established. During these sudden rises and falls, the ice coming down with the velocity due to the river, pushes or shoves and packs, — rising up and piling itself in mounds on the banks ; covering the wharves — already submerged — to the extent of from two to twelve feet ; mounts, generally, a retaining wall twenty feet above the ordinary level of the river, occasionally packing and piling upon it, and obstructing the wide front street, with a mound rising in some instances to the eaves of the warehouses, from twenty-five to thirty- five feet high. In other places, as on the low islands in the river, and in shoals in that part m 26 II I » of it opposite the city, the accumulation goes on, while the projecting up-stream side of St. Helen's Island receives its share. Doubtless the discharge of the river is, to some extent, reduced in quantity through the freezing up of streams whose volume is not regulated by lakes on their respective water-courses; and the discharge of the large lakes is also greatly reduced by the obstruction caused by the barrier of ice across their mouths ; and where, as the head cannot rise in the like proportion (t. t. to a degree sufficient to compensate for the reduction of the hydraulic mean depth of the river at its outlet), the mean velocity and discharge must decrease. Such effect, at least, is perceived at the lower parts of the river, where, in general, from six to ten days elapse after the final taking, and all shoving has ceasf'. The whole surface then falls, except in those parts where the ice has grour ; for although the ice is, over a good part of the area under consideration, estimated at from ten to twelve feet thick, some portions may be deeper, and actually resting firmly on the bed of the river. There successively appear indications of shoal water : and we may recognize in some of the large mounds on the surface, when it has fallen to its final " regime " of minimum level (which is attained generally in ten days after the final tt{king), the shoals and dangers of the navigation, — a sort of parallol repetition and model of the surface of the bottom. The circumstances which have been here related occur again at most of the Jtapids ; and there are interesting illustrations every year at Lachine, — on no oc- casion or place more so than the remarkable shove which took place last Decem- ber [1865 ?], four miles above Montreal, also at Cornwall, and in other Eapids uj, stream. Similar effects take place on the river in the Eichelieu Rapids, below Lake St. Peter, which generally rises far above its usual level, and causes considerable inundation in the district above this part of the river, and on both sides of it. But perhaps the most striking feature of the season is its breaking up, which is generally attended with the same features on evon a more extended scale, the average period of this being about the 10th of April; and at Montreal it has been accompanied by many curious effects, of jamming and shoving, and what is more important, by certain occasionally attendant floods, so as to render it a matter of surprise, in spite of repeated warnings, and with a past history of the river, which nature has painted in such distinct and marked lines as cannot be misin- terpreted, — that the subject of a remedy has not long since met with more becom- ing attention from the authorities of the city, especially in the interest of a portion of it extending towards Lachine swamp, which bears marks of its ancient office, as an important channel of the river. The breaking up is always accompanied by the shoving, and generally with more or less packing. In these movements are tested the value of the cribwork elsewhere described. The wharves being kept low, they are comparatively clear of the moving mass of ice ; and if sufficiently loaded with stone, and left with smooth surfaces, do considerable injury results. Instances of the removal of y ' ^ 27 large masses of cribwork. although known, are rare ; and where they have oconred, the fact has generally arisen from want of attention to their loading or their un- due height, or to injudicious position or direction of their sides. The tidal portion of the river occasionally " takes" at the Eichelicu Rapids ; and in about four years out of five it takes for a few days, at least, and sometimes even for the whole time, in the narrow gorge of the river, opposite Cap Rouge, from six to eight miles above Quebec. At Quebec the much wished for " taking," and the formation of a "pont" so called, is less frequent; and it seems that one year in four is about the fre- quency of occasions. When the ice bridge or " pont " exists, the surface is generally frozen for a considerable distance to the head of, and sometimes down both channels of the river at the sides of, the Island of Orleans, from one to six miles. The navigation at and below Quebec soon generally becomes obstructed through the large accumulation of drift-ice in the tideway, which fills up most rapidly, and sometimes to the extent even of almost the whole surface of the xiver, for eighty miles down its course, before the end of January. The manner of its accumulation is chiefly to be observed in the bays aad indentations, where accumulations go on increasing until an occasionally higher tide than usual floats large fields of ice into the stream ; this, of course, generally drags along the shore of the river, or becomes attached to older drift-ice, or to stones and rocks, which it grinds and rubs to a smooth, rounded, moutonnee sur- face, recognizable on all rocks subjected to glacial action, and a " bordage " accumulates, having a width and thickness chiefly affected and modified in form by winds and tides. WINTER AND LUMBERING. The progress of civilization i d of trade in Canada, has developed occupa- tions for the farmers in winter, who avail themselves of the frozen rivers and lakes to move heavy loads of produce which oould not be carried over the un- metalled roads of this vast district of soft surface clay and marl, and, therefore winter is now looked for with almost as much interest as the harvest. The lumbering operations of Canada are almost all performed in the depth of winter, and while there is a great depth of snow, the trees generally being felled when there is from two to three feet of snow in the woods. These are then hewed down to suitable sizes, and hauled out by horses, on the snow or across the ice to the frozen streams, upon which they are moved forward, first singly, then in drams,— a number of which go to form a raft, — and in this state, at the opening of navigation, they travel for many hundreds of miles, down rivers, across lakes and overcoming rapids by means of slides or shoots, having a slight depth of water to facilitate their movement. i f 28 METEOROLOGY. 1 With respect to the temperature of the waters of the valley of the St. Ltw- rence, the writer is not aware of any other continued observations thanr those which have been made in the Eiver St. Lawrence at Montreal. The following is the result of one year's observations on the mean tempera- ature of the water, and the mean temperature of the air, taken at two stations at 9 A. M., noon, and 3 and 6 P. M., for the year 1861, neur to the City.* These results show that the mean temperature of the year was 45.03''; that the mean of the air during November, December, January, February and March, 151 days, was 24.20"; that the maximum was 47.50'', and the range 76°; and that the number of days at and below zero was 16 ; at and below 32°, 113 ; and at and below 24.20*", the mean, 75, That in the next period, — April, May and Octo- ber, — 92 days, the mean was 49.23**; the maximum, 73. 50^; the minimum, 21.50° ; the range being 52'^ ; and at and below 32'', there were 8 days ; at and below 49.23*^, 58 days ; at and above 60^^, 19 days; at and above 70°, 3 days. Of the remaining 122 days, namely, June, July, August and September, the mean was 07.91'' ; the maximum, 91** ; the minimum 45.50" ; the range, 45.500. That at and below 50", there were 4 days; above 67.91°, 86 days; at and above 80°, 14 days ; at and above 90", 3 days. The total number of days in the year below 32", was 121; the extreme range of the year, between 9 in the morning and 6 in the evening, was 119.5"; in any 24 hours in the summer, was on July 10th and ilth 20.50°; and in winter, January 10th and 11th, 38". The mean temperature of the water, during the year, was 45.80" ; the mean of the month of August was 69", and of January, 30.50". And the records show that the temperature of the water for four months, namely, January, February, March, and December, were, respectively, 30.50", 30.55", 31.20", and 31.90°. The extreme range of the temperature of the water was 46", — its maximum temperature was 75", on the 5th of August, and the minimum 29", on the 8th of February, on which day the minimum atmospheric temperature was also observed. The mean temperature of the soil has been observed, for a considerable period, at Burlington in Vermont ; and also at Dr. Smallwood's Observatory, at Isle Jesus, near Montreal ; and the mean temperature, at four feet beneath the surface, is stated to be 44.70". The majority of deep springs which have been observed by the author give a temperature of 44". With respect to the penetration of the frost into the ground, much depends upon the nature of the soilj and character of the vegetation, or the depth of • The observations were made, and elaborate statements prepared by Mr. Thomas D. King of Montreal, — tables of the daily observations being printed along with Mr. Blackwell's treatise. The table containing summary of means, &c., for the year will be found in App. No. IV.— W. J. P. 2» 3t. Ltw- an- those- tempera- stations * These ,he mean 51 days, that the d at and nd Octo- linimuni, ; at and 3 days, sptember, le range, 86 days ; umber of , between rs in the 10th and i 45.80=" ; And the January, 31.20°, 46°— its num 29°, nperature Qsiderable vatory, at neath the have been h depends depth of [r. Thomas g with Mr. e year will ■snow which covers the surface of the earth. But as a general rule, for the guidance of engineers in the country, it is stated that no water-pipes are safe at a less depth than four feet ; and at this depth there were many indications of frost during the existing winter, in the trenches prepared for gas and water- pipes, in the city of Montreal. FLOODS. Attention has been drawn to the remarkable absence of floods in the Eiver St. Lawrence. Although those in the Ottawa are felt, yet they rarely exceed seven feet in the greatest instance, the whole basin forming an exception to the general rule of all North American rivers. In fact, taking the St. Lawrence Eiver proper, from Lake Ontario downwards, it is most remarkable that, except under the influence of the packing of the ice (the efiects of which are elsewhere explained), the floods in the river, due to freshets, are scarcely perceptible; the extreme fluctuation which generally takes place in the months of April and May being about two feet two inches above the normal level. This is, of course, due to the compensating effiect of the great lakes, the area of the rivers themselves, and the uncounted lakes and swamps scattered over the whole of the basin on the slope of the northern side of the drainage area. And it is not a little remarkable that these lakes appear to be most numerous in the Laurentian system. The same feature is observable in the Adirondack region, which is also full f streams and lakes, many of which are found at seventeen hundred to eighteen hundred feet above tidewater at the head of the Moose River, and the Black Biver, naturally draining into Lake Ontario, at Sackett's Harbor, and lying closely con- tiguous to the head waters of the Screen and Mohawk, flowing to the Hudson, and those of the Raquette, which drains into the St. Lawrence, at Cornwall. If we examine the basin of the Ohio (the southern neighbor of the St. Lawrence), draining the northeast portion of the Mississippi basin, and havmg its source from five hundred to one thousand feet above the level of Lakes Ontario and Erie, the dividing ridge not averaging thirty milen away from the shore of l)oth of them, and having an area of about two hundred thousand square miles, one is struck with the remarkable contrast in its discharge. The river flows for its entire length (about nine hundred miles), in its low state with a gentle current, uninteroepted by rapids, exoept at the Falls of Ohio, near Louisville, where there is a sudden fall of twenty-six feet in three miles ; and it is daring the summer season a scanty, shallow stream, a suooession of long pools and ripples, with a current alternately sluggish and rapid, with bars in the upper part of it eeDsisting of gravel, and in the lower part of shifting sand. The rain fall of the Ohio Valley may, perhaps, slightly exceed that over the average of the St. Lawrence Valley, as far as we have the means of cafculatmg (the average fall Ofer its area being, perhaps, fifteen per cent, more than that of the St. Lawrence basin) ; yet the range between extreme low and extreme high .'jui The fluctuation, as may be supposed, ill a matter' of extreme importance to the, various interests which have sprung up on the borders of the lakes, and the great rivers connecting them, but to none more than to the canal interests, a»in the case of the Erie Canal, at Black Rock, the supply to which canal is derived through its uppermost reach, direct from Lake Erie, and in which the extreme fluctuations that occurred, as recently as in 1863, caused very consider- able anxiety to the managers of that canal ; and the relief from which was only to be fiound, in the deepening of the whole of the canal for about twenty-two mileSf the gTeater part of it through a limestone cutting. As to the causes of this class of fluctuations, a great variety of suggestions hare been thrown out, ^nd, as it appears to the writer, some degree of unn«eeB~ li, it is forty-five ieet below them ; confluence with [ceed twenty-five i occasionally as 3, and generally bout six weeks, lins, lasting from le. In October oats of eighteen se, and continues e autumn rains, E SURFACES rtained as to the d in the " Rela- )ondence sent to subject. Later in Canada, from ) waters of Lake ly in the course 1 falling fourteen iters, as well as e attributed the rio, and on Lake iu to partial and ons existing over several years to erne importance )f the lakes, and e canal intereste, which canal is nd in which the ed very consider- whioh was only bout twenty-two y of suggestions gree of unnvew- 31 sarj difficulty suggested, as to the explanation of the causes, which we should probably find little difficulty in explaining, and even of predicting the fluctuation?