Navigation. 373 



Bat few things distinguish the cightecntli cen- 

 tury more than the extension and the improve- 

 ments of the system of Inland Navigation. Canals, 

 for the conveyance of small vessels, through dis- 

 tricts of country not favoured with rivers adequate 

 to the purpose, have been more or less in use for 

 many ages. But, during the last age, the number 

 of these canals has been astonishingly multiplied; 

 various improvements in the construction of them 

 have been adopted ; and they have become an in- 

 calculable source of convenience, comfort, and 

 wealth. 



Very early in the eighteenth century the cutting 

 canals in the empire of Russia was undertaken by 

 command of Peter the Great, and prosecuted on 

 a. scale of wonderful extent. That celebrated 

 monarch was led to this undertaking by observing 

 the great utility of canals in Holland, by means of 

 w^iich a low and marshy tract of country was con- 

 verted into a rich, populous, and fruitful territory. 

 Though the Emperor did not live to see the com- 

 pletion of his plans, yet, under his auspices, they 

 were carried on to a considerable length, and con- 

 tinued with great zeal, by his successors, especially 

 by the late Empress: insomuch that there is, pro- 

 bably, '' no part of the world where inland navi- 

 gation is carried through such an extent of coun- 

 try as in Russia; it being possible, in that empire, 

 to convey goods by water, four thoiisandfour hun- 

 dred and seventy-two ?niles, from the frontiers of 

 China to Petersburgh, with an interruption of only 

 sixty-six miles; and from Astracan to the same capi- 

 tal, through 3. space of o?ie thousand four Ira?idred 

 and thirty-four miles ; a tract of inland navigation 

 almost equal to one fourth of the circumference of 

 the earth!'"" The number of vessels employed on 



v Sec Phillips's History cf Inland Ka'vigailon, 4to. chap. iii. 



