625 



lavia. On sweeping round the extremity of 

 Lake Ontario the large fort of Niagara pre- 

 sents itself, on the eastern bank, at the en^ 

 trance of the river: it was originally built by 

 the French in 1751, taken by the English in 

 1759, ceded to the United States by the treaty 

 of 1794, and delivered up to them in 1796, 

 with several other frontier posts. It was at 

 one time esteemed the key to the upper lakes, 

 from being a strong place and commanding 

 the entrance of the river, which from point 

 to point is about 1000 yards across. Among 

 the events of the late war it made a principal 

 figure, having been taken by the English on the 

 19th December, 1813, by assault, in a very dis- 

 tinguished manner, and held by them until the 

 peace, when it was returned to its former mas- 

 ters. On the bank of the River Niagara a very 

 good road, with a few settlements interspersed, 

 runs as far as Fort Schlosser. Lewistown, op- 

 posite to Queenstown, on the English side, a 

 pretty little village of forty or fifty houses, was 

 burnt by the British troops, immediately after 

 the capture of Niagara, as a measure of retri- 

 bution for the unnecessary and unprovoked 

 cruelties inflicted by the Americans upon the 

 unoffending town of Newark. From Lewistown 

 a fine road goes to Batavia, from whence others 

 branch off through the states of Pensylvania and 



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