nt time would disdain to
pilot. What a rush of business there would be at the Marine Post-Office in
Detroit, if some day this company would decide to cut off three of its
large steamers and send out enough schooners of the size recommended by
the English officer, to take their place! The fleet would comprise at
least 318 vessels, and would require not fewer than 1500 seamen to
navigate. It is sometimes said that there is a continual panorama of
vessels passing up and down the rivers of the Great Lakes, but what if the
Englishman had guessed right? Happily he did not, and vessels of 1500 tons
can navigate the connecting waters of Lake Huron and Lake Erie much better
than those of fifteen tons could in his time. That the early ship-builders
did not pay much attention to J. Collins, is evident from the fact that,
when the Detroit was surrendered to the Americans in 1796, twelve merchant
vessels were owned there of from fifty to one hundred tons each.

[Illustration: "THE RED-MEN SET UPON THEM AND SLEW THEM ALL"]

At the close of the eighteenth century the American sailor had hardly
superseded the red men as a navigator, and lake vessels were not much more
plentiful than airships are nowadays. Indeed, the entire fleet in 1799, so
far as can be learned, was as follows: The schooners "Nancy," "Swan," and
"Naegel;" the sloops "Sagina," "Detroit," "Beaver," "Industry,"
"Speedwell," and "Arabaska." This was the fleet, complete, of Lakes Huron,
Erie, and Michigan.

"A wild-looking set were the first white sailors of the lakes," says
Hubbard in his "Memorials of Half a Century." "Their weirdness was often
enhanced by the dash of Indian blood, and they are better described as
rangers of the woods and waters. Picturesque, too, they were in their red
flannel or leather shirts and cloth caps of some gay color, finished to a
point which hung over on one side with a depending tassel. They had a
genuine love for their occupation, and muscles that never seemed to tire
at the paddle and oar. These were not the men who wanted steamboats and
fast sailing vessels. These men had a real love for canoeing, and from
dawn to sunset, with only a short interval, and sometimes no midday rest,
they would ply the oars, causing the canoe or barge to shoot through the
water like a thing of life, but often contending against head winds and
gaining little progress in a day's rowing."

[Illustration: ONE OF THE FIRST LAKE SAILORS]

One of the earliest A