s of time, render it
the seat of a dense population, and a principal granary of the western
continent. Wheat, maize, and tobacco, are cultivated with equal success.
The returns of the agriculturist are large, secure, and of excellent
quality. The last-named article has been grown in considerable quantity
about the river Detroit, near the head of the lake, and favoured, in a
small remission of duty, by the British government, is sent to England,
after having undergone an inland carriage, to Quebec, of 814 miles. Salt
springs exist in almost every township, accompanied, in one or two cases,
by large beds of gypsum. Bog iron ore is common on the north-east side of
the lake, and is worked. The water communications of these countries are
astonishingly easy. Canoes can go from Quebec to Rocky Mountains, to the
Arctic Circle, or to the Mexican Gulf, without a portage longer than four
miles; and the traveller shall arrive at his journey's end as fresh and
as safely as from an English tour of pleasure. It is common for the Erie
steam-boat to take goods and passengers from Buffaloe, to Green Bay and
Chicago, in Lake Michigan, a distance of nearly 900 miles, touching, at
the same time, at many intermediate ports. In about three years, in
addition to the canal connecting Lake Erie with tide-water in the Hudson,
another will be excavated across the southern dividing ridge, to
communicate with the Ohio. Near its place of junction with this river, a
canal from the Atlantic, across the Alleghanies, will enter the Ohio.
Lake Erie will then also have a steady line of water transport to
Baltimore, on the Chesapeake, and New Orleans, on the Mississippi. The
surveys, preparatory to these projects, have been in execution for two
years; there is no doubt of their practicability.

We cannot even hazard a conjecture as to the number of inhabitants around
Lake Erie. They are numerous, and daily augmenting; but with incomparably
greater rapidity on the south side of the lake, distributed between the
States of New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. Ohio, which occupies the
largest portion, in 1800, had 45,000 inhabitants; in 1810, 250,760, and,
in 1820, 581,434. At present, it cannot have less than 750,000
inhabitants, and there is ample room for more. There are few or no
Indians on the north borders of the lake. The Mohawks are placed high up
the river Ouse, and the Hurons, from four to ten miles up the river
Detroit.

The winds are generally either