INTRODUCTION. 111 
canal ; assuring the legislature, however, that the canal board had not been led 
astray by local considerations or ephemeral expedients, and that they would be 
able to combine the accommodation of flourishing cities and villages with the 
promotion of the general convenienée and welfare. He noticed the efforts on 
the part of Illinois to connect the river of that name with Lake Michigan, and 
those of Ohio to unite with Lake Evie the river which formed her southern 
boundary, commending those efforts to the munificent patronage of the national 
government, and the favorable countenance of New-York. He recommended 
also the institution of a board of public improvements, to be composed of enlight- 
ened and public spirited citizens, and invested with power to establish and faci- 
litate all useful channels of communication, and all eligible modes of improve- 
ment. 
The tolls on the portion of the Champlain canal which had been completed, 
amounted, in the previous year, to one thousand three hundred and eighty-six 
dollars. 
The legislature at this session directed the canal commissioners to open a boat 
navigation between the village of Salina, the Onondaga lake and the Seneca 
river. These improvements when completed, together with those previously 
directed, created an artificial canal from the Erie canal to Lake Ontario, and 
constituted a portion of what afterwards became known as the Oswego canal. 
Acts were also passed to encourage the construction of harbors at Buffalo 
creek and Black-Rock, and to adapt the Glen’s Falls feeder of the Champlain 
canal to boat navigation. 
On the first of January, 1823, the government went into operation under the 
new constitution, Joseph C. Yates having been elected to the office of governor. 
The constitution declared that rates of toll not less than those set forth by the canal 
commissioners, in their report of 1821, should be collected on the canals, and that 
the revenues then pledged to the canal fund should not be diminished nor di- 
verted before the complete payment of the principal and interest of the entire 
canal debt, a pledge which placed the public credit on an impregnable basis. 
