61 1,832 378

----- ------- ------
Total, 7,304 592,839 40,659

[*Transcriber's note: This figure is not correct]

It will be seen, from the foregoing statement, that the tonnage of the
vessels belonging to our colonies is about equal to that of the whole of
the French mercantile marine, which in 1841 consisted of 592,266
tons--1842, 589,517--1843, 599,707.

The tonnage of the three principal ports of Great Britain in 1844 was:--

London 598,552
Liverpool 307,852
Newcastle 259,571
---------
Total 1,165,975

On Lake Erie, the Canadians have a splendid steamer, the London, Captain
Van Allen, and another still larger is building at Chippewa, which is
partly owned by government, and so constructed as to carry the mail and
to become fitted speedily for warlike purposes.

Lake Ontario swarms with splendid British steam-vessels; but on Lake
Huron there is only at present one, called in the Waterloo, in the
employment of the Canada Company, which runs from Goderich to the new
settlements of Owen's Sound.

Propellers now go all the way to St. Joseph's, at the western extremity
of Lake Huron; and the trade on this lake and on Michigan is becoming
absolutely astonishing. Last year, a return of American and foreign
vessels at Chicago, from the commencement of navigation on the 1st of
April to the 1st of November only, shows that there arrived 151
steamers, 80 propellers, 10 brigs, and 142 schooners, making a total of
1,078 lake-going vessels, and a like number of departures, not including
numerous small craft, engaged in the carrying of wood, staves, ashes,
&c., and yet, such was the glut of wheat, that at the latter date
300,000 bushels remained unshipped.

Upwards of a million of money will be expended by the Canadian
Government in protecting and securing the transit trade of the lakes;
and the Canadians have literally gone ahead of Brother Jonathan, for
they have made a ship-canal round the Falls of Niagara, whilst "the most
enterprising people on the face of the earth," who are so much in
advance of us according to the ideas of some writers, have been,
dreaming about it.--So much for the welfare of the earth being co-equal
with democratic institutions, _a la mode Francaise_!

The American government up to 1844 had spent only 2,100,000 dollars on