^ if suitable arrangements existed for obtaining data by a sufficiently extended series of observations upon the quantity, the rate, and the time of the fall of rain and snow, and of all the other meteorological phenomena which affect the conversion of the snow into vapor or water. It would be necessary to record the prevalence, direction, and continuance of the winds, which are observed to produce the most extraordinary effect on the surface of these lakes. And, lastly, should be observed the manner and the form of the taking of the ice at the outlets of these great lakes. This latter feature appears to have been almost entirely overlooked in the suggestions which have been made to account for the increase or decrease of level in the lakes. But it will at once be apparent that the existence of a broad belt of ice over the whole surface of a rapid river, running at the rate of from three to four miles an hour, must have a great effect in regulating the discharge of that river, and so far modifying its surface. For instance, as at Fort Gratiot, at the foot of Lake Huron, where the river is about nind hundred feet wide, and usually runs at the rate of about three and a half miles per hour (the depth being about forty-five feet), through about half a mile of its course. The river, also, for several miles below, has about double the width mentioned, and is from twenty- five to thirty-five feet deep, with a fall of about six inches per mile, producing a surface velocity of 1.45 miles per hour. The flatter surface last mentioned is generally covered with ice throughout the winter, but the rapid at the lake outlet is rarely covered more than once in five years. And under these circumstances, it will be observed that the hydraulic mean depth will be reduced from forty to forty-five per cent., by addition of the coating of irregular masses of ice forming the surface, which thus adds to the wetted perimeter, our divisor in hydraulic calculations. The same facts have been observed to take place at the discharge of Lake Brie, near Buffalo, which is described by Major Lachlan, in the Canadian Journal, of 1854, at the breaking up of the ice of that year, as having had the effect of reducing^ for forty hours, the discharge of the Niagara lliver, so as (according to other testimony), to have reduced the apparent discharge of the cataract by at least one-half, and on which occasion operations were carried on by the mill- owners, on the American side of the river, far out into the stream. The writer also observed, in September, 1857, a rise of two feet nine inches, in the level of the water at the Ferry wharf, below the Falls, which took place in the course of one night. This result was not due to rain, nor to any other circumstance, but the continuance, for about twelve hours, of a heavy gale from the southwest, which had the effect of raising the head, and thus increasing the discharge through the rapids at Buffalo, so as to require the additional head of two feet nine inches, in the reach of the river, immediately below the Falls, to enable that defsp section of the river between the Falls and the Suspension Bridge, to carry off the increased volume. 82 The writer by no means desires to imply that all these fluctuations in levels are to be explained by the effects of the accumulation of ice, or by its entire absence ; as it is obvious that these only form one of the many circumstances which regulate the very interesting phenomena to which reference has been made. It will be observed from the facte above stated, that notwithstanding the extensive area of these great lakes, which act in general as compensatory reservoirs, in equalizing the discbarge to an almost uniform quantity ; yet there are times, as before explained, when an excessive discharge, as well as the reverse action, will introduce abnormal conditions which would have to be eliminated in any calculations of actual quantity ; and it may be stated, as an interesting fact bearing on this subject, that the rise of water, to the extent of one foot, on Lake Huron, for about twenty hours, in the summer of 1858, appears to have aflfected the dis- charge of the whole of the River St. Clair, the Detroit River, and the intermediate Lake St. Clair, throughout its length, the increase twenty miles down having been about seven inches, and at Detroit two and three-quarter inches : the central surface velocity at the point first mentioned being increased from three and a quarter to six and a half miles per hour. Up to the present time [1865] there have, unfortunately, been very few opportunities of obtaining these observations by any special scientific or pro- fessional investigation. THE OTTAWA. The Ottawa is a magnificent river, having three points of confluence with the St. Lawrence; one passing by Yaudreuil, entering at the foot of the Cascade Rapids, another by St. Anne's, at the upper part of Lake St. Louis, about twenty-four miles above Montreal, and the third opposite Yarennes, thirty miles below i)hat city. The northern stream (which flows to the north, and thus insulates the district of Montreal), bifurcates near the village of St. Eustache, and further insulates the distrist of Laval, known by the name of Isle Jesus. The two reuniting once more close to the lower confluence with the St. Lawrence, both branches of the river pour down their brown, peaty-oolored waters and stain the north-west side of the St. Lawrence nearly into Lake St. Peter, the blending there being favored by the various currents induced by the low alluvial islands occupying the river, which is about six miles wide (between Sorel and Berthier). From St. Anne's, passing up the Ottawa, we pursue an almost westerly course to Ottawa, one hundred and ten miles above Montreal, where the Fall known as the *< Chaudiere," interrupts the navigation : the Fall itself, with six miles of rapid water above it, having a total descent of sixty-seven feetw In that part of the river now described, the Ottawa receives many very important afflutnisfrom the northern side, draining the front and the vast platean in rear of the Laurentian Hills. The chief of these are the " Dn Lievre," and the '< Gstineau ; " the latter joinmg dose to the town of Ottawa, and having its; 83 eouroea as far north as the forty- eighth parallel, its head waters lying closely oontiguous to the head waters of the St. Maurioo and the Saguenay. A very limited extent of settlement has been carried out in this direction, and the region is comparatively unexplored and unknown, — still less surveyed ; although thoso who have crossed it in various directions report it as being filled with uncounted lakes, which regulate the annual supply to the rivers of the whole of this vast region. The affluents on the south side are the Petite Nation, and the Rideau Eivers, the hesid waters of the former draining back into the country, within nine miles of the main stream of the St. Lawrence, at Prescott, where its head water is forty-nine feet above it, and about ninety feet above its confluence with the Ottawa. The line of the main channel of this small stream extends its tortuous course through deep alluvial soil, for upwards of a hundred miles, passing through and producing swamps which have the same effect, to a certain extent, as the lakes on the northern side. The Bideau Eiver has proportionately a very large drainage area, filled with lakes and streams flowing chiefly from, and determined in outline by the outcrop of the Laurentian formation, which has been described as sweeping down from the Chats Falls to the Thousand Isles, near Kingston. Above Ottawa there is rapid water extending for upwards of six miles, and from this point the stream, although less direct, passes on in the direction of the northwest, over and through a wilder country of the Laurentian Hills, with heavy forests of pine and other timber extending down to its very mai^in. The irregular and tortuous channel, swelling occasionally into deep, wide lakes, ter- minates immediately above AUumette Island; and from this point the river, taking a slight bend once more in a west-northwest direction, pursues its course through a series of long reaches, separated from one another by short, abrupt falls or rapids, with a tolerably uniform width and depth, as far as the affluence of the Mattawan ; then turning to a direction almost northward, it is described as terminating in a series of lakes, the largest of which, in the direct course of the river, is " Temisoaming," " Tamagaminque," and "Grand Lake," the one lying some distance to the west, and the other about as far to the east of Temisoaming, pouring their waters into it by the " Montreal " and " Mo«se " Rivers respectively, and the drainage occupying the whole district lying as far north as the forty-ninth parallel, and generally separated from the drainage into the river below Ottawa by the meridian of seventy-six and a half degrees. The affluents upon both sides of the river, for the portion west of Ottawa, are maeb mote numerous, and are all very much smaller than the streams previously mentioned. On the north side they consist of the " Golonge," uniting close to Portage du Port, the "DuMoine," the "Bear," and the "Kippeway." On the south side, the chief of these streams are the Mississippi, the Madawaska, the Bonne Ghere, the Petawawee, and the Mattawan. These drain a vast ■extent of Laurentian formation, covered for the most part 'with heavy pine ai 34 timber, the dietriot of the ohief lumber ing operations in Canada at the present moment. The country is very much broken, and the bottoms of its valleys and creeks are occupied by numerous streamlets and lakes lying at elevations extend- ing up to fourteen hundred feet above tidewater ; at which elevations may be found the sources of the streams last mentioned, draining into the Ottawa, and the head waters of the Mnganatawan, flowing into Lake Huron. One tributary, on the right bank of the river, unites with the main Ottawa, at Mattawan, the poiat of northern divergence just mentioned ; and it is im- portant as being the favorite ri ute of the early voyageurs in their journeys to Lake Huron and Lake Superior. Starting from the Hudson's Bay Post, at its confluence with the river, the Mattawan is traceable in a course generally westerly, through five or six small lakes, terminating in Trout Lake, which is the head of the drainage in this direction, and about six hundred and fifty-nine feet above the sea. Among the various schemes which have been proposed for the improvement of the navigation between the upper lakes and the Atlantic, that of Mr. Shanly, which is gaining (and perhaps deservedly) the most favor, is one which proposed, after improving the River Ottawa, up to the mouth of the Mattawan, to follow the line of this tributary up to its head water in the Trout Lake. From this point it is proposed to lock down into Lake Nipissing, which is only about twenty-three feet below it, through the valley of the " Vase." Lake Nipissing, which receives the drainage