The Great Fresh-water Seas of Canada.
A sentimental journey in Canada is not like Sterne's, all about
corking-pins and _remises_, monks and Marias, nor is it likely, in this
utilitarian age, even if Sterne could be revived to write it, to be as
immortal; nevertheless, let us ramble.
The Welland Canal naturally leads one to reflect on the great sources of
power spread before the Canadian nation; for, although it will never,
never be _la nation Canadienne_, yet it will inevitably some day or
other be the Canadian nation, and its limits the Atlantic and the
Pacific Oceans.
President Polk--they say his name is an abbreviation of Pollok--can no
more dive into "the course of time" than that poet could do, and it is
about as vain for him to predict that the American bald eagle shall claw
all the fish on the continent of the New World, as it is to fancy that
the time is never to come when the Canadian races, Norman-Saxon as they
are, shall not assert some claim to the spoils.
Canada is now happier under the dominion of Victoria than she could
possibly be under that of the people of the States, and she knows and
feels it. The natural resources of Canada are enormous, and developing
themselves every day; and it needs neither Lyell, nor the yet unheard-of
geologists of Canada to predict that the day is not far distant when her
iron mines, her lead ores, her copper, and perhaps her silver, will come
into the market.[6]
[Footnote 6: Since I penned this, a company is forming to work valuable
argentiferous copper-mines lately discovered on Lake Superior. The
Americans are actually working rich mines of silver, copper, &c.]
I see, in a paper lying before me, that Colonel Prince, a person who has
already flourished before the public as an enterprising English farming
gentleman, who combines the long robe with the red coat, has, with a
worthy patriotism, obtained a very large grant of lands from the
government to explore the shore of Lake Superior, in order to find
whether the Yankees are to have all the copper to themselves; and that,
in searching a little to the eastward of St. Mary's Rapids, a very
valuable deposit has been discovered, which has stimulated other
adventurers, who have found another mine nearer the outlet of the lake
and still more valuable, the copper of which, lying near the surface,
yields somewhere about seventy-five per cent.[7]
[Footnote 7: A recent number of "The Scientific American," published in
New York, contains the following:--Some of the British officers in
Canada have lately made an important discovery of some of the richest
copper-mines in the world. This discovery has created great excitement.
Some of the officers, _en route_ to England, are now in the city, and
will carry with them some specimens of the ore, and among them one piece
weighing 2,200 lbs. The ore is very rich, yielding, as we learn,
seventy-two per cent. of pure copper. Some of the copper was taken from
the bed of a river, and some broken off from a cliff on the banks. The
latter is six feet long, four broad, and six inches thick.]
We know that rich iron mines exist, and are steadily worked in Lower
Canada; we know that a vast deposit of iron, one of the finest in the
world, has lately been discovered on the Ottawa, a river in the township
of M'Nab; and we know that nothing prevents the Marmora and Madoc iron
from being used but the finishing of the Trent navigation. Lead abounds
on the Sananoqui river, and at Clinton, in the Niagara district; whilst
plumbago, now so useful, is abundant throughout the line, where the
primary and secondary rocks intersect each other. Mr. Logan, employed by
the government, _ex cathedra_, says there is no coal in Canada; but
still it appears that in the Ottawa country it is very possible it may
be found, and that, if it is not, Cape Breton and the Gaspe lands will
furnish it in abundance; and, as Canada may now fairly be said to be all
the North American territory, embraced between the Pacific somewhere
about the Columbia river, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, for a political
union exists between all these provinces, if an acknowledged one does
not, coal will yet be plentiful in Canada.
Canada, thus limited, is now, _de facto_, ay, and _de jure_, British
North America; and a fair field and a fertile one it is, peopled by a
race neither to be frightened nor coaxed out of its birthright.
The advantages of Canada are enormous, much greater, in fact, than they
are usually thought to be at home.
The ports of St. John's and of Halifax, without mentioning fifty others,
are open all the year round to steamers and sea-going vessels; and when
railroads can at all seasons bring their cargoes into Canada proper,
then shall we live six months more than during the present torpidity of
our long winters. John Bull, transported to interior Canada, is very
like a Canadian black bear: he sleeps six months, and growls during the
remaining six for his food.
Then, in summer, there is the St. Lawrence covered with ships of all
nations, the canals carrying their burthens to the far West and the
great mediterraneans of fresh water, opening a country of unknown
resources and extent.
These great seas of Canada have often engaged my thoughts. Tideless,
they flow ever onward, to keep up the level of the vast Atlantic, and in
themselves are oceans. How is it that the moon, that enormous
blister-plaster, does not raise them? Simply because there is some
little error in the very accurate computations which give all the
regulations of tidal waters to lunar influences.
Barlow, one of the mathematical master-spirits of the age, was bold
enough once to doubt this vast power of suction on the part of the ruler
of the night; and there were certain wiseacres who, as in the case of
Galileo, thought it very religiously dangerous indeed, to attempt to
interfere with her privileges.
