Vi Inland Navigation of the 



ridges. But the lower part of the Susquehannah is so much 

 obstructed by rocks and rapids, that this circumstance is not 

 likely to lead to any important practical advantage. The 

 state of New York, therefore, in the deep navigable channel of 

 the Hudson and the valley of the Mohawk, possesses natural 

 facilities for opening a communication far beyond those of any 

 other state. These natural advantages were, as we have seen, 

 noticed and partially improved at an early period. They have 

 been finally completely developed by the construction of the 

 great western canal, which affords a continuous and uninter- 

 rupted navigation from the Hudson to Lake Erie, and com- 

 municates also, by means of a lateral branch, with Lake 

 Ontario at Oswego. This canal is 363 miles in length ; the 

 difference of level between Lake Erie and the Hudson is 564 

 feet ; but the canal may be considered as divided into two 

 great but unequal sections, one deriving its waters from Lake 

 Erie, the other from a summit level in the vicinity of Utica. 

 Lake Erie is made use of as a principal feeder from the mouth 

 of the canal as far as Montezuma on Lake Cayuga, a distance 

 of 67^ miles. The descent is 190 feet, by means of twenty-one 

 locks. Beyond this point the canal rises 62 feet by means of 

 seven locks to the summit level ; this extends for a distance 

 of sixty-nine miles of level and uninterrupted navigation. 

 The descent to the Hudson is by fifty-three locks, twenty of 

 which lie within the space of a few miles in the vicinity of the 

 Cohos, or Great Falls of the Mohawk near its junction with 

 the Hudson. Besides the lesser aqueducts and culverts by 

 which this canal is carried over smaller streams, it crosses the 

 Genessee River by an aqueduct of nine arches of 50 feet 

 span, and the MohaAvk twice by aqueducts of 748 and 1188 

 feet in length respectively. 



The cost of this great work, up to the time it was opened for 

 navigation, was nearly nine millions of dollars ; seven millions 

 and a half of which were raised by a loan, for the payment 

 of the principal and interest of which the faith of the state was 

 pledged, along with the receipts of several branches of revenue. 

 These produce about ten per cent, upon the amount borroAved, 

 and hence ensure the liquidation of the debt within a period 

 by HQ means remote. Thus, then, had the tolls on the canal 