of the " Sturgeon," the *" Namanitigong," and other rivers, with that of numerous lakes, at their several head waters, communicates with the Georgian Bay, through French River, the length of the river being about sixty miles, and the descent, eflFected in a series of weir-liko falls, sixty- four feet. The entire distance from the Georgian Bay to Montreal, by the route which has now been described (and which, of course, includes improvements of the river to overcome the falls at Ottawa, the Chats, and other points of inter- ruption, as well as the reconstruction of the small canal near OarilloD and Grenville), being four hundred and thirty miles,— -the lockage upwards from Lake Huron to the summit would be eighty-Bev6n feet, and the fall downward^ would be six hundred and nineteen feet, to the harbor of Montreal. * And having now generally referred to this enormous river, a full deScriptiob of which might have occupied a far more extensive space, — and having men- tioned the proposal to improve the water dommuiiication, by a more direct route, between the upper lakes and the Atlantic, it is only proper to draw attention to another project, with the same object in vjew. This consists of a canal commencing at the level of Lake Huron, near Nottawassauga Bay, pawing through part of the Valley of the Muskoka and of the Severn, which •onstitute the drainage of Lake Simcoe, into Georgian Bay. It is proposed to ihake Luke Simcoe, which is one hundred atid thirty feet bbove Georgian Bay, the summit level ; and cutting through the dividing ridge^ to a depth of two^ 86 hundred feet, lock down its eouthern slope, four hundred and seventy feet, into Lake Ontario, near Toronto. With regard to both of these plans, however, little has been done beyond preliminary surveys. Taking Chicago and Montreal as common points, and comparing both with the Wolland Canal, the following would be the position of affairs : No. 1. Welland Canal, Lake, and River, " 2. Toronto and Georgian Bay, ■ . " 3. French River and Ottawa, . . DISTANCKS FROM CHICAGO. LOCKAOV Miles. Miles. Miles. Miles. Up. Down. Total. Lake. River. Canal. Total. 1,145 775 575 132 155 347 71 120 58 1,348 1,050 e80 130 87^ 535 675 619 Y 536 806 7(»6 From which figures it appears that in point of distance, No. 3, namely, by the Ottawa, holds a very wide advantage over both the rival routes, and is also superior, in point of lockage, to the Georgian Bay route. CANALS OF CANADA.* The system of canals which were exclusively undertaken, or are controlled, by the Provincial Government of Canada, consists of a series of works for over- coming the Eapids, on the line of the main discharge of the waters of the upper lakes through the St. Lawrence Valley ; secondly, in improvements of the same nature applied to the Ottawa Eiver ; thirdly, in a connection effected by a cross canal between the Ottawa Eiver and the city of that name, with the Eiver St. Lawrence, at Kingston, which is at the outlet of Lake Ontarj/O ; fourthly, of improvements on the Chambly, or Eichelieu River, which is the outlet of Lake Chaimplain. There is, also, a series of minor improvements in the form of locks, or very short canals, in the district occupied by the line of lakes extending almost parallel with the north shore of Lake Ontario, from Lake Scugog by way of Peterbftrb' and the Trent Eiver to Trenton, at which place the Trent discharges into the lafcd. '' The first of these great improvements was commenced about the year 1819, by a private company , which undertook the construction and completion of the Laohine Canal, which proposed to overcome the Eapids from Lake St. Louis down to Montreal, the total length of fall being four thousand three hundred and seventy- five feet. This canal commenced in the St. Lawrence River, at a place called 1^ i(l4miU Point,, 494 near the. uppgr .^D,d of tj|;ie present harbor ain Montreal. One !) I. ]hf' -.1 J;- ),., • See App. No. II. ■> I ! I j 86 of the original locks still remaiDS at this point,H< and the dimensions are one hun- dred and twenty-six feet by twenty-four. The line proceeds across a marsh for about four miles, and eventually passes into more solid ground, and terminates in u rock of the Trenton group at Lake St. Louis. The number of looks originally was nine. Following this great improvement, which at once overcame the most consid- erable difficulties in the inland navigation, some improvements were commenced on the Siver Ottawa, consisting first, of the St. Ann's loek and dam, to overcome the Rapids of St. Anne, at the entrance of the Ottawa Eiver, about twenty-four miles west of Montreal. The length of the entire work is about half a mile, and the fall, which is on the average about three and a half feet, is overcome by one lock one hundred and ninety feet long and forty-four feet wide. At Carillon there is a small lockage, consisting of two combined looks rising twenty-three feet to pass over a small summit (the cost to cut through which was considered too expensive), and one single descending look 12.93 feet ; so that the actual fall surmounted at this point is only about ten feet. The length of the canal is about 2,o miles. The Chute a Blondeau is the next canal, and closely contiguous to the former one ; its length being about one-sixth of a mile, overcome by one lock surmounting a lift of three feet ten inches. The Crenville Canal, still further up stream, is a canal having the same object, five and three-quarter miles in length, having six looks, overcoming a lifb of forty-six feet ; the total lift for the three canals being 72.88 feet ascending, descending 12.93 feet, or 59.95 feet. All looks upor) the rystem last mentioned have a depth of five feet upon the sills, are one hundr of navigation, * down the River St. Lawrence to the embouchure of the Richelieu, forty-five miles below Montreal, and about one hundred and thirty-five miles above Quebec. At Sore), the direction of the route is a little to the west of south. The river has an average rate of about a mile and a half '^er hour, and in low stages of the river it occasionally runs at a rate of four miles an hour in certain localities; besides which, at St. Ours, there is a decided rapid, having a (all of five feet, where a lock and dam have been in- troduced, the dimensions of which admit of vessels one hundred and eighty-five feet long, and forty four feet wide, with a draft of seven feet, and at Cbamblj another rapid exists, amounting to a seveniy-four foot fall, extending through eleven and a half miles of the river. This rapid is overcome by a canal and nine locks, the dimensions of the canal being sixty feet top-water, thirty-six feet at • See App. No. H. ^mim 40 bottom, and eight feet depth ; and the locks are one hundred and twenty feet long, twenty-four feet wide at top, aqd twenty-two and a half feet at low water, and will admit of vessels one hundred and ten feet long, twenty-two feet wide, and seven feet draft. The navigation, which extends up to Lake Cham plain, which is reached at about eighty miles from Sorel, meets with no further obstacle, and is continued free through Lake Champlain to the New York Champlain Canal, at Whitehall, where it has only to overcome a height of fifty-five feet before commencing to fall to the tidewater of the Hudson at Troy. IMPROVEMENTS TO THE NAVIGATION OF THE INLAND WATERS OF THE NEWCASTLE DISTRICT. Above the town of Peterboro, the Otonabee, for some miles, maintains the character of a fine river, nearly two hundred feet wide, discharging a Ijjrge supply of water at all seasons, and affording admirable sites for factories requiring large power. The river there spreads out into a number of lakes, which are the recip- ients of several considerable streams : some of these navigable, and some, it is stated, capable of being made so at a very small cost. The connection with this district is of considerable importance, on account of the large quantity of timber abounding in that section, and the valuable nature of the country for agricultural purposes. Some improvements hare been commenced, but no very extensive or permanent works executed. Improvements in the Scugog River have been carried on, and a dredging engine employed for the deepening of shoal places. The value of the several reaches of conti juous water communication may be considered as created by these limited works, and daily become more manifest. They extend through a distant" not less than one hundred and thirty miles; and when the various improvements proposed have been carried out, a great benefit will be extended to a large district of country. Among the collateral advantages ^hich have been afforded by the construc- tion of the various canals in Canada, is that afforded by their water power, by means of which the Provincial Government has been enabled to offer encourage- ment to manufactures on canal banks ; and arrangements were made, in the first instance, for a considerable supply of water for manufacturing purposes, which, in several instances, has been carried to a very great and injurious limit : as, for instance, on the Lachine Canal, the velocity in which has become a serious incon- venience to the traffic ; so much so, that a large expenditure has been rendered necessary during the present winter, for the enlargement of the croas sectioa through the rock cutting already mentioned near Lachine. enty feet w water, eet wide, lamplaiD, obstacle, hamplain -five feet APPENDICES. rEBS APPENDIX No. 1. itains the ■ge supply ring large the recip- jme, it is with this of timber ricultural tensive or en carried rhe value iidered as 3^ extend when the t will be construe- power, by icourage- the first which, in as, for fus incon- rendered section N ■X CANADIAN NAVIGATION. This line of ocean and inland navigation extends from the Straits of Belle-Isle, r«ulf of St. Lawrence, to Fond du Lac, at the head ol Lake Superior, a distance of 2384 Statute miles. The distances on the several sections, comprising the Gulf and Biver St. Lawrence, as well as the greater and lesser lakes, with intersecting and connecting canals, are shown in the following table : — From the Straits of Belle-Isle to'thc head of tide-water (Throe Bivcrs) From the head of tide-water (Three Bivers) to Lachine Canal The Lachine Canal From Ladiinc Canal to Beauharnois Canal, (Lake St. Louis) The Beauharnois Canal From the Beauharnois Canal to the Cornwall Canal, (Lake St. Francis) The Cornwall Canal From the Cornwall Canal to Farran's Point Canal The Farran's Point Canal From Farran's Point Canal to Eapide Plat Canal The Eapide Plat Canal .From the Ilapide Plat Canal to the Iroquois and Galops Canal The Iroquois and Galops Canal From tlie Iroquois and Galops Canal, to Prescott From Prescoi t to Kingston From Kiiifiston to the Welland Canal The Welhind Canal From the Wclhind Canal to Sault Ste. Marie Canal, (passing through Luke Erie, the Detroit Biver, Lake St. Clair, the St. Clair River, and Lalic H nron) The Sault Ste. :Marie Caiml From Sault Ste. Marie Canal to Fond du Lac, head of Lake Superior IntcrnuMliftte (liBtancefi In Statute miles. Total distances from Bellc-l8lc. 986 994J ioos| 1021 10531 1065| 1070^ 1071 1081J 1085J 1090 1097| 1105 1164 1334 1361 1986 1987 2384 Note. — It may he noted, that in the foregoing tabular statement, the Lakes mentioned in the navigation hetwiM n Lacliiue tind Cnniwall, are merely expansions of the Si. Lawrence river propi r. T'lii tlicr, tlie Sault Ste. Marie Canal, uniting Lakes Huron and Superior, is an American work, being constructed on the United States side of the St. Mary's river. D iMMil 42 i ■ ( ■^ A •*! K ts .» Q V •*t OJ ■<5 » W .» < Hi .Q Q (3 it i ^ U !zj '*• >-> V ^N » « m 1 O 1 1 CO to P V r O s 1 tf \» Vl < •:3 c>l W ■v* V <2 >*• P4 <-i w g ^ Sz; •5 G 1 « '^ p w ^ ^ H • ^ p^ « ^ o a ■K. H <>^ Oh W .^ P .5 ^3 1 ©0000©'<*00000010 o c o o o in Tf o lo o o c o t- 00 — ooc;-^0'0 W o 1^ cc ri m 00 1— 1 r^ —< (M (M »-l o e o o o o o ccooomo--** •* CVJO'M'^CO'— 'f-ii-l I— t-1 C^ r-1 r— .-I (M o •c si *^ a o ;-: O O « 3 S.S fc-u 3> O CI « a W C i ^.a C d 03 C f^ to t ce I* ■§3 cs 3 O O fl > efl O •«J *J iS m »- U 'g • — O O S l- T3 a, 1/j h or; 43 n H O CO O «3 '"I 14 W O n H Ph p .1 i R 1 3 V .2 c .00 J- CO s C 8 . •CPU 3 < >- ^ " . S •3 fl C 1- g (S aj e8 4i S g ^ o O o (U Q, (^^ ^1 G ft S i Q •< >-5 i-s' cc H OH .•^ ^^ 6 c 3 o o o o o o 1 d o o o o o o a oi "* 4f CO 4(1 4)> r— 1 r-H f— ( t— * i-H »— ( «0 < 1 >s r* & o o o o o o o c 5 a) o o o o o o o o ^ a fH O 05 ■* ■* >— ■* N .^ r— t t— I ^ o V I ><; •»i ^ ^ © o o o o o © © O O O O lO o © o "« % rH 05 t- CO CO r-H rC ^ ■Ji o i-H r— < i—t .— 1 r-i ^H i-H 1 I-; « J *i o © o c o o © o *^ a> o o o o © o o m «^ iM o cq «o in CO Tf CVJ 'S w rH I-H C*) r-4 rH (— < F-H fH "3 ■<; o • 1 la !2 • ^i • 08 bo 'w :cc : 1 h a :»4 : aj u s l"= • 03 • s § •PQ'-C • 0) „ K • a <$ ■3 :-tfO 1 u 'C 1 1 1 c 01 t 01 01 1 ii > Ol o 3 CO "3 '5 .2 21 OS o 5 00 Eh O Ph O H 5z; 1-5 H ai.