IMPORTANCE OF THE ST LAWRENCE. 213 



encourage direct communication with Europe, and to 

 endeavour to perfect itself to make more use of the 

 navigation of the St Lawrence. Western America is 

 now beginning to feel the importance of this river, 

 which is the great natural outlet, and must become a 

 main commercial outlet for the growing productions 

 of the new North-Western States. The Erie Canal is 

 already far too limited for the traffic which at present 

 comes to it, and the St Lawrence presents facilities 

 which the canal does not possess ; and of these facilities 

 numerous parties in the States are already beginning 

 to avail themselves. Instead of making sacrifices, 

 therefore, with the view of obtaining a reciprocity, the 

 benefits of which would be at least as great to New 

 England as they would be to Canada, let the Canadian 

 wheat and flour be sent direct to Liverpool ; and in this 

 way the Canadian merchant and miller may put in their 

 pockets the duties and profits they are now made to pay 

 to other parties as they pass through the cities of Roches- 

 ter and New York to the same final destination. 



This great canal, the sole main artery along which — 

 until the railway from Albany to Buffalo was formed — the 

 traffic of the west and of the upper lakes found its way 

 to the Atlantic, is not only very creditable to the enter- 

 prise and foresight of the people of New York State, but 

 has been a source of great wealth to them. It has also 

 proved the means of developing, in a most rapid manner, 

 the natural resources of the State, and of creating an 

 extent of commercial and manufacturing industry which, 

 without such a means of easy, lengthened, and econo- 

 mical transit, it might have taken centuries to establish. 

 This canal connects the navigable waters of the Hudson, 

 at Albany and Troy, with the north-eastern part of Lake 

 Erie at Bufi'alo. It has a length between these extremes 

 of 363 miles, and it is joined in its way by branches, 

 which with their feeders are 273 miles in length. There 



