RIVERS. 



167 



(or Monongahela and Cheat) and Patowmac, and 

 there are but two portages ; the first of which, be- 

 tween Cayahoga and Beaver, may be removed by 

 uniting the sources of these waters, which are lake^ 

 in the neighbourhood of each other, and in a cham- 

 paign country ; the other, from the waters of Ohio 

 to Patowmac, will be from fifteen to forty miles, ac- 

 cording to the trouble which shall be taken to ap« 

 proach the two navigations. For the trade of the 

 Ohio, or that which shall come into it from its own 

 waters or the Mississippi, it is nearer through the 

 Patowmac to Alexandria than to New York by 580 

 iniles, and it is interrupted by one portage only. 

 There is another circumstance of difference too. 

 The lakes themselves never freeze, but the commu- 

 nications between them freeze, and the Hudson's 

 river is itself shut up by the ice three months in the 

 Siear ; whereas the channel to the Chesapeak leads 

 directly into a warmer climate. The southern parts 

 f^i it very rarely freeze at all, and whenever the 

 northern do, it is so near the sources of the rivers, 

 that the frequent floods to which they are there lia- 

 ble, break up the ice immediately, so that vessels 

 may pass through the whole winter, subject only to 

 accidental and short delays. Add to all this, that 

 in case of a war with our neighbours, the Anglo- 

 Americans or the Indians, the route to New York 

 becomes a frontier through almost its whole length, 

 and all commerce through it ceases from that mo- 

 ment... .But the channel to New York is already 

 known to practice ; whereas the upper waters of 

 the Ohio and the Patowmac^ and the great falls of 