-Hccoto©050o«- e^05Tf©«Dei ® oc©©CJtoi^cotn— icq 5.^ i-H-<*ico e• CO lO cs :5 o CO C-H rH i-i rH S5 <»B oai ■^oseo-^cot^-tc— i-^os do tntot~<7it~oo^c. t~t~aj IZSnil i f0©«O>O»-C^C^05tOi-l »0 »-i »0 u^ '.H 1:— 1— <>^>^>^ i 2^>^ BSsSBBoo^a OOCOOc^„^„ OOOOOOQQQQ CS nj ■^ 10 W r- 00 03 — 1 44 Statkmbnt showing the opening and closing of navigation at the Port of Quebec in each year from 1860 to 1874 inclusive :— Arrivals Arrivals Sailed Time of Year. from Montreal- Steamer. from Sea. for Sea. Ocean Navigation. 860 April 26 April 28 November 26 6 Months 29 Days. 1861 <• 26 " 22 " 26 7 " 5 " 1862 " 30 " 16 " 29 7 " " I8'^3 Mav 3 May 4 " 27 6 " 25 " 18' V April 21 April 27 *' 30 7 " 4 " 1865 " 31 " 29 " 28 7 .< " 1866 " 26 " 28 December 1 7 " 4 •' 1867 May 3 17 November 29 7 " 13 " 1868 April 28 " 23 " 28 7 " 6 " 1869 " 30 " 27 " 27 7 " 1 " 1870 " 25 " 16 December 2 7 " 17 « 1871 " 18 " 22 November 27 7 " 9 « 1872 May 6 " 30 " 26 6 " 27 " 1873 " 2 " 28 " 23 6 " 24 " 1874 " 10 " 28 Statement showing the opening and closing of navigation at the Port of Montreal in each year from 1861 to 1874 inclusive : — Opening Close First Last Length Year. of of Vessel Vessel Navigation. Navigation. from Sea. for Sea. of Season. 1861 April 24 December 22 April 27 December 4 7 Months 29 Days. 1862 " 23 " 7 " 28 November 27 « 15 — Great Britain May 4 1846-Ship Albion April 27 1847— Ship St. Lawrence May 14 1848— Ship Caledonia May 3 1849— Ship Alb'on May 4 1850— Ship Groat Britain April 28 1851— Ship Toronto April 28 1852— Ship Shandon May 2 1853— Ship Shandon April 28 1854— Ship America May 20 1855— Ship Ottawa May 9 1856— Ship Queen of the Lakes April 30 1857— Ship Montreal May 1 1858-Shlp Toronto Arril 30 1859— Steamship United Kingdom May 3 1860— Steamship United Kingdom April 30 1861— Steamship Jura April 27 18«2— Ship Shandon April 28 1863-Ship City of Quebec May 6 1864- Ship Ardmillan April 28 18(55— S.S. Peruvian, and Ship Shardon.May 3 181)6— Ship Qleniffer May 1 1867-S.S. Moravian, andShip Qleniffer.May 4 1868— S.S. Hibernian May 2 1869— S.S. Nestorian April 4 1870— Ship Abeona April 30 1871— Ship Lake Superior April 22 1872— Steamship Scandinavian May 5 1873— Steamship Prussian May 4 1874— Steamship Quebec May 11 I': 46 SEA-GOINO TONNAGE AT MONTREAL. The following tabular statement shows the number and tonnage of sea-going Teasels at the Port of Montreal, during each of the seasons specified :— Clasbrs. 1864. 1865. 1866. 1867. No. Tonnage, No. Tonnage. No. Tonnage. No. Tonnage. 51 47 90 21 38 131 59,071 ■'55,462 40,000 5.036 5,849 16,483 63 33 66 13 35 158 78,015 26,086 24.789 3.139 4.943 15,971 70 51 119 27 69 180 75,474 42,169 54,397 6,415 9,981 17,339 106 66 81 18 64 140 87,199 ghipjg 47,463 Barques Brig8 39,883 3,757 Briffnnt.inf A 9,27S 11,478 Total 378 161,901 358 152,-'43 516 205,775 464 199,053 Or.Afl51FR. 1868. 1869. 1870. 1871. No. Tunnage. No. Tonnage. No. Tonnage. No. Tonnage. 105 41 75 21 49 187 101,566 36.ii93 31,871 4,875 7,807 15,947 117 66 103 18 49 204 117.965 64,484 45,710 4.735 9.243 17,7^6 144 78 157 16 62 223 133,912 73.175 75,797 4.183 10,351 19,428 142 99 170 26 47 ISO 146,927 ShiM 92,602 82,363 Brigs.... 6,5.19 7^.'59 15,651 Schoon^m Total 478 198,759 657 250,863 680 316,846 C64 351,721 Classes. Steamers Ships Barques Brigs Brignntinee — Soliconers Total 1872. No. Tonnage. 215 67 182 i'O 68 175 727 217,713 62,775 87,199 5,221 11,504 14,388 398,800 1873. No. Tonnage. 242 72 164 18 59 147 702 24.5,237 {■6,S23 75,594 4,660 8..';81 12,583 412,478 1874.* No. Tonnage. 247 46 163 14 59 156 C84 399,647 From opening of navigation to Ist November. ATLANTIC WINTER PORTS OF THE DOMINION. During the Winter season, Cinada's Winter Port has been at Portland, Maine, via Grand Trunk Railway— that bfing the terminus for the Mail Steamers; shipments of Produce have also been made in winter via Boston, and sometimes (though but seldom) via New York City. When the Intercoloni . 1 Railroad is completed, Montreal will have direct railway connection with St. John, N.B., and Halifax, N.S.,- as indicated in the map. Connection with St. John will be nearer, when the River du Loup and Fredericton Railway is completed. 47 APPENDIX No. II. THE CANAL SYSTEM OF CANADA. The Lachine Canal.— Tho. first work on the main line of the St. Lawrence naviga- tion, is the Lachine Canal, which, beginning at the city of Montreal, extends westward a distance of ^ miles to Lachine, thus overcoming the natural obstacle in the rapids on the river between the latter village and the former city. The construction of this work was suggested, and at times earnestly urged even before the passage of the Constitutional Act of 1791. But it was not until 181.5 that any practical measures were adopted, when, its necessity becoming apparent from a military pointof view, the Legislative sanc- tion for an appropriation of £25,000 was obtained; but peace immediately ensuing, the work was not begun. In 1819 a Joint Stock Company became incorporated, with a cap- ital of $600,000, — the Act of 1815 being repealed ; but this scheme also came to naught, their charter being annulled in 1821 by the pa-ssage of a Bill authorizing the Government to construct the canal as a government work, commissioners being appointed to manage the project, while actual operations were commenced in July of that year. Upon condition that all military stores should have free access to the canal, the sum of $50,000 was contributed by the British Government towards the performance of the work, while the Province paid the remaining expinditurc, the whole cost to the end of 1826 being $438,404.15. In 1825 the canal was opened to the passage of vessels ; its dimensions were : 28 feet wide at bottom, 48 feet at water-surface, with a depth of 4J feet, while the locks were seven in number, and strongly built of stone, being 100 by 20 feet each. But with the extension of trade, especially from the western province, this canal became inade- quate to the requirements. With the proposal to unite the provinces of Upper and Lower Canada, arose the question of canal improvement, the exigencies of the increasingly im- portant Lake Trade being considered, when it was determined to retain the old location of the canal, and enlarge it to the dimensions it possesses at the present time, viz : locks 200 by 45 feet, with 9 feet of water on the sills, and a width of canal 80 feet at bottom, and 120 feet at water-line. In accordance with a decision arrived at in 1844, the two locks nearest Montreal (Nos. 1 and 2) were deepened to 16 feet on the sills in 1848, thus admitting large sea-going vessels into the basin of the canal ; but it was not until the spring of 1862, that the entire canal was excavated to its full width. The report of the Public Works Department gives the whole cost of the work, up to July 1867, at $2,587,532.85. The Beauhamois Canal. — Previous to the construction of this canal, the obstacles which it was designed to overcome, viz : the " Cascades," " Cedar," and " Coteau " Rapids, were surmounted by four short canals, giving facilities to craft of light draught to pass between Lakes St. Louis and St. Francis. Although the subject of improving this navi- gation was frequently agitated, and reports presented to the Legislature at different times, yet no decioive action beyond recommendations was taken until the summer of 1842, when contracts for construction were commenced. This work was built upon the South Shore of the St. Lawrence, although the North Shore route was then and is even now contended for. The dimensions of this canal arc similar to those of the Lachine. The total cost to July 1867, was $1,611,424 11. 48 liini The Cornwall Canal. — TLIh work was the first in the series of St. Lawrence Canals constructed on the present scale, its dimensionK serving as the standard for the others. The rapids of the " Long Sault" were the ohstncles to bo surmounted. Although the improvement of the navigation below Prescott was a matter of Governmental consider- ation, as early as 1817-18, yet it was not until 1832 that an appropriation of over a quarter of a million dollars was made by the Legislature of Upper Canada. Meanwhile surveys were made and dimensions determined, so that the first sod was not cut until 1834 i then came the rebellion and financial depression to hinder progress, thus deferring the formal opening of the Canal, until the summer of 1843. The dimensions, both of the locks and the water-course, are larger than any other of the Canadian Canals. The Williamsburg Canals. — Under this name are included the series known as the "Farrans Point," "Kapide Plat," and "Galops" Canals. The first two were completed about 1847. The last mentioned was originally three short canals, but in 1850 joined into one, under the designation of the Galops Conal. Their dimensions are uniform, as will be seen by the table annexed. The Welland Canal. — The next Canal going westward is the Welland, at the head of Lake Ontario, which connects the latter with Lake Erie, by carrying navigation around the Niagara Falls. This work was, from its inception, attended with difficulties. The first practical measure was undertaken in 1821, when a commission to consider the subject of inland navigation, was appointed by the Parliament of Upper Canada, its report being received two years later in favor of constructing the Welland Canal. As a result, incorporation was obtained by a private company in 1824. The various trials, and disappointments, need not be detailed. Work was prosecuted with private capital, supplemented at difTerent times by Governmental aid. By 1833, the Canal occupied almost the same site as the present one, and was practically completed, although the locks were of small dimensions, and built of wood. But after the union of the two provinces, and in 1839, Parliament authorized Government to purchase all the private stock, thus to make the work public property ; but it was not until 1841 that the Board of Works assumed sole control. Henceforward systematic improvement was prosecuted, the wooden locks being replaced by stone works, while locks and water Course were both enlarged to the present dimensions given in the appended table. Sault Ste. Marie Canal. — The Canadian system of Canals connecting the western Lakes with the River St. Lawrence terminates with the Welland ; but Dominion craft have access to Lake Superior through an American canal at Sault St. Marie. It is a mile and one-seventeenth long, and capable of paesing vessels of 2000 tons burthen. Another classification may be made for the Ottawa and Ridead route, between Montreal, Ottawa and Kingston. After the Lachine Canal, the first in the series is the St. Anne Lock, built to overcome the rapids of the same name at the Junction of the Ottawa with the St. Lawrence. It has been completed since 1843. The Carillon, the Chute a Blondeau and the Grenville Canals form a chain commencing 27 miles above St. Anne, surmounting rapids and using navigable stretches of water for 13 miles, after which there is a clear course to Ottawa City. The Rideau Canal. — Like the three preceding canals, this work was constructed by the Imperial Government as a military necessity, and was completed in the year 1832. It extends from Ottawa to Kingston, making the Bideau and Cataraqui navigation avail- able for craft of a certain depth of water, the distance being 126| miles. The dimensions of this set of canals are given in the tabular statement annexed. 49 . The Richelieu Canals form a third scries in the general canal system. Entering the Richelieu river from the St. Lawrence at a point 46 miles below Montreal, and ascending towards Lake Chaniplain, the obstinctions to navigation are overcome by the St. Ours lock, and farther on, the Chambly Canal, extending from the basin of same name to St. Johns, a distance of twelve miles. These two are called the "Richelieu" Canals, — after which navigation is free from dilHculties to the hiad of Lake Champlain, where the Americans have the Wliitehall canal, through which access is obtained tc the Hudson river. Particulars respecting these works are given in the general table. DIMENSIONS OF CANALS. The following table affords a concise view of the details of the various canals of the Dominion :— its •3 a .5 U h5 11 Cornwuil Canal. Williamsburg Canals. Dimensions c f Canals. ll Total rise of Lockage Length of Canal Numhfir of Tjocks 443 ft. 8i ill. 5 200 ft. 45 " 2= 16 ft. 3= 9 " S 80" 120" m ft. 11 'in. 9 200 ft. 45 " 9 " 80 " 120 " 48 ft. 11m. 7 200 ft. 55 " " 100 " 150 " 4 ft. 3 m. 1 20c ft. 45 " 9 " 50 " 90 " Hi ft. 4 m. 2 200 ft. 45" 9 " 50 " 90 " 15i ft. 7^ m. 3 200 ft. 45 " 9 » 50 " 90 " 330 ft. 27 m. 27 2=200 ft. 24=150 -' 1=230" 3= 45 " 24=26i " lOi " Im. Length of " Width of " — Dopth of water on Sills- ■ • \ Breadth of Canal at bottom. •' " water surface — - I a a 1 s 1 s s .a "3 a s p 2 13 B a Richelieu Canals. Dimensions of Canals. ll Total rise of Lockage 3 ft. im. 1 190 ft. 54 " 6(217" \ 213 ft. up \ 13 ft. do'n 2J m. 3 J 1=128 ft \ 2=12(>i" S 2=32* " 1 1 =32| " 6i " 30 50 " .1] ft. im. 1 l30 5-G ft. f 32 .'1-6 ft. upper laojft. lower. 