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• In Senate of the United States.
• Report.
• Great Canals, Along the Atlantic Sea Coast.
• I.: Massachusetts Canal.
• II.: New Jersey Canal.
• III.: Delaware and Chesapeake Canal.
• IV.: Chesapeake and Albemarle.
• Communications Between the Atlantic and Western Waters.
• I.: Santee.
• II.: The Lower Or Great Falls of Roanoke.
• III.: James River.
• IV.: Potomac.
• V.: Susquehannah.
• VI.: Ohio.
• Communications Between the Atlantic Rivers, and the River St. Laurence and Great Lakes.
• I.: Hudson and Champlain, Or Northern Navigation.
• II.: Mohawk and Ontario, Or Western Navigation.
• III.: Niagara.
• Interior Canals.
• I.: Merrimack.
• II.: Schuylkill and Delaware.
• III.: Schuylkill and Susquehannah.
• IV.: Appomattox.
• V.: Neuse and Beaufort.
• VI.: Cape Fear River.
• VII.: New Orleans.
• Turnpike, Or Artificial Roads.
• Recapitulation and Resources.
• Circular Queries, By the Secretary of the Treasury, In Order to Obtain Information.
• Queries Respecting Canals.
• Queries Respecting Artificial Roads.
• Mr. Latrobe’s Communication.
• Mr. Fulton’s Communication.

III.

Niagara.

The fall from lake Erie to lake Ontario has already been stated at 450 feet. A company had also been incorporated by the state of New York, for the purpose of opening a canal at this place: but it does not appear that any thing ever was attempted after the survey had been made. The intention seems to have been to open a canal navigation for boats only, from fort Schlosser to Devil’s hole; the lake itself and Giles’s creek would have supplied the water, and the expense was estimated at 437,000 dollars.

It is however evident that the canal, in order to be as eminently useful as the nature of the undertaking seems to require, should be on such scale as to admit vessels which can navigate both lakes. Considering the distance, which in that case must be extended to about ten miles, and the lockage of 450 feet, it is not believed that the expense can be estimated at less than 1,000,000 dollars.

The works necessary to effect water communications between the tide water of the North river, the St. Laurence, and all the lakes, (lake Superior only excepted) are therefore estimated at four millions of dollars, viz.

The papers relative to those communications will be found under the letter (B.); but the utility of these will not be confined to the extensive navigation of the lakes themselves. For the mountains being completely turned, when arrived into lake Erie, the ridge which separates the waters emptying into that and into lake Michigan, from the northern branches of the Ohio, and from the waters of the Mississippi, is of a moderate elevation, and is gradually depressed in its course westwardly. There is no doubt of the practicability of opening canals at a future period, between several of those waters, either by selecting proper levels, or by means of short tunnels across favorable parts of the ridge. It will at present be sufficient to point out the principal communications now in use.

The distance from lake Erie to lake Chetoughe, an extensive and important elevated reservoir, which is the source of the Canowango branch of the Allegheny, is seven miles by a continual ascent, the elevation of which is not ascertained.

From Presq’ isle on lake Erie, to Le Beuf on French creek, another branch of the Allegheny, the distance is sixteen miles, and a company is incorporated by the state of Pennsylvania, for making an artificial road across that portage.

The navigation from lake Chetoughe, and from Le Beuf to Pittsburgh, offers no impediment whenever the waters are high; and the greater part of the salt now consumed in the north-west counties of Pennsylvania, as far as Pittsburgh, and some distance down the Ohio, is brought from the salt springs of New York, by Oswego, through lake Ontario; then across the portage of Niagara to lake Erie, and thence by either of the two last mentioned portages to the waters of the river Allegheny.

The distance from the place where the Cayuga, a river emptying into lake Erie, ceases to be navigable, to the navigable waters of the Muskingum, which empties into the Ohio 170 miles below Pittsburgh, is only six miles; and a company is said to be formed for the improvement of that communication.

Sandusky river and the Scioro take their sources in the same swamp. The navigation of the Miami of lake Erie is interrupted by some falls; but its upper branches approach those of the Miami of the Ohio, and of the Wabash, and are stated as being nearly on the same level.

The Illinois river, which empties into the Mississippi above St. Louis, rises in a swamp, which when the waters are high, affords a natural canoe navigation to the sources of Chicago creek, a short stream, which falls into lake Michigan, at its southern extremity.

Another communication generally used by the Indian traders is that from Green bay, also in lake Michigan, to the Mississippi, by Fox river, and tho Ouisconsing. Nor is there any doubt that if the inland navigation between the North river and the lakes was completely opened, the whole Indian trade either of the Mississippi by lake Michigan, or of the north-west by lake Superior, must necessarily center in an Atlantic port of the United States; a consideration of minor importance as a commercial object, when compared with the other advantages of that great communication, but of great weight in its relation to the political intercourse of the United States, with the Indians.

INTERIOR CANALS.

Under this denomination will be included all the canals of which any knowledge has been obtained, and which are not immediately on the rivers opening communications with the western waters or with those of the St. Laurence, although some of them may be considered as extending those communications to more remote sea ports. The documents from which the information is extracted will be found under the letters (C. c.)