Open Road — Guides — Railroads — Canals — Bridges 



permit, we were obligingly furnished with a bateau by the officer i 79 g 

 of Fort Chippeway, to whom we carried letters, to convey us to Weld 

 Fort Erie. My companions embarked in it with our baggage, 

 when the morning appointed for our departure arrived; but 

 desirous of taking one more look at the falls, I staid behind, 

 determining to follow them on foot in the course of the day; I 

 accordingly walked down to the falls from Fort Chippeway after 

 breakfast, spent an hour or two there, returned to the fort, and 

 having stopped a short time to rest myself after the fatigues of 

 climbing the steeps about the falls, I set out for Fort Erie, fifteen 

 miles distant from Chippeway. . . . The day was by no 

 means favourable for a pedestrian expedition; it was intensely 

 hot, and we had not proceeded far before we found the necessity 

 of taking off our jackets, waistcoats, and cravats, and carrying 

 them in a bundle on our backs. Several parties of Indians that I 

 met going down the river in canoes were stark naked. 



The banks of Niagara River, between Chippeway and Fort 

 Erie, are very low, and covered, for the most part, with shrubs, 

 under whose shade, upon the gravelly beach of the river, the 

 weary traveller finds an agreeable resting place. For the first few 

 miles from Chippeway there are scarcely any houses to be seen; 

 but about half way between that place and Fort Erie they are 

 thickly scattered along the banks of the river. The houses in this 

 neighbourhood were remarkably well built, and appeared to be 

 kept in a state of great neatness ; most of them were sheathed with 

 boards, and painted white. The lands adjoining them are rich, 

 and were well cultivated. The crops of Indian corn were still 

 standing here, which had a most luxuriant aspect ; in many of the 

 fields there did not appear to be a stem less than eight feet in 

 height. Between the rows they sow gourds, squashes, and 

 melons, of which last every sort attains to a state of great perfec- 

 tion in the open air throughout the inhabited parts of the two 

 provinces. Peaches in this part of the country likewise come to 

 perfection in the open air. . . . The winters here are very 

 severe whilst they last, but it is seldom that the snow lies longer 



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