6 ft. 30 " 30 " 453 ft. 53 m. 7 106 5-6® 130§ ft. 19 ® 32i ft frjft. 20 ® 30 " 25® 60" J 2821 ft. up 164 ft do'n 126^ m. 47 134 ft. 33 " 4i ® 5 ft. 54 ® 60 " 80 " 5 ft. i m. 1 200 ft. 4.5" 7 " 74 ft. 12 m 9 Lencthof " 118®122 ft Width of " Depth of water on Sills ... Breadth of Canal at bottom " " watersurface 23 23i " 7 ft. 36 " 60 " 50 I !'■ '''i o o •nnilo fiXiil> JO -oj^ !g i/7f-itei-iiNffiAMQo>««'»fe>ifiX'3"-a!5PtlI OJ y. i-< lT-« •-• ac »c ccn* I - i < lA CO r-t CCX> ^ issisu'r^Rsr.a'^Ka 'Cu t^.'u'CCI^'n'uX' ^ u u. u u u w . c-c go a B.tBp JO 'OJ^ §Kli'^§ij^§?^f)^§rifilifj§Sar,SflS a o eg ; 1 1-5 ci f -I ul CO jg (M cj 1 1 e i ?^ (m (n c-i 'C'CT >■ >>'u"C >.'C'CX'C'C 5;'C"n >>'Z.'u, >'u'Zi >• ^ aacn ^ a. s. n a. a. a, o. aj^ o.a'=^ —a.^ cp." 't •J . «2 •iitido s/np JO 'ON a O 00 tc IP t* c -^ ^ *^ »— o -t r- 'e'C tu'E'C'EX'c >i'cc i^'T'C "j'cc 1 5> -»3 <;<:^ :►<»j^ 1^ o a) ■< "^^ , •«) [14 sXnp JO -ON Cj IM 6) iM ifrj N IN CM t3 S^ C 1 Vl CI Ol C 1 CI IM ir4 4-4 CJ C^ (M C i CJCOa;O0'a;(U6JO0JQrCi)C;ft^C4>4i0>OVV o;is>?;cpcccco-(2'<^C::^cc;xccGC« ^ e^iii i.ctjjc^ici cj?i c^ cJn cMcii-; ' >* >?'CC »^'u,*n - '- ■z>>>> , =. B « « c. a « c. c a c o jj a a = « as a c " " < (S M O O UtiUO fXBp JO -OK c-1 CI c c iQ ec C". t£> tC 5^1 1" C^ 'i C-) t- 1— I- "C « 00 •* CM r-C CO CO e>3 c. : c3 cc c-i c 1 c-i *t « e<; c 1 C 1 o 1 c^ O I r- T , 1-. M M £J Cl Qi CICM S-l C^ CI :^^ CS (M IM .- 1 C4 ei C-1 ?< C) c; IM C4 C4 c3 c^ o 5 t-CltC-^CciDvCCH-l-cCICJCJCCOMr-^OOl-OOOCaO a o . . •-x'Of-^l-CCC C4 C^J ?0 ) >»'tI'EI*u ^'i , >>>» Ga«aaaan&aa a^>5 s^ & C'.S »£ - a^^ ■« :>; lCgC4CICoU^^c>oi».e5e.'Jt>t>c>cotit» C!j^O!2;pjif;Ovx.^cos!:pcCPCp;^CifiCt2; *>) I-H t-H (JvJ CO I'C ^*u >> ^ ^ >>'i aft* fc = i!^ * a aaaa« aaaa — * aa * «^ -< ■•I o u E u ■uodo SiCep JO 'oji 5 a O oco-^jii-'-fC^ii-onr-.-tciC'xoa'. a;'£*5^!.'^QC«t^ccc COCC54C-.Or— ,— C>)e>l«Clr-iC5flc5CJ — Mr-c5■ & 5 b fe^ ^rnmcnt, for the Sault Ste. Marie, Welland, and St. Lawrence Canals was : 270 feet length of chamber, 45 feet width, and 12 ft-etof clei: draught over tho mitre sills. As regards the Welland, the contracts were given out during the present year, and the mode of enlargement on the scale adopted for it is progressing. The enlarging of the St. Lawrence Canals throughout has not yet been commenced, although tenders arc advertised for on that portion between this city and Lachinc ; but the construction of another set of locks, at the Montreal entrance of the Lachine Canal,— the same to have 17 feet of water on the mitre sills, forming a second line of connection between the harbor and the upper basin, was bogun during the past summer months. The improvement of canal navigation from Ottawa City to Lachinc, and the enlarge- ment of the Chambly Canal, on the scale of 200 feet length of lock, 45 feet width, and a general draught of 9 feet over the mitre sills, was recommended. It may be noted that tho main features of every existing or proposed canal route, oamo under the notice of the Comrnis.sioners, and were either commented upon simply, or placed in the form of recommendations, according as their importivnce seemed to demand. The construction of the proposed Bay Verte Canal, to connect the waters of tho Golf of St. Lawrence, at Bay Virte, with those of the Ray of B'undy, at Cuml)€rland Basin, by cutting across the Isthmus of Chignecto which unites Nova Scotia to New Brunswick, was recommended. Various surveys have been made, and the lino of constmction has been determined on by government, — the dimensions to be those as recommended, viz : 270 feet length of lock, 40 feet in width, and having 15 feet draught of water on the mitre sills. Advertisements have been inserted in the public press, calling for tenders for the work. y M \H Ml 1! ! 62 APPENDIX No. III. MARINE DISASTERS ON INLAND WATERS. Accurate records of casualties and losses, of recent occurrence, are not easily obtainable, although an effort has been made to procure later details than are given in the annexed tabular statements, — the one on page 54 being that appended to Mr. Blackwell's treatise. Such information is important, as influencing the rates of Marine Insurance, — though its import is more evident in connection with Gulf and river navigation. But these figures are of comparatively little service, without a record of the tonnage eng.aged in the trades, — both inland and ocean, — out of which the disasters have arisen. The table immediately following is a comparative statement of the accidents and wrecks, which happened on the great lakes to both American and Canadian craft, during the seasons .specified. But many of the instances recorded are mere mishaps, perhaps only affecting the cargo, rather than the vessel, yet still placed under the head of "disasters." The second table following, however, gives the actual wrecks (total logs') in 1867 compared with 1873 — the figures for intermediate years not being found accessible : — 1807 January 2 February 2 March 7 April 34 May 125 June . . . .' 63 July 58 August 83 September 153 October 110 November 286 December 40 i8Ta 1873 3 Vi 7 2 10 7 39 50 77 115 46 97 46 134 63 114 197 235 84 291 179 211 8 48 963 759 1316 The tonnage lost may be thus classified : — VESSELS. Steamers Propellers Tugs Barques Brigs Schooners Barges Scows Total 1867. Number 3 6 9 2 52 1 7 86 Tonnage. 450 3,143 565 4,121 624 11,196 462 509 21,070 1873. Number , 2 14 5 2 3u T 67 Toiiiage, 551 8,513 273 696 6,276 3,240 305 19,914 Value. $ 48,000 469,000 32,000 30,000 209,800 67,000 10,900 $866,700 58 Statbment of the Number and Tonnage ofWrecks and Casualties that have happens . to Inland Vessels on the lakes and I»land Waters of the Dominion during each of the Calendar years following : — e not easily are given in ndcd to Mr. es of Marine ilf and river a record of the disasters ccidcnts and adian craff, tre mishaps, ler the head recks (total being found DESCRIPTION OF VESSELS. Steamers .... Propel lors . . . Tugs Barques Barquantines. Brigs Brigantines . . Schooners . . . Darges Total*. 1870. No. 73 6 103 Tons. 1,574 2,644 302 350 1,P98 600 9,461 16,929 1871. No. 6 42 1 63 Tons. 1,311 971 444 2,247 6,718 50 11,741 187!3. No. 12 7 2 5 1 36 6 69 Tons. 4,983 1,568 60 1,147 366 6,271 1,115 15,510 1873. No. 11 4 29 Tons. 3,046 725 1,394 299 5,469 Statement of the extent of Wrecks and Casualties, with the Months in which they occurred on the Lakes and Inland Waters of the Dominion, — during the Calendar years 1870-1873, inclusive : — Value. ^ 48,000 469,000 32,000 30,000 209,800 67,000 10,900 >8O«,700 MONTHS. January . . . February . . March April , May June July August .... September. Octt)bi'r . . . November. December . Totals 1870. No. 2 3 4 3 !) 52 17 1 93 Damage. 1,600 19,000 3,100 33,500 3,600 4,300 161,8,ii0 53,661 900 $281,561 1871. 187a. 1 No. Damage. No. Damage. No. $ $ 1 16,600 • • .... , , . . .... • . .... 1 , , .... 100 2 3 . • . ■ 11 22,582 2 4 20,000 77,440 3 2 450 2 50,000 2 1 • > • • 11,400 fi 6 12,600 16 86,183 2 14 37,745 8 68,3i)3 6 11 53,800 18 67,106 3 3 32,000 1 67 30,000 1 45 §173,095 $413,264 1873. Damaob. $ 7,000 4,300 32,000 2,000 1,000 25,650 36,600 50,000 $1.">7,450 54 Q < < W H O •S 00 00 <3 •< I ft ■« CO x> O 1^ O H Ed o © « in o o O lO I-- o o ;e^cD_ a-. M K I, 00 .R Cd h3 t" 00 m u !»; o o n OD 2 S o a "3 > ! S CO o o ■* o o n eo^io Oi Ol IM lO O 05 M CO -^ CO « 1 5 Of Oi ■< n 1 o © O © O 1 O O O o o u-5 eq o> O 1- I ^ 00 »- 05 "O en -. 00 V> eg ^ 6 m ■^ in CO 0) tz; rl rH CO «» 5o c 00 bo a CO o (9 O o o o o o o o © m o in o ■r i-T evT t-^ ©" O 01 C>J CD 00 •<*" O en •^ ph t-H CO OS I— > »n 09 K OQ © o c o © © o o in c © © © o in r— CO in m o o ■>i<^ in" c^ o" Ci (O o" -- O OS 00 CO 00 c< OS CO ■* CO c^ o in m eg OS 00 ■ ^ > OS 't ^ CO PS r> ^ m 02 6 T(< t- M CO T»l N ^^ 'A in Tf CO ^ in m c at 3 ? > O a u c« o fz; 00 T)< © OS Tti CO ■* T*< in i-H 00 •^ ©_CD in^--> 00 —I CM OCl a CM CO 1—1 in 00 i— CM 1- t- CO m 00 00 © in e O CO in th CD co^ in »— < — CM m OS r-l CO © rf in CO CO 00 0C)^t-^O_^ coiOrS OS CM OS CO OS t- CM li © © © © in in CO t- o Tji in CM t— C- CO t- Jr- CO cs r-T ©" in" i>r Tj< r- f— " t^ CO CO *^ OS CO CO f-* ^H cq_ lO" OS CO o in os^ ao CD ©_ ei" s cS CO O CO Tf CO 00 CM e •< u H I/J , © iz; -- CO 00 I © in © in © © in in o t- o -H CO_Tf^O CD_CO__CM_ cm" oo" in" in" cd" oT CD i—c CO »— •-1 ■* CO f— I ^ rH rH I— OS »- «— in ■-• CM CO r-l OS •* OS in o OS CM »~r lO CM_ I »-• CO CM I CM CO , C( Ha CQ 00 CO o >A h O « in s CO cb S)9 « 2i iSa ^ •= « 5SP^o 65 The two preceding Btatemeuts on page 53 are compiled from information, pub- lished in the Annual Reports of the Department of Marine and FJBheries, duiing the years specified. But as these returns do not show all the wrcckn, or loss of life, or pro- perty, the figures^require to be taken with the reservation : that thiy are correct in so far as information has been received. For example the first table cannot be considered alto- gether accurate, inasmuch as the tonnage of the vessel meeting with a mishap is in nu- merous instances omitted from the Departmental Report In like manner, the money- value of damage reeeivcc, as noted in the second table, is frequently left blank in the Rej)ort ; while there arc fu.ther cases where the mouth in which a ciisualty has happened does not appear. Notwithstanding these discrepancies, however, the information is compiled from the official source mentioned, as being probably nearer the mark than any other statements would be. The proportion of total wrecks is comparatively small, if the aggregate of the casualties be the point from which to draw conclusions. Bi , it must be remembered that a large number of the so-culled disasters appealing in .ihese tables, are often merely partial damage to the hull or the cargo, or perhaps to both. A comparison of the money-value of total losses (vessel and cargo) during the years 1872 and 1873, according to the Deijartmental figures, shows the following : — 187^. 1833. Propellors 2 . . Steamers 4 4 Schooners 9 3 Tugs . . 1 Barges 4 i Value $332,793 $133,000 APPENDIX No. IV. METEOROLOGICAL SUMMARIES. Tub Mean Monthly Temperatures at Hamilton and Toronto, Ont., Montreal and Quebec, Q., for the year 1855, were as follows :— MONTHS. January February .... March April May June July August September . . October .... November . . . December . . . Annual Mean Min. 1865. .. Max. 1856... Hamilton, Ont. (Lit. 43° ir.') Head of Lake Oiiturio. 29.37 19.14 32.11 45.48 5C.95 G2.63 71.65 68.(8 64.02 47.89 41.08 29.21 10 y'rs, 48. —20.00 96.00 73 TdnoNTD. Ont. (Lat. -lir 8ii') oil fec't above the tiou. MOKTEFAI..Que. (Lat. ^r>^■' ■.vy). 29.95 15.41 28.4fi 42.43 53.07 59.93 67.95 64.06 59.49 45.39 38 . 58 26.99 IG y'rs, 44.27 —25.00 92.08 .88 .23 .08 .15 .85 ,39 17 11 24 40, 56 62 72.73 64.94 58.55 46.35 31.58 20.84 y'rs, 42, —33.09 97.00 QUKBIC. Que. (Lut. 46"49'J. 24 16.70 10.65 21.06 34. U 49.03 58.34 68.86 61.54 55.16 45.43 28.75 18.09 185.5, 38.09 —29.06 90.00 lUi 56 ANALYSIS OF OBSERVATIONS ON TEMPERATURE AT MONTREAL. The annexed Statement affords an Analysis of observations made at Montreal dur- ing the year 1861, the same being summarized from statements of extensive and detailed observations, all of which accompanied Mr. Black well's treatise : — '361. Monthly Mean of Water at Noon. Monthly Mean Tempbratube op Aie. Monthly Mean 9 A.M. Noon. 3 P, M. 6 P.M. of Air. January 30.50° 30-55 31-20 33-80 48-80 61-60 66-60 69-00 61-10 48-00 36-60 31-90 lO-Oo 17-0 21-0 37-0 50-6 63-0 66-5 66-1 57-2 47-5 34-4 22-1 13-50 22-1 25-8 42-5 56-4 69-4 70-7 72-1 62.3 51-0 37-1 25-8 15-2° 23-0 28-2 43-9 59-1 72-0 73.0 72.6 64-1 52 2 38-2 26-2 13.7° 22-5 26-3 44.0 57.5 70.6 72-1 71-2 60-0 50.1 36.6 24.9 12.90" February 21,20 March 25.40 April 41 70 May . . . , . ...,.., 65-90 June 68-77 July 70-50 August 70-90 September 61-48 October 50.10 November 36.60 December 24.95 9 A. u. Noon. 3 P.M. 6 P.M. Means, 45 -SO^ 40-96" 45-72° 47-30'' 45-80° 46 03° Mean Temperatures between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. Mean of Air, Nov., Dec,, Jan., Feb., March (151 days) 24-2° Maximum +47-5 Minimum — 28 • 5 Range 76° April, May, October (92 days) 49-23° Maximum 73-5 Minimum 21-5 Range 52° June, July, Aug., Sept. (122 days)., 67-91° Maximum 91 Minimum 45 ■ 5 Range 45-5° Number of days At and below zero 16 <' " 32° 113 ■ • • . ■ 17,967 394,752 3,508 « • ■ • 1,411 179G * • • • * • • • 4,352 3,168 298 • ■ ■ • .... 1797 .... * ■ • . 13,932 31,424 1,349 . • . . 1,862 J 798 • • • • • • • . 9,530 91,708 3,568 7 3,393 1799 .... .... 