370 APPENDIX. 



the profits and value of which increases in the ratio of the sur- 

 rounding population, and as the country advances in improve- 

 ments. But this advantage is far less sensibly felt, and cannot 

 be considered essential to the successful working of mines of 

 silver, copper, &c. Neither the remote position, therefore, of the 

 \. Lake Superior copper mines, nor the want of a surrounding popu- 

 lation, present objections of that force whicb would at first seem 

 to exist; and it is confidently believed that, if their fertility is 

 such as facts indicate, they may be opened and wrought with 

 eminent advantage to the Eepublic. But let ns examine their 

 situation with respect to a market, and compare it with that of 

 other mines of the same metal, and of some of the coarser metals, 

 which bear a considerable land, and the most distant water car- 

 riage. To favor the inquiry, let it be granted for the moment 

 that proximity of situation to a market, or free water carriage, 

 are indispensable to the success and value of the most fertile 

 mines. 



Assuming the confluence of the Ontonagon Eiver with Lake 

 Superior (whicb is apparently the centre of the mine district) as 

 the place where the metal is first to be embarked for market, it 

 must be carried down the lake 300 miles to the Sault or rapids 

 of St. Mary's. Here, if it is in barges, it may descend the rapids 

 in perfect safety, as is the invariable practice of the traders on 

 arriving with their annual returns of furs and skins from the 

 north. If in vessels, it must be transferred either into boats or 

 carts, and carried half a mile to the foot of the rapids, where it 

 will again be embarked in vessels, and transported through the 

 Lakes Huron, St. Clair, and Erie, and their connecting straits, to 

 Buffalo, a distance of 650 miles. The progress made in the con- 

 struction of the great canal which is to connect the lakes and 

 Atlantic, is such as to leave no doubt upon any reasonable mind 

 of the full completion of that work with the close of the year 

 1824. Through this channel, the transportation is to be continued 

 in boats or barges, by a voyage of 353 miles, to the Hudson at 

 Albany ; thence a sloop navigation of 144 miles, which, for speed 

 and freedom from risk, is perhaps unequalled in all America, 

 takes it into the harbor of New York, making the entire distance, 

 from the mouth of the Ontonagon, 1,447 miles. From New York 

 •^ it is distributed to our naval depots, and to the markets of Europe. 



