UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 



SITUATION AND EXTENT. 

 Wiles. Degrees. 



Greftest breadth 1 III I between i 30 ° 30 ' and 49 ° S7 ' North Latkude * 

 Least do 620 I 1 67 ° and 97 ° 30 ' West Lon S itude " 



The superficial contents of the United States have not as yet been 

 accurately ascertained. The calculation of Hutchins, so frequently re- 

 ferred to by geographical writers, was not of the United States, 

 but of the British dominions in North America ; which he estimated at 

 1,200,000 square miles. But this is evidently erroneous, as the author 

 himself has since acknowledged. From the best data in our posses- 

 sion, the United States contain 1,050,900 square miles, equal to 

 677,614,400 acres. 



Boundaries. ...They are bounded on the north by Upper and Lower 

 Canada ; on the east by New Brunswick and the Atlantic Ocean ; on 

 the south by East and West Florida and the Gulf of Mexico ; and 

 on the west by New Mexico and the Mississippi river, which latter 

 separates them from the territory of Missouri. 



The boundary line between the United States and the British and 

 Spanish provinces in North America, as definitely specified in the 

 treaty of Paris, begins at the mouth of the river St. Croix, in the 

 Bay of Fundy, and runs along the middle of the river to its source ; 

 thence due north to the highlands, which divide the waters, falling 

 into the Atlantic, from those which fall into the St. Lawrence ; thence 

 south-west along the highlands to the north-west source of the Con- 

 necticut river ; thence along that river to the 45° N. lat. ; thence due 

 west, till it intersects the river St. Lawrence ; thence through the mid- 

 dle of the St. Lawrence, the lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron, Superior, 

 and their connecting waters, to the north-west point of the Lake of 

 the Woods ; thence due west to the Mississippi ; thence down the 

 middle of that river, till it intersects the 31° N. lat. ; thence due east 

 along the said 31° N. lat. to the river Apalachicola ; thence along 

 the middle of the river to its junction with Flint river ; thence di- 

 rectly to the source of St. Mary's river, and down it to its estuary 

 at the Atlantic ; comprehending all the islands within 20 leagues of 

 the shores of the United States, excepting such as are or have been 

 within the limits of Nova Scotia.* 



* According to the above description of the boundary line, as delineated in 

 the treaty of Paris, it is to pass from Lake Superior (what particular point of the 

 lake is not specified), through the Lake of the Woods to the north-west point 

 thereof, and thence due west till it strikes the river Mississippi. This must have 

 been owing to the ignorance of the framers of that treaty, with respect to the re- 

 lative positions of the Lake of the Woods and the sources of the Mississippi. For 

 the north-west point of the former J9. according to Mr. Thompson, astronomer to 