14,475 128,872 545 79 595 leoo 64 14,293 20,271 217,128 3,512 1,555 6,896 1801 89 18,142 38,146 472,472 7,215 4,211 6,266 IfcO'-i 101 21,264 28301 1,010,032 466 6,283 2,372 1803 95 20,399 14,432 367,568 1,766 506 1,825 18U4 85 16,797 14,319 201,544 315 4,785 3,726 1805 69 15,076 18,590 22,016 4,571 7,774 6,270 1806 79 ] 9,041 10,997 96,912 6,810 5,803 3,417 1807 239 42,293 20,442 201 ,544 7,899 5,636 2,961 1808 334 70,275 - 42,462 186,704 58,2-27 6,743 3,336 1809 434 87,825 20,726 198,216 66,872 3,913 9,425 1810 661 143,893 12.519 170,904 1^0.821 18 1,082 1811 532 116,687 19,340 856 4,936 • • ■ • 1,270 1812 399 86,436 37,652 263,176 24,6-22 . ■ • • 1,372 1813 193 46,514 517 • • . • 3.390 - ■ • ■ • • • • 1814 181 38,605 1,217 . • • . . • . > 648 1815 194 37.382 1.9-20 .... 217 .... .... J816 288 61,211 1,137 .... 187 • ■ • • 766 1817 334 76,559 38,047 145,664 6,3,9 .... 19,688 1818 409 94,675 30,543 401,792 54,601 14,587 7,561 1819 650 155,842 12-.086 37.896 11,947 2,348 1.352 18-20 596 149,661 45,369 319,048 3,467 768 4,625 1821 436 102.8;»8 22,635 318,480 3,372 777 4,971 IS22 641 149,353 47,674 147,288 3,469 767 6,363 1823 • 609 138,219- 46,538 4.710 2,732 42 37,849 18-24 680 159,662 41,901 5.396 4.974 .... 3,968 182.''. 883 227,707 40,167 718,016 16,976 1,660 11,100 I8'2(i 8ol 198,848 33,666 228,635 26,082 2,590 3,907 1827 678 162,096 54,004 391.4-20 31,830 4,193 19,385 1828 763 191, 19p 35,760 120,112 21,056 ,835 20,017 1829 922 240,399 25,689 40,462 12,971 .... 1830 900 2-26,518 71,749 590,101 17,193 3,345 31,915 1831 1,045 2t)6.8i)9 81.062 l,329,-269 7,130 2,520 35,246 1832 1,053 281,598 51.058 657,240 346 82 70 1833 969 247,933 59,561 10(),301 1,748 .... 6,185 • 1831 1,123 298.672 60,122 166,771 3,439 985 1,637 1835 1,141 315.974 ti9.39i) 2,122 1,4-26 950 2,732 1836 1,227 352,575 83,921 1,958 1.740 1,290 8,405 1837 1,050 322,877 29,383 50 1,165 .... 1.124 IKW 1,0.'')9 34(1,935 44,34(i 1,283 .... 1,468 • The particulnrs in this table, from the year 1823 to 1873 inclusive, were most obligingly furnished by J. W. Dunscomb, Esq , Collector of Customs at Quebec. £ 58 The Trade at Port of Quebec from the year 1793 to 1869.— Continued. I YEARS. No. of Ve?skls Clear' u. Total Tonnage Cleauei). FLOOR brls. WHEAT Bushels. PEAS Ilushels. BARLEY BusbelB. OATS Bashelg. 1839 1,116 370,051 20,626 no 1,305 120 310 1340 1,314 449,085 202,773 29,910 35,076 70 369 1841 1,263 438,849 174,5.37 ir)9.429 75,054 48 620 1842 878 298,674 112,293 57,140 40,359 U 100 1843 1,249 450,412 139,416 54,513 27,869 859 1844 1,239 453,896 190,677 26,964 46,631 8,291 4,071 1845 J, 499 .584,540 214,725 68,544 55,166 46 24,671 1846 1,467 572,373 313,004 28,041 59,890 4,427 11,091 1847 1,215 489,817 371,111 66.034 29.491 55 19 651 1848 1,194 457,430 244,146 65,508 41,667 40 6,162 1849 1,243 4-^1,227 143,781 17,704 4,770 1,197 28,129 1850* 1,275 494,021 151,094 512 6,543 3,470 11,541 1851 1,394 586,033 145,268 25,510 12,184 1,051 5,827 1852 1,270 533,913 82.111 2,223 23,819 54 1,663 1^53 1,406 599.56/ 129.266 103,535 8,970 185 2,009 1854 1,558 C[)3..''>8J . 65,284 19,930 3,035 105 500 1855 877 408,994 28,269 74,113 2,180 760 4,659 1856 1,083 510,855 83,931 187.193 27,731 • • • • 5,924 3857 1.355 644 262 35,505 232,200 3,753 3,818 • • • • 1858 1,058 518.600 54,007 95,979 11,4.T7 .... 4,014 . 1859 1,051 539,135 34.262 2J,204 31,667 1,015 18,781 1860 1,491 635 576 48,148 29,204 15,899 1,015 a5,281 1861 1,534 767,142 55,963 19,332 3,917 124 5.561 1862 1,319 619,106 62,955 97,956 3,4S2 68 2,972 1863 1,785 861,208 74,008 11.5,319 8.321 87 916 1864 ],.561 777,575 28,727 13,475 5,104 • • • • 5,146 1865 1.517 902,554 .55,408 21,670 3,449 150 5.078 1866 1,410 727,793 47,902 92 11,289 14,870 80,489 1867 t 1.252 637,410 18,311 133 59,172 12 23,79.< 1868 1,038 754,600 7,018 • ■ • I 5,466 3,052 22,.097 1869 993 662,995 17,968 205,832 8,622 4,512 1,500 1870 1,007 726,360 11,519 227,520 8,520 4,112 300 1871 899 698,987 7,374 511,772 23,336 • • • • 10 1872 1,030 808,542 6,777 446,612 24.870 18 • • • • 1873 875 683,928 14,359 502,055 4,126 .... 117 During the first forty years specified in these tables of Flour and Qrain, shipped from iihe Port df Quebec?, the Richelieu Valley was the chief Wheat-growing region of Canada ; the principal flouting mills being in that city and neighborhood. While the large quantities exported, (ytry large for those early times,) lead naturally to the beliel that there must have been a much larger yield, to admit of so great a surplus for shipment, — the present condition of that Valley and of the Province of Quebec in general shows that, as in the United States, the progress of Wheat culture is westward. The conjecture that any considerable quantities of Baltic and Black Sea Wheat were, in the years referred • Foreign vessels were first permitted, in 1860, to proceed under license to Mont- real for the purpose of loading, — returning to Quebec for a sea-clearance. Many of the foreign vessels, therefore, which are noted as clearing at Quebec in 1860 and following years, were actually loaded at Montreal. t On and after Ist July, 1867, Flour and Qrain shipped to ports in Nova Scotia and New Brunswiclc from ports in Ontario and Quebec, were not recorded at Custom-hooseB >aa exports, and are, therefore, not included in the above table. 69 310 36"J 620 100 ii: to, shipped to Canada, and re expo t d to Great Britain, thus evading a certain amount of duty, is not verified by any r -cord to wliieh the writer has had access. But a gleam of light is thrown upon tli^' question, — AVliore did all the Grain, referred to in '.he table as shipped fifty or sixty years ago, come from ? — by the following paragraph taken from a valuable contribution by T. C. Keefer, Esq., C. E., to a volume on Canada, published several year ago, entitled " Eighty Years Progress '' : — " During the first (luiirter of the present century, — before the State of New York had availed iierself of tliat remarkable pass through the Alleghany range, which is aflforded by the Hudson River, and had tapi)e(l Lakes Cbampl.iin, Ontario and Erie by means of her grand canals, — exports from Northern Vermont ami New York via Lake Champlain (or Corlaer's Lake, as the Uuteh had named it,) as will as from those tributaries of the St. Lawrence which lake their rise in the ' Empire State,' sought an outlet at Quebec and Montreal. Previous to the year 1822, American lumber, gr.iin, &c., were admitted into Canada duty free, and exported with all the privileges afforded to Canadian products, to the British West India colonies. While New York was pressing forward her canals (commenced in 1817 and completed in 1824.) the Imi)erial authorities, in 1822, prepared the way for the complete diversion of Amorican exports from the St. Lawrence to those canals, by imposing a duty upon such exports to Canada. Sir J. B. Robinson, in 1822, as the agent of Uj)per Canada in London, very i)roperly suggested that the propriety, or otherwise, of such a duty might saftly he left to the Cnnadians ; but the defence to the measure was that, as Canadian prodHcts were admitted into the British West India col- onies free of duty, wiiile Anitriean were taxed, the free/idmission of the latter into Can- ada would be a discrimination in favor of British bottoms, via the St. Lawrence, against American bottom.s, via the Mississip|>i, of which the Americans would complain as an evasion of the relaxation professed to be made in the navigation laws for the benefit of a reciprocal commerce." This blunder was, howt^ver, acknowledged, in 1831, by the re- admission of American exports, as before, free of duty." An interesting article published in the Oswego Advertiser and Times, entitled " Sketches of the Commercial History of Oswego," by H. C. Stillman, Esq., Secretary of the Board ot Trade of that city, contains the following statement corroborative of Mr. Keefer's remarks : — " For many years prior to the construction of the Welland and Oswego Canals, the products of Western New York, including wheat found their market chiefly at Montreal «nd Quebec — from the Oswego, Genesse and Niagara Rivers principally, in vessels to Kingston, Prescott or Ogdensburg, then re-shipped on board Durham boats, French batteaux and rafts. The navigation of the Mohawk had been improved, so that goods taken on board of Durham boats at Schenectady, by way of Wood Creek and Oneida Lake, reached Oswego Falls. Here was a portage, and the goods re-shipped on boats of a smaller size, were conveyed to Oswego. Property destined for the west was shipped to Lewiston in vessels, taken to Schlosser in wagonn, thence in boats to Black Rock, there shipped on board vessels and towed by oxen into Lake Erie, The rival route was from Albany to Buffalo in wagons." The dilTertntial regulation in favor of the importation of Canadian Wheat and Wheat Flour into the United Kingdom was not established prior to 1815 ; it was in that year provided that Foreign Wheat could not be imported free of duty until the price of British Wh«at reached 82s. 6d. per quarter, nor Colonial Wh« at until the price of British Wheat reached (j9s. 1^ per quarter. From about the year 1828 to 1842, a sliding-scale of duties prevailed. The rates upon Fon-ign Wheat varied from Is. to 208. 5d. per quarter, as the price of British Wheat ranged from 73s. to 668. per quarter ; and an additional shilling per quarter was charged for every further fall in price of one shilling or fractional part thereof. Tlic rates of duty upon Colonial Wheat were 58. per quarter, when the average of British Wheat was under 67 s., — and 6d. per quarter when the price was at or above €78. In 1843, the duty upon Canadian Wheat was reduced to Is. per quarter, at which it remained until the free admission of "Corn" in 1869. Foreign Wheat was also subject to the same rate of duty (Is. per quarter) between the years 1849 and 1869. M (6, P O h4 H O o P^ Q M n «) o o 1^ o m H J?; & Of H n H cs M O n » » o o 60 a 70 " -St;? o P4 ■3?5 -o c 7> tc — X X — J- 3 c: 1.7 s,«o r: j^,ri -^ o^rj^iw b c -r ci '3 o -a tC I o" '^» X* rj ri — x -^ s-r ^5 '~' c; r? »-" ji -j* r: -m" m rf rT lo '*' ?» JJ — rf ' c; o J'. :; ' ?» 3 1- - to • ci i.t T s T -?< • ci — ?J r» t- ~ r< r5 -H 1* — t- X rs" 0.0 in — V> o li^ CO ^n o — o l>.X01'CS-«l''-'5< a o a a. IS M • '.S O t^ X :z If — -T O --> — I 1" —• X -1" M Ci — ■>> — fO «5 -^ X r* T 7» O •S I ■»f ^s '*' "c" 7j c-r 7." 1 -* i>r 1 "i x •£ f f t' x" p — ' o sT — — ^ ^: '^ j>^ ^'' i.r: tC S . cs X !0 C5 1.-: c^, I', c; o — ( X C'J T cr> ?> — . »T C-, TO -"T eo o j^ T S i^ r-« M —1 — ir* 1-1 'T f i s>j o i^ 1-- ■^ C5 — !>• «o I-': i^ !>. — 35 ^ A P4 X s f »5 <>. v; c •?> -»• X ^^ O *^ Ci l.'^ in ?c t ■C "O Ci rj CD in «>• — ifl O in ■^ r-. X 3". 3i '" X 3* i>. t- s3 ^ m i-< ii 35 X to c ~ J 1^ ci i.^ «i i.*^ 7^; c* ^ 'JL' :i^? i^ f* w! ^^^ irg 1— i ^^ ^ /j i > I- in « .= 32 3> i'. 31 1— — X 10 ■» SI t- n M f: 3i : rf: 35 1-1 3; 3> X — 7( -■ in - r: -M — i- r: -^ 5 3< in in 1* n s* ^ i-» -1 fo in 1— I (■• T— 1 i^ — ' ■ - — i., . ■ . . 3 1^ -, t, •^r in o « TT — _ — ; 'T 3i i>r '^ -o -N o" 3r nT ^' 5» in ■ " •" ■' '.". M o •?» i:: 35 a in in ^inmxs^co'* a a o en a TJ i • X : • I-* 35 : '. in" vf 3^ ' ri :i .-n »-.■> ^ ^ ,_, -jj ,i_, • i-i o nHc 35 — rt 1-1 in •?» 35 ; {>. -^ ^-3 — 1 1^ 35 r: X «^ X r; X o X — — . -). jj — jy, „ ^ — — , _ >^x TJ_j^ -s' c-^o 35_^r5 35 .' ^.z x" x" x' '»" m" "* i~r -i x -r •rr' cT -T rn rj *o cT o s 1-i T-i •^_t-._o t>. x_^'^ i>. PI xinin i-T f-T r-T ?f t^" cc <1 m ?-5 1^ X 35 5 — ^T ^r *7^ *T X X X X :■ 35 = — -N r: <* in "O I- X 35 o — (?» M -r in ta r- X 05 o — 3« ^: r -* in o in in m in in ■" o in ^n -3 to o i; «5 '2 to ?c •* r>. i>. ?» i>. Tt) X X X X X X X 'X X X XI X X X -f X OD X X X X X 00 X I S M M 1 to -^ Oi . ^ ip t^ ' S l^ T-« ' (^ — 3J 61 2,87 7,54 3.52 r: L*^ Tf 1-^ rj <^ o ^r - 'O o eg; = o T r: ITS -r soo-j'-xi ^ T.- -H jj a < g »:) -< K O EH o I H H n O i» EH M H O H «4 M CO o >5 O H CO «e 00 Pi !zi H H P4 O P^ H H o H s ,5 t- »a d ao to (0 « o> C4 to -H 00 M O •A lA O N lA l-l a» 00 1 a ■>t 00 to to O CO ^ Tl" 05 -H ■^ 00 O 05 lA ^ © ■* t 00 o ■«(' J; to CO t- to ^ to t- 00 I-H N CO to •^ I- lA 00 -1 00 CO 00 rH lO u Q a >a in ci © CO o> 00 05 CO in t- -H to 00 05 05 lA 00 1* to t- r; ■•* r-l M fH •<*l i-H ■ 05 to to m to to M ,2 r-( 1— 1 CJ to to o 05 O rt t- Tt< -* O CM cq t- to 'f CO Cfl rH to M ^ I- 00 1- to © © -H ■* ■* 00 CM OO •'f 00 o» to 00 to ^ CO to 1^ ?• 1— eo 00 lO t- —1 to CO CM t- ■* © •^ 00 CO CM I-H ■^ rH 05 i- 0> H t~ CD c^ a •* ■* C to M- CM CM CO 00 CM CO 00 o ■ft, CO t- in lA e >A 05 to to ^ 10 1- IN t- in © CM to 00 CM t- Tf CO i- e« to CO ■* — lA CM CO I- CO 00 lO 1- to CO t- 00 to 00 ■*•© CM ■* o o N Ti< lA ^ rH lA 5 o to e^ 00 CO to I-H CO ■>* 00 ■* r^ •0 CO ■* 05 to to 00 © CI O) 05 i-c CO 1-1 eo f-H e^ 1-H n f-i CM eo in ■^ in CM lA in CO C^ CO •<♦ «A H ^' lO 0» to lO in CO CO -H I-H fH 05 to O 05 t- 05 ■* o rH lA t- CO 01 M ^ to 00 in 00 CJ CO to 00 ■* —1 CO ^ 05 CM o to •^ in CM © O ^ lA CO 01 00 to 00 t- Tj< 05 I-H © 00 CM l-l '^ rH to o to t- 00 00 a e 05 Ir- ■* t © r-l CO ■>* t- CM l-l 00 CO -"t CM t- © 05 I-H in rH t- fS| N to c-l t- O -1 CO in 05 CO m CO l-l 00 00 in to 00 t- o 1* 0> a If I.