308 Percy Wells Bidwell 



utors of the West India commodities and European manufactures 

 received in return.^ 



The principal inland waterway in eastern New England was the 

 Merrimac River. Originally it had been navigable only as far as 

 Haverhill, about twenty miles. Above this point its rocky bed and 

 frequent falls had rendered it of little use in transportation of any 

 commodities except lumber. In 1803, however, a canal was opened 

 from Boston harbor across Middlesex County to the junction of 

 the Concord and Merrimac rivers where the city of Lowell is now 

 situated. Although this work represented a considerable invest- 

 ment of capital, its usefulness was limited by its many locks and 

 shallow bed.^ The principal commodities transported to Boston 

 by this means seem to have been timber and logs. By land Bos- 

 ton received cattle driven in from the surrounding country and from 

 southern New Hampshire to be slaughtered and packed for exporta- 

 tion, and in the winter some grain and dairy products came over- 

 land on the snow.^ 



The Connecticut River furnished the only means of cheap trans- 

 portation through the central region of New England. Although 

 originally navigable only as far as the falls at Enfield, Connecti- 

 cut, some sixty-five miles above its mouth, a series of canals con- 



' See Weld, Travels, I. 57. A considerable i)ortion of this trade was diverted 

 in the opposite direction by the restrictions of 1807-1808. It was evidently 

 comparatively easy to smuggle goods across the frontier into Canada, and there 

 was almost continuous water transportation via Lake Champlain and the St. 

 Lawrence River to Montreal and Quebec, whence the goods were trans-shipped 

 to the West Indies, their original destination. For a description of this trafl&c 

 see Lambert, Travels, I. 100-104, 139-140, 225-226, 245, 250-253, 260-262; and 

 Kendall, Travels, III. 277, 283, 294; also WiUiams, Samuel. The Natural and 

 Civil History of Vermont. 2 ed. 2 vols. Burlington (Vermont). 1809. II. 365- 

 367. This writer remarks: "The trade itself has been of great advantage, in 

 promoting the settlement of the country; but the carriage of the articles, being 

 chiefly by land, and through long and bad roads, has been attended with great 

 expense; and has much prevented the raising of wheat, and other kinds of grain. 

 Ibid. p. 366. 



*The work when completed in 1808 cost about $500,000. It was 28 miles 

 long and contained 22 locks. Its depth, 3^ feet, permitted navigation by boats 

 of 24 tons. See Gallatin, A. Report of the Secretary of the Treasury on the 

 Subject of Public Roads and Canals. Washington. 1808. p. 51. The traffic 

 through this canal in 1806 amounted to 9,400 tons. Morse, Gazetteer, 1810. art. 

 Middlesex Canal. 



'See Belknap. History of New Hampshire, III. 80-81. Rochefoucauld- 

 Liancourt, Travels, II. 160. 



