C 53 ] 
fcarce any wind. But it is evident from the 
face of the earth, that the water of the lake 
Ontario is confiderably diminifhed and has loft 
ground a great number of years, for the 
fhores above a mile within land, are abun- 
dantly more low, as well as of a loofer tex- 
ture than the foil beyond, whether this effeCt 
is in common to all the waters on the 
earth, according to a conjecture of the 
great Sir Ifaac Newton : Or whether it be 
not at (leaft in part) owing to the removal 
of fome great obftruction, which by caufing 
a fall in the river St. Lawrence , might for- 
merly pen the waters up to a greater height 
than now ; or only to the gradual wearing 
away by the perpetual paffage of the water 
over thofe falls that ftill fubfift : or to a ca- 
fual ruin of fome part of one of them, I 
fhall leave to the determination of a more 
able naturalift than myfelf. 
The water was very clear and as cold as 
our river in May, it is well tafted and fup* 
pofed to be 120 miles broad, and near 200 
long, ftreaching N. N. W. but this muft be an 
error, the common maps giving it a bearing 
to the Northward of the lake, but Mr. Beilin 
fhews us it lies E. and W. from the obferva- 
tions of P. Charlevoix , on the exadlnefs of which 
he thinks he cannot too much relie, and Bei- 
lin in his map of thefe lakes has given it this 
bearing 