-: t- M< -t o CO 05 in o •<*< © M 05 t- 05 05 05 to t- lA CO l^ O CO eq r-. O 05 CM t- CO © I-H to 00 ^ w o © CJ CO 00 IM e 00 t- oi e> 00 in ■* CM to t- 00 t- *- to 00 05 to © 1- © © i- •cq r-l to CO l-l to CM T(< CM CO CO CM in o ■ t^ to ^^ 00 © CO in 05 O CM 05 1* 00 t- 00 00 <-> 05 © e; ■* to CI 05 O to rt Tf CM CM CM CO in in in to CO lA in-* lA to ,ij ■* CO CO ■^ CO CO t- © 00 CO CM 00 CO Tjl t- CM •* rH © to © i- e -^ to t^ -^ O lO CO 1-- rt I- in © ■J5 to 05 t- 00 -H ■«^ lA CM 05 i:- 05 M e to ■* © >o 05 00 r-> t- CO to CO © rH 00 05 05 O 05 rH t- CM © fiq 00 e• ■^ to T}. 05 to O « I "A I N '. •< fi^ M CI co CO ■* to CM CO •* CM lA H J5 CO CO 1* 00 00 t- «M 00 ■* o lO . CO . 05 . c • CM . co . 05 . CM . CO . © . • s ■* . 00 • in • •* • m . 05 . CO • 00 • in • CM . o> • •^ w ■* '. w ; ■* ! e^ I. 1— 1 I-H t- ■ ■* ! 00 ; © ; 00 ; a ft^ CO •o >* I-H CO CM • c* Cfl CM CM ■* as •H s ,fi to 00 1-4 If to 00 T(l o 05 © © ^ «rt . r-< • in . o . 00 . J;- . d . o . Tt . O • CO • h I-H o • f-H • 00 • 00 . i- . © . 1— 1 05 . in • r- • M e <^ '. o ■ 1— t « I 00 ; e^ I 05 ; ^ ! t- ' o ; © ; Ik e; CJ ■«*< CI r-l CO e^ CM c* O CO ■* s •9 ,-) o> © •* -t f-4 ■<»< to CO 05 00 H o> . in . to . I-H . o> . 05 . CO . to • to . 00 • 05 • 1 f—l * e^ • 05 • 1— 1 • CO . CO • I-H • CO • 00 • Tj< . C^ • g <^ '. "5 '. o ; © ; 00 ! t- • A H "^1 6^ 6^ ^i dt3 d J 6*3 6^ 6»3 ii CO •<*< in to t- 00 05 o r-l CM CO to to to to to to to t- t- *- t- H 00 00 1-t 00 1^ 00 I-H 00 •-H 00 00 r-l 00 «-H 00 •■H 00 rH 00 rH 1 62 ii at IS M 00 M g P M H O o o H CO 00 DQ Pi H H o H H O m H M H M et t- o CO CO O (O © Ok © >• CO o ■^ 0» O O rjl ■ •• a> »o © 00 © •* t- o >o o c^ ^ 00 © •^ o CO — M 3 io_e-» t- • ■*^'^ e-i^io^ t- CO ©__©_ e^ © . ^- co^ ■ t- . '*.."^. i u H a 09 oo"oo" ^ '. -f(0 (rTaT © o> oo^kT •* © ! "» <=" ■ *0 in"i-^" lO 1-4 CO . CO •* 00 -H ^ -^ CJ 0> M 00 CO ; f^ •♦ © «l o © r^ ro1S~ "6 CO -f-H ' ©CO © f ■* •^' © in o © O CI O t- H 1 C> N lO -J* ■* -H ■* »t o t- CO 01 T). ^ in m rH to O CO O 1- B r-_«>^ CD_OT '■*-'^- lO_CO^ CO ^ o>_co__ t- o CO CD^ 0D_^CO_^ © CO oo_^in 3 o cf oT i-^oT i-TTfT c-TocT ■* 00 i-^cT ■*"-h" 1— t oTco" co"co" --" co" W M ■<»• ur> o m lO o •! f-H -H , 00 M 00 0> O CO © ^ © 00 O -1 T)< in © CO m t- o m o t- M •D m 00 O '-I O CO 1:- CO o es © c^ 00 t- © C o 00 I- -H f-H t- 00 © CO '^.,'*., CO^l-^ R-'^ 1-^00^ g 1 oo"-*" oTin" o o 00 C5 >* lO CO 00 CO © c^Tin"" i~^-^ oo"co~ 1— r^ 0> r-4 00 •o m ^ 00 CO 05 -i m m CO CO CO m © CO rH -t 'O u ■* f-H C-l I-H ©_ ■^ *1 CO e^ e.T in o> in © 00 in o © m T)< in o t- in CI o oo_o_ 00 C-1 IM 00 -H ■* m -^ Ol_C0__ "t1 CO lO^ e^© ©_^cc r-^«^ K ^"o" CO CO ei a tjTtjT m o> •fin" in'rH" «>■" ©"co" co"-*" 1-^ — • H M 0> r^ r-t CO t- t-H I-H © lO -< e CO cq O 00 © m V t- o t- CO 00 •t t- © rH © t- m 00 a 1 3 M_o^ ^ 00. t-_^(M__ as_©__ "5,1 e^ ^" '*„'*- ift_in__ in^© oo^co_^ oo__-t_ 5 oo TjTt-T -Too" *-^— T cf©" oT co" ©"-h" co"in" rH"in' cf cT ©"©" c* ^ e^ CO e«i -^ rH 00 rH T)t e^ »- M CI © CO ^ 00 m ci f^ 00 o» C«l i-l 00 CJ_ rH ©__ CJ 00 lO ^ M CO © OJ O CV| © Ol © o CO CO T»« © © © •^ t- © © 1 -H O tn <7> e^ CO lO 00 © « © CO m o © M ^ 00 f-H rH >^ «9 O i-H 00 ■* CO t- in "^-■^^ in c*i CO t- ci_ao_ "I"!. © 00 f— f — >J o ■* cTo" oTr-T f-H CO ©"icT CO CO © c> oo"in" t-"or co"©" © -t b CO CO C^ tr- CO C4 n C« CO c< •»)< PJ »t c< o ^ o CO ^ m © •» CO ee ■* rH CO CO •^ ■«*• ^ , "co^oT" in CO © © ~©~oo" cTo" o ■* t- m O CO © CI ~in~©~' o © 1 e^ o t- CO >a CO lO CO o © « -H CO 00 m M m rH C5 CO o m M 0>^CO_ co_co_ o o> OJ CO t- -H ■^o_^ UO^Tj*^ ©_IC1_ CO •^ CJ_©_^ 00^CO_ >; cf ci" e4"^ oo"co~ CO e CO lO CO c^ e-1 -H 01 C^ 00 •>*l CO © «:- CO in C4 in CO CJ ■<(< Cl »^ M ©„ lO CO C0_ o^ ©_ e-^ f-H f-H ^• © o rt uo t- o © 00 o e^ o •* o © o © o t- © 00 © © •5 to t- © o o tn m o> la -H © ^- O t- lO CO © CO in -^ o t- h co •<*< CO -< r^^ e^t lO o> ffi in ei_t-_ ^ "i. c» o t- © CO 00 00 00 M ■< ^ o ee".-r © i- 00 lO ^ t~ ©"•*" cfco" TjTtvT © in CI CO Cl X N -< e N t- -H t^ in CO CO tfl ■<*< o t- in .n 1^ f-H r- rH e^ •* c* »^ ■* ©_ in_ CO 00 -H -H f— < o o © © ■* »in © © © © © W © © o lO o> o ■* in in CO © ^ *- . "t • OS . ■* . oo_ . t-^ • © • e<_ . r- . in • 00 • S f-H 1 •*" ; w" : o>" '. f-H * -H ' ■*" : ^ • Tf< . 4 ■^ Si CO . CO l co" ', «^" I • w" ; X >< . o i-H © © ~00 © o © © in © M ^ 00 ^H o o © o © o © c^ 00 ■^ u 00 . co_ • ■*» • et_ • s ««>" : "" ; co" '. >«" ! o : e^" ! o" ; *"" ', c^" '. t~< ' -i<" ■ a <» . c . t—t , d , c*» . , rH ; , a e '. * * t- ; o> ; CO 1 CO . ■^ . c^ . «^ ! r^ ■ • • e*> ! f-H ^ o; • • • ^1 H • • • • ^1 ^1 ■ • ^1 S"! • > ^1 • • ^1 ^1 • • cS O o ^^ ^5 Je5 i5 i3 ^3 Z6 ^6 i5 ^6 2 :§ g Is Is &S 'is Is Is ss Ph S Is Is . '^ •fh . **H . '-^ . "^ »m4 « tu2 0>J 63 • oj %i ^'i 63 63 & CO •^ »o CO . ^- 02 01 © f-H c» CO CO CO CO CO CO CO CO t- t- t- i- tS 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 f-4 1— t rH --H f-H f-H 1-^ -H f-H ^^ — ' 68 n 1- r o ""^ ^ t^ D 1— n iO —I .~5 t t- l'- s 1>- rj t~- ^. ao 1^ t 'J ~^ '^ M s o M o - « -* p— - CI !■- ^— 2 't 3 00 f n cs ri n 00 5 0> - <-H ^ ■>+ 1 05 r* 05 o__t H n (-1 » H w •< H »-( Q n H O n o EH M m H H O Eh 1^ » H !Z! O o M H < n o M H :z; i-t n H OQ 1^ H M to a H o <1 o H o . O O -H 05 1— >« .« 00 c «o O O f a 05 rt • •<* CO «- f2 "-I irt o OCTOBRE. . lO W 00 -^ lO W «£> 3 >o c^ t- -H CO C^ CO • CO 00 M s H CL, H og i-i ■»!< -H ;o t~. -- •9 N CO O r- 05 't "S OO^^'^^J, • • ^ 5O.00 "g o-t-^w" ' • cTco^co" 3 t- CO 00 ■ O 00 "t . •* M © -H lO t- 45 o «5 ^ ^- -4 -t "S t-^efoT ■ • ef ca"or 3 00 CO «0 ; ; 0> CO CO 1^ CO .-1 rH • ■«»' e^w . <0 t- 05 i-c 05 0> <0 •» 05i-iNt- cot-m •^ 'o,'-<,oo_<'i. •<»,'^_'* a t-lr-COCQ '0'«J't- jg CO M 1-1 N »_«) H . t~ lO 00 to O CJ •^ •» i-ioiNco in t~ CO ^ lO«OCOO .NOOO jS rt rH (M •-♦ Tj-^CO H . cO'*io«eoo-- 431 9.59 mills. 1863 7,498,509 2.40 II 8,432,23. J " 9,< .u05 8.76 " 1864 8,542,370 2.75 « fH CO M C4 »» M A t- *- '^ •^ eq a eo ■^ •a f 00 © o 0> CO l-l »- lA © © 2 2 S £ g in 0>_ o" o in" oo" •T co_ 00_ o" C0__ oT 1 o" o" ©^ t-" I-H co" oo" PH ■»1«" ce_ I-H ©~ o SSh M CO M 00 I-H N M 00 CO N •>* 0> in ■«*< '^l CO © 00 I-H M ■^f 00 0> CO 00 m M CO 00 I-H 'I' PH 00 CO <,.g S3 Hi >n U) M m CO CO 00 00 00 00 o I-H o ^H I-H ^■H I-H la PH (0 pH 00 PH IM in o> N o ♦0 CO 00 00 so fO N in CO o> PH 0> -H 0> o lA o> t- m t ^H o in 00 M ot I-H 00 t- M" CO CO pH TS M o OT pH a> at o ■* e>i o m I-H ■^ C4 •^ h- oi" o >o •H I-H in f) o 00 00 00 •* o CO c« •^ (t) CJ 0> CO 0> I-H I-H o »- CO 00 M t~ •^ I-H I-H I-H I-H r^ H r-^ I-H I-H C«I N C4 e (T) © 04 * £. 00 CO 0> 00 -H m 00 o> ■* in « C«I M on CO on t- 00 • M S» © o pH CO N CO t- CO o> CO e«« CO M o *- 00 lO t- 3 M) a in 00 M o> CO »- CO •* I-H 21 o 00 m o 0» in m N t- 00 •* m ^- CO *- CO 5 »-H M CO r^ CO m m in 00 t- t- CO -* CO I-H ^ CO CO < H "C M M 05 ■«»< •'J' in in 1« -# m m CO m .CO CO CO CO i ^ ^ 1 « ^ £ l« I-H ^H M 00 in o CO -H CO CO o> M o ■^ © *- *- > 00 •>* m t- M A o> Tj" « •»»< 40 on in ;?— on m pH 04 « I-H 00 00 I-H M ci ■>* 00 '0 I-H in 00 CO CO <* 0> 00 ^ Cl © CO in on CO d o _- I- CO lO in I-H in t- -* o Cfl CO CO <* CO t- ^- in CO i 1 f M ■<»' N t- o l-H 00 CO •* N CO •0 CO w co M CO I-H -h" H " ' 1 & to « 1— ( CO in e^ ■«*' OS m CO 00 o Cfl CO CO o> in 00 '* C4 e» CO CO t— m I-H m 0> 01 in OJ ■* •^ © © o t- © N o Ol o m T«< n t- CO t- in ei ri in N C4 t- £ a CO oo CO Oi 0) CO •4 in o ■^ r' T»l 00 ?» ««i ■* 'J" C4 -«1 ^ « t- I-H CO cc in CO I-H t~ CO 00 © I-H in H« CO p-H ^ 0> 0> w 00 I-H M CO 00 i-H N c» ■♦ Oi •0 00 00 in CO s " -H fH 1^ M M CO M CO •* ■0" •* m CO 1 « t- >* »- M 0> ••*< « CO *- CO CM I-H 00 CO 9 © o B ■^ 1— t M M m in M CO 00 r- CO CO m t- t- t- r4 CO a ^ (2 o> CO in t- C4 o> 00 CO o> co 0> ■* ■'J' 0> o CO t- V' B «= o GO o •* n t- CO p-H 00 in e« t- t- w M 00 in PH •fll ■^ C4 m I-H 05 ■* CO M — H I-H 01 t- o e^ CO ■* -H a 5 2 I-H 1-H I-H I-H I-H M r4 e^i M N CO C4 CO •0 ■^ t- t- IT a ^ -O 5 H ® 1 5 « m pH »- a> « C4 CO •* 00 A r- CO o> m o CD m ■* r 1 I-H 0> o I-H 00 o CO o ■* <3> 04 N o> 00 © in CO e* t<% I-H M ■^ CO I-H M I-H o> in 00 © © Ol t- *• tf> ao in ■«*< 00 b- t- o> »- in Cfl i- CO I-H N ea CO M to o t- M CO M M CO 00 ■«J< m t- e co ■«*< 00 e>) CO o> e^ t- on t- 00 o I-H CO •* in pj CO CO 00 N r-H m CO in ^ I-H iH I-H I-H I-H pH I-H I-H " N Tf •* ■* m 1 • Jb- I-H t- ■-H « M in © I-H CO «. ■* ©• I-H pH O) ■«i< N N ■^ o in t- CO 00 00 I-H o CO* at s CO 00 I-H o> CO o o A in t- 00 m 00 CO m I-H CO fH 00 -* 0» 00 0> oo to I-H o n I-H 0> in I-H 0> CO in 00 H«> t- «> 00 d 00 Jr- O •* ■* '* CO o CO ■^ in •> CO CO o> in in in 5 •<> C4 M CO M M TC ■^ ■* •* CO ■* •<*< in t- N ■"i" PH ■* ^ g s PH I-H PH pH 5? H • c d C 4 P t <0 1- on 0» O I-H M fO •«l< in CO *- «0 0> o pH M CO lO to to lO CO «D CO «o CO CO CO CO CO CO t- t- »- i- 00 ft 00 1-4 00 l-l CO I-H 00 00 fH CO <-4 00 t-t 00 I-H CO l-l 00 9^ CO 00 00 00 CO 00 I 66 H M "Jci o f- o cc * «5 S-l 'O — O X '^. M .^ -'5 Al 3-H M I- m 35 OJ CO -O M •-<«>■. to to 1 ■i< ,li li" Ai "^ I.-3 .■■<; cic f 1 00 1-" X MO M CO -I" » ±0 I* f>c S "i to -o dv a CO >-i K- »f o o o -f a. ^- (N CD CO «0 3> "1 00 iri SO o : ^ OO IM 3» a» o il< GO w op o 00 '^ {. t O 00 o to 00" M t- -MO N i-H : CO o .0 00 CO : N t- '• M to CO 00 o to ■ ■« •« OS . 00 N : a> o ■ OC 1-* ■O "S H H ^^ St: «s 00 o> i^ E^ f* -^ "O M S .3» O M t^ DO) tOtOfi— '-< 2o»M«OM ^x■r|l'nl^^ e2^.cocpo -lis o M o -■<»< 0^9 to to O O O b- M r; M •;< to o ^n ^ ■i)i <^ oa 00 Ci t^ rM It) tm *"• I" o> o> to _- M t-H »>• to 2 «o M p» p- M h- «9 ^• ■^ OS "O •— -cb .ll -^ O 1-4 o ^ :eo : : M : 00 • CO : 1-1 o» "-1^ f- b- : M : : « : e» -f o ; e^ -^ CO ;oo6 «=: 2fe ! M b- : to CO M to to W 1^ : : ^ t as O 2 ^ ?n.o . b- ifl • 9* "?" : CO M 0> OS • CO CO ■ M CO ' ?• T ' M eo ■ 00 -H e o to • t- CO ; ^ o to -i< 00 to o pH to •^ OO OS 00 o eo i M CO ; OS 'Ti '■ i^ to ' OS OS "i* . p- ji t^ •— : o CO ^ • . • • . . ■< . O CO O OS 5SS5 000 At P4 pLi n n (3 2 2.2 ^&5 ^2 Si eg o H 2^2 ''. a B n S 2 2 ^ *-» *rf a E a 000 h« k. t-i 522 000 Ph CU P>i 80 en c: 2 £ « M to g 13 .21 .5 (J 222 « " h b >» b o e o o w 00 ca ♦^ ♦.* .2 u- iJ t) H g 00 2 2 2 g'2s s s a 000 si O O O o rt *^ AA «- r^ SZ'SS o c o o ala.euP^ la n a S o 3 pi* *« I2. W «it ^ » 3 ;s °s h L. bi C •5 O O O P4 AiPh O4 00 a a 52 2 22 2 WCfflg 2222 "»2222 " b & b u o o c o a 03 .5 2 3^ S r/2 g 6 w = O c S " ■2^2 •^23 a s a o o o u i« Ip 4 I ^ a 11 11 |i p- Bd a K B 2 2 2 g-/JOQ S « n .222 ■352 acnca 19 .S U O t) tJ Has ^Bssa 909 50000 • _ S a a 2 o H 2 2 '/I 03 a s 2 2 A T in to 00 f • t- M • CO : lo -«< : o> : 1— 00 r o (Mt~ • ■* .• • .• N «■ . . ui e»5 «» ' 5 : b- 3» <».o :>OM (^ • o ■•■•■• o> _ - • m *" " « : M t^ : -4 ... -.2533 ; fc b '" '■ ; o o o o ; c *» 7} fl : .2 -2 ii §• : -255=5 D d w * O J <-> ♦^ «3 I C 5 « a 1 .5 -I S 2 ;■? 55* 'a a -Ann i s B a s Lo o o o •• k bi I. C ; Ph Bb b Ph 67 MOVEMENT OF FLOUR AND GRAIN FROM THE LAKE ONTARIO. Movement in 1873. Receipts at Flour. Oswego .... Charlotte 35 Cape Vincent .... Ogdsnsburg 116,593 Montreal 1,130,641 ' Total 1,247,272 Movement m 1872. Receipts at Flour. Oswego 110 Charlotte 32 Cape Vincent r .... Ogdensburg 137,859 Montreal 92 1,963 Total ~T7059,969 Movement in 1871. Receipts at Flour. Oswego 1,552 Charlotte 12 Cape Vincent .... Ogdensburg 199,605 Montreal 941,633 Tc tu 17i42^0'2 Movement in 1870. Receipts at Flour. Oswego 5,752 Charlotte 32 Cape Vincent .... Ogdensburg 216,502 Montreal 1,031,021 Total 1,2537307 Movement in 1869. Receipts nt Flour. Oswego 3,522 Charlotto 320 Cape Vincoiii 194 Ogdensburg 247,895 Montreal 984,192 Total 1,235,133 Movement in 1859. Receipts at Flour. Oswego 64,941 Charlotte 1 ,764 Cape Vincent 9,390 Ogdensburg 294,659 Montreal 597,573 Total 968,247 Tho porcontago^oach port received is shown i 187.% 1872. 1871. Oswego 20..34 28.83 39.64 Charlotto 24 .60 .29 Cape Vincent 9; 1.35 1.49 Ogdensburg 11.39 14.00 13.89 Montreal 61.06 55.22 44.69 LAKE REGIONS OVER Grain. Total inbu. 8,547,720 8,547,720 79,465 79,640 314,227 314,227 3,111,781 3,694,746 14,159,816 19,813,036 26,213,009 32,449,360 Grain. Total in bu. 9,224,429 9,224,979 192,596 192,756 437,373 437,373 3,786,689 4,475,984 12,937,663 17,547,505 26,578,750 31,878,595 Grain. Total in bu. 14,209,214 14,216,974 8.5,834 85,894 638,692 538,692 3,954,234 4,952,259 11,457,314 16,165,479 30,245,288 35,659,298 Grain. Total in bu. 12,250,286 12,279,046 111,169 111,329 455,756 455,756 2,566,502 4,649,502 7,469,813 12,624,918 13,853,526 30,120,551 Grain. Total in bu. 13,378,972 13,396,582 81,799 83,449 207,476 208,446 2,884,701 4,124,176 8,116,827 13,039,787 24,671,775 30,852,440 Grain. Total in bu. 7,022,145 7,346,850 425,711 434,631 603,369 550,319 1,132,231 2,605,076 915,782 3,903,697 9,999,238 14,840,473 n tho following table : — 1870. 1869. 1859, 40.77 43.44 49.60 .37 .27 2.92 1.51 .67 ♦ 3.70 15.48 13.06 17.56 41.92 42.26 26.23 68 Annual Receipts qf Western {U.S.) Wheat and Com at Kingston, from 1850 to 1873. Whbat. CORM. Whbat. Cork. YEARS. YEARS. Bushels. Bushels. Bushela. Bushels. 