SOLON ROBINSON, 1845 539 



Wilkins, who has been a sailor for forty years, this being 

 his twenty-seventh upon the "Upper Lakes," as all above 

 the Falls of Niagara are so called. Twenty-five years 

 ago he was at "Fort Dearborn," the only vessel in the 

 season, where now run such numbers, including a daily 

 line of large steamers from Buffalo — Fort Dearborn now 

 being the city of Chicago, with probably 12,000 citizens, 1 

 surrounded by twelve times 12,000 inhabitants. But to 

 our present trip — not that there is nowadays any thing 

 particular in a November trip upon the great Lakes, but 

 merely to tell some of your far off readers how the thing 

 is done. 



We left Buffalo on the last day of October, with a 

 load — ah, never mind the catalogue, just get your Bible 

 and see what Noah had in his ark, and then fancy that 

 we have some things that he had not, and you will have 

 an idea of our load, only that our bipeds outnumber his, 

 or else he had a "whaling big family." 



Here a lot of "fourteen families" of Canadian French, 

 without one word of English, are chaffering with the 

 agent for a passage in mass and with a mass of "plun- 

 der," some of which it would be doing them a kindness 

 to pitch into the dock; for instance, a cart that looks as 

 though it was old enough to receive an honorable dis- 

 charge from a long service. By the side of it is tied a 

 very large dog or a very small horse — perhaps the cart 

 knows which. Here comes a canal boat alongside, loaded 

 with living beings — for, notwithstanding the rail road 

 carries its thousands, the canal boats still come loaded — 

 now comes on board the old family bedsteads, chairs and 

 tables every barrel bulk of which must pay a freight of 

 a dollar, and at last will not be worth the money. And 

 here is a wagon, for which the owner paid $55, and $5 

 freight to Milwaukie, where he could buy a better one for 

 less money. 



1 The population of Chicago in June, 1845, according to a state 

 census, was 12,088. See Wright, John S., Chicago: Past, Present, 

 Future, 288 (Chicago, 1870). 