1850 145,472 1862 5,079,417 1,913,010 1851 148,364 31,622 1863 3,135,055 653,855 1852 28,936 109,906 1864 1,813,152 121,978 1853 117,537 1865 1,686,718 640,041 1854 33,301 253,912 1866 274,252 1,442,912 1855 372,258 472,924 1867 2,064,509 700,692 1856 651,882 679,905 1868 1,461,272 999,515 1827 1,443,919 380,844 1869 5,092,571 171,220 1858 1,228,468 169,781 1870 4,839,591 165,283 1859 347,376 90,688 1871 5,546,193 2,766,449 1860 1,184,062 218,929 1872 2,754,148 6,300,959 1861 2,850,677 1,013,554 1873 5,561,446 2,580,877 SUMMARY OF COMPARATIVE GRAIN FREIGHTS. The following table affords a concise statement of comparative average rates of freight for Grain per bushel from Chicago to New York city and to Montreal, — there being also comparative averages via Buffalo and Oswego. The averages from Chicago to Montreal largely favor tlic St. Lawrence route, — the saving of time in transport being also a verv valuable item ; — Chioaqo to New York, Via Buffalo. H ^:h rate to )rk. Ybars. best ffalo w Yc 6 a to.SPQ ^5 « Szi-" go 26 c. a«^ 1861 ^ 30 c. 1862 ^ 17 c. 24jo. 1863 9 12§c. 25 c. 1864 10 18 c. 22 0. 1865 10 19 c. 26 c. 1866 10 23 c. 23 c. 1867 10 16 c. 25 c. 1868 10 13}c. 24 c. 1869 10 12 c. 26 c. 1870 10 10 C. 16 c. 1871 11 18 0. 17 c. 1872 11 le c. 17 c. 1873 11 13 c. 13 c. bo v 4) , 27i 26^ 23 28| 26| 30| 22| 23 23 17 20^ 24J 19 CniOAOO TO New York Via OswKGo. Highest rate Chicago to Oswego. Highest rate Oswego to New York. 3Cic. 22 c. 22}c. 17 t. 18 c. 18 c. 24 c. 18 c. 27 c. 18 c. 30 c. 20 c. 18^-. 16 0. 17 c. 17 c. 16jc. 16 c. 20 r. 12 c. 20 c. 14 c. 20 c. 14 c. 20 0. 9 c. 27 c. 26} 0. 22|c. 28^ c. 27} c. 31} c. 22^ c. 23 c. 23} c. IsXc. 21} c. 23} c. 22 c. CmCAGO TO Montreal, bt Schooner to ElNOSTOK. Through rates. 26 c. 16 c. 18} c. 18} c. 18} c. 17} c. 17} c. 16 c. 16 c. 14} c. 21}('. 18} c. "ft o^ '-a « cC hf t. b '.B > "I "Is Mil All the ratea noted in this table are in U. 8. currency. to 181B. Cork. Bushels. 1,913,010 653,855 121,978 640,041 1,442,912 700,692 999,515 171,220 166,283 2,766,449 6,300,959 2,580,877 ige rates of ;real, — there I Chicago to isport being rig ago to >ntrbal, bt boonbr to Kingston. ough rates. rs i. ^ p ^•^•2 2 ■Sl 3 •- e a » ""5 J i; •» ? V ft* i 69 NOTES ON GRAIN TRANSFER. Facilitibs for Handling Grain at Kingston are afforded by five floating elevators, capable of transferring 250,000 bushels per day of twelve working hours. The barge capacity for transporting the same to Montreal is as follows : Montreal Transportation Company 550,000 bushels St. Lawrence and Chicago Forwarding Company 420,0( " Messrs. Holcomb & Stewart 200,000 " / " Millar & Jones 2 0,000 " TliUB in one trip downwards by the barges of these lines, about a million and-a-half bushels can be moved ; and if it be calculated that on an average each boat could make thirteen trips during the navigable season, there is shown a capacity for transporting over 18 millions of bushels. Of course, this barge capacity is only supplemental to the sailing cra^'t from Chicago to Kingston. But there are fully 30 steam propellors regu- larly making through trips from the first named port to Montreal, which have an aggregate grain carrying capacity of 5 millions of bushels, — while there are other transient craft in the trade, — altogether showing facilities for transporting an aggregate of probably 25 millions of bushels. Thk General Rate op Fkeioht, during the season of 1874, on wheat from Kingston to Montreal is 4 cents per bushel. A fair average through rate from Chicago to Kingston would bo 7J cents American currency. The upward through freight to Chicago by propellors consists of Pig Iron'and Salt at $2.50 per long ton ; with general merchandise at $:^.00 to $4.00 per long ton . Tub Avbuaqe Time, during season 1874, occupied by schooners in coining from Chicago to Kingston is 13 days ; average time of transfer and delay at the latter port I day; and the time of barges from Kingston to Montreal is 3j days, making in all 17J days from Chicago tu the head of Ocean navigation at Montreal by schooners and barges. Propellors usually perform the trip in 9 to 10 days. The Elevatino Capacity connected with warehousing facilities in Montreal com- prises 11 elevators, capable of transferring 3,000 bushels of grain per hour. In nddition, the Jlontrcal Elevating Company have 9 floating harbor elevators, each capable of handling about 4,000 bushels per hour, or an aggregate of 30,000 bushels. The storage capacity for flour equals 200,000 bushels. ROUTES FROM THE INTERIOR TO LIVERPOOL. A table is given on page 43, showing distances from tlie head of Lakes Superior and Michigan, to Montreal and New York rcsjjcctively, by existing routes. The following figures indicate further comparative distances : — Chicago to Liverpool, via Welland Canal and K ontreal 4088 miles Chicago to Liverpool, via Erie Canal and New York 4480 " Diff'erenco in favor of St. Lawrence Route 392 " 70 APPENDIX No. VII. DEEPENING OF SHIP CHANNEL, AND HARBOUR IMPROVEMENTS. Wm. J. Pattkhson, Esq., Montreal, 2nd Nov. 1874. Sir, Secretary Board of Trade, In your note of the 28th ult., you ask me to give you a brief statement of the present capacity of the channel for navigation between Montreal and Quebec, and the accommodation which now exists for ships coming to om- Harbour ; — as well as the intended improvements, in both the Channel and the Harbour, which the Commissioners are about to undertake. In doing this, it may be well to observe first, that previous to 1850, no successful improvement of the channel between Quebec and Montreal liad been made, and the size of the ship trading to Montreal was limited to a draft of 11 feet at low water; — that being the depth of water through Lake St. Peter, for a distance of 12 miles. Lighterage of cargo at the season of lowest water was so expensive, that few vessels were employed in the trade of over 350 tons burthen. The necessity of deepening a channel from Montreal to Quebec, through Lake St. Peter, and other shallow parts of the river early engaged the attention of the merchants of Montreal, say from 1838 to 1843, when the Government of Canada, unsuccessfully, made an attempt to do so. But it was not until ISTjO, when a plan of operation was commenced, which in 1853 resulted in a ship being taken through from Montreal to Quebec drawing IG foet of water, where before there was only 11 feet. The channel was further deepened to 18 feet in 1859 ; and in November 18G5, the present channel of 20 feet at low water, and 300 feet wide at bottom in the narrowest place, was completed, and tested by a vessel loaded down to 20 feet, passing tlirough when there was 11 feet in the old channel. The result of this is, that steamers of 3500 tons and over, for most of the season, come to Montreal without breaking bulk ; but when the water falls to the lowest point, or 11 feet in the flats of Lake St. Peter, giving 20 feet in the channel, large steamers have to lighten to come to, or go from Montreal, with full cargoes, and sometimes it is found unprofitable for t'le largest steamers, say of 3900 tons, to come up at all. The effect on the cost of outward freight, by the deepening of the channel to 20 feet, and employing the large ship, harf been to reduce freight 33j per cent, compared with the rates current, previous to the improvement of the channel. As a large vessel therefore can carry cheaper than a small one, it is highly important, not only for the trade of Montreal, but of Canada, that the channel should be so deepened and the Harbour so improved by- facilities therein, for loading and discharging, that ships and steamers from sea of the very largest size, should at all times, and at the lowest depth of water, bo able to come from and go to sea without breaking bulk. The Harbour Commissioners believe that the cost of freight will thus be diminished, and as a conse- quence that the value of what is exported will be increased to the producer, and imports cheapened to the consumer. The Commissioners have therefore resolved to deepen the channel from 20 to 25 feet at lowest water. There was some doubt as to whether this depth could be obtained, as it was known that rock existed in the channel at " Cap Charles," and " Cap ii la Roche," where the tide rises from four to six feet. From an examination, however, which has lately been made by engineers, there is no longer any doubt that at these places (50 miles above Quebec) a 25 foot channel at low tide can be secured, while there is no difficulty in getting the same depth, through Lake St. Peter, and other parts 71 MENTS. Nov. 1874. racnt of the boc, and the K well as the ommisHioncrs no successful , and tlie size water ; — that Ligliterage ere eniidoyed rem Montreal iarly engaged ! Government ISoO, wlien a aken tlirough only 1 1 feet, ber 1805, the he narrowest sing through Df the season, lowest point, Bteamers have les it is found channel to 20 ent. compared a large vessel only for the lened and the hat ships and lowest depth The Harbour ud OS a c'ouse- r, and imports from 20 to 25 1 be obtained, d « Cap k la ion, however, that at these lecured, while ad other parti ol the river. A new channel, parallel with that now in use at Lavaltrie, a distance of seven miles, has been suggested, on the south side of the river, oi)po8itu Contrecceur, which is very wide and deep, and which will require ho little dredging that it is esti- mated a saving of $350,000 will thus bo made by this change. A Dredge and a stone lifter have been working at Cap Charles, since the opening of navigation, and ne.\t spring the Commissioners will be i)roi)ared and ready to begin their great work of the 25 feet cliannel, with 7 powerful Dredges, 7 Steamers or Tenders to same, 5 Spoon Dredges, 1 Stone Lifter, and 30 Scows, which when fully manned, will give employment to over four hundred men, and the consumption of coal for the season is estimated at 15,000 tons. It i ; i>roi)08ed to carry a cut througliout, first of 2A feet, thus securing a channel of 22i feet — and, when this i* done, to go tlirough with another cut of 2i feet, making the 25 feet. It is supposed that all this will be acct)mplished during five years. The next important consideration is, that simultaneously with the improvement ot the Channel to 25 feet, the Harbour must also be improved to corre8j)ond. At present there are no berths for steamers or ships in the harbour drawing over 20 feet, and only a few berths of that dei)th. The depth of water in the channel opposite the City is only 20 feet, and the question conies up : where can ships and steamers drawing 25 leet find berth room in the Harbour ? Tlie present wharves built and under contract in all parts of the harbour, have a frontage of 22,640 feet, affording accommodation for vessels from 10 to 20 feet at low water. The Commissioners are now engaged in dredging out the river in rear of the factories on Mill street. This cannot be completed in less than five seasons, and will give a further accommodation of 4,300 feet, with 25 feet depth. Opposite the city is an extensive Shoal, which engineers have advised should be wliarved, and outside of the shoal, a new channel 25 feet deep can easily be dredged. In Hochelaga Day there is ample water, but that point is very distant from the centre of business and the mouth of the Canal. Then there is tlic schonK! of Docks recommended by Messrs. T. C. Kcefer, Chas. Legge, Kirkwootl, Childe, and McAli»ine, below the Victoria Bridge and abutting there- on, extending down to Wind-Mill I'oint, covering a simce of 120 acres, the property of the Commissianers, and now useless. This space can be filled with water to the depth of 20 feet, above the level of the water in the harbour, from the St. Lawrence between Lachine and the Harbour. Messrs. McAlpine, Kirkwood and Childes, declare that from the water power which can thus be created in this Dock for Mills, Elevators, and Manufactories of all kinds, a revenue will be obtained which will more than three times {lay the cost of its construction, while Dry Docks for building purposes can also bo secured. The subject Is extremely important, and doubtless will force itself on public attention ; but looking at the future requirements of the trade of the St. Lawrence, from and to the West, ther ..♦ ^'/I i/W. rH^ mtwi'niiRni.AMD '^nf"*' ^ LrF"n't •• i: I -^.-T-■-tr ^T f ■ I ■ I ■ I . It ri T pT - t J frtrr-r '- p ^ " ■ I • i " l ■ i » i . r- . - f- p ,>«iX«» ^,\\» ..*• ,H1S >«»'• "ft • l« >» .v\*» C,»^' •»•» I**' i,»r»' «■,■•»«•? .WW'^'^ fh*l'> .*»">■" ^ 6>«f' <''"»•'' i«7« ',)!« «o f "P" <■''••• ' '•'"' '"'"'' •"•' '" '•'""T""' ,?M Ma,, A"* A.**' ,6,.-'^"*''^ .^•" . I-** •«v >»«•• T . iXf^ li»' **•• \1»* M*" V,i» '' l)*' ,s..«» ..»•• ** i«r \* ^' ^" « So' ,.v ,«»'• A T n»V ,S^' \o' .I'V**' c,,««(:''^'^ ^•* 1. ANT I O to accompany (;reat water highways of WITH 8TATCMENTS RELATING TO CTOMMERfE«NAVI