But, in fact, the phenomenon of the tides is just as easy of explanation
by the motion of the earth as it is by the moon's presumed drinking
propensities, and, as she is a lady, let us hope she has been belied.
The motion of the earth would not affect such narrow bodies of water as
the Canadian lakes, but the moon's power of attraction would, if it
existed to the extent supposed, be under the necessity of doing it,
unless she prefers salt to fresh liquors.
One may venture, now-a-days, to express such a doubt, particularly as
Madam Moon is a Pagan deity.
The great lakes are, however, very extraordinary in their way. Let us
recollect what I have seen and thought of them.
We will commence with Lake Superior, which is 400 miles in length, 100
miles wide, and 900 feet deep, where it has been sounded. It contains
32,000 square miles of water, and it is 628 feet above the level of the
sea.
Lake Michigan is 220 miles long, 60 miles wide, and 1,000 deep, as far
as it has been sounded; contains 22,400 square miles, and is 584 feet
above tide-water; but it is, in fact, only a large bay of Lake Huron,
the grand lake, which is 240 miles long, without it averaging 86 miles
in width, also averaging 1,000 feet deep, as far as soundings have been
tried, contains 20,400 square miles, and is also about 584 feet above
the tidal waters.
Off Saginaw Bay, in this lake, leads have been sunk 1,800 feet, or 1,200
feet below the level of the Atlantic, without finding bottom.
Green Bay, an arm of Michigan, is in itself 106 miles long, 20 miles
wide, and contains 2,000 square miles.
Lake St. Clair, 6 feet above Lake Erie, follows Lake Huron; but it is a
mere enlargement of the St. Lawrence, of immense size, however, and
shallow: it is 20 miles long, 14 wide, 20 feet deep, and contains 360
square miles.
Then comes Lake Erie, the Stormy Lake, which is 240 miles long, 40 miles
wide, 408 feet in its deepest part, and contains 9,600 square miles.
Lake Erie is 565 feet above tide-water. Its average depth is 85 feet
only.
Lake Ontario, the Beautiful Lake, is 180 miles long, 45 miles wide, 500
feet average depth, where sounded successfully, but said to be
fathomless in some places, and contains 6,300 square miles. It is 232
feet above the tide of the St. Lawrence.
The Canadian lakes have been computed to contain 1,700 cubic miles of
water, or more than half the fresh water on the globe, covering a space
of about 93,000 square miles. They extend from west to east over nearly
15 degrees and a half of longitude, with a difference of latitude of
about eight and a half degrees, draining a country of not less surface
than 400,000 square miles.
The greatest difference is observable between the waters of all these
lakes, arising from soil, depth, and shores. Ontario is pure and blue,
Erie pure and green, the southern part of Michigan nothing particular.
The northern part of Michigan and all Huron are clear, transparent, and
full of carbonic gas, so that its water sparkles. But the extraordinary
transparency of the waters of all these lakes is very surprising. Those
of Huron transmit the rays of light to a great depth, and consequently,
having no preponderating solid matters in suspension, an equalization of
heat occurs. Dr. Drake ascertained that, at the surface in summer, and
at two hundred feet below it, the temperature of the water was 56 deg..
One of the most curious things on the shallow parts of Huron is to sail
or row over the submarine or sublacune mountains, and to feel giddy from
fancy, for it is like being in a balloon, so pure and tintless is the
water. It is, like Dolland's best telescopes, achromatic.
The lakes are subject in the latter portion of summer to a phenomenon,
which long puzzled the settlers; their surface near the shores of bays
and inlets are covered by a bright yellow dust, which passed until
lately for sulphur, but is now known to be the farina of the pine
forests. The atmosphere is so impregnated with it at these seasons,
that water-barrels, and vessels holding water in the open air, are
covered with a thick scum of bright yellow powder.
A curious oily substance also pervades the waters in autumn, which
agglutinates the sand blown over it by the winds, and floats it about in
patches. I have never been able to discover the cause of this; perhaps,
it is petroleum, or the sand is magnetic iron. Singular currents and
differently coloured streams also appear, as on the ocean; but, as all
the lakes have a fall, no weed gathers, except in the stagnant bays.
The bottom of Ontario is unquestionably salt, and no wonder that it
should be so, for all the Canadian lakes were once a sea, and the
geological formation of the bed of Ontario is the saliferous rock.
I have often enjoyed on Ontario's shores, where I have usually resided,
the grand spectacle which takes place after intense frost. The early
morning then exhibits columns of white vapour, like millions of Geysers
spouting up to the sky, curling, twisting, shooting upwards, gracefully
forming spirals and pyramids, amid the dark ground of the sombre
heavens, and occasionally giving a peep of little lanes of the dark
waters, all else being shrouded in dense mist.
People at home are very apt to despise lakes, perhaps from the usual
insipidity of lake poetry, and to imagine that they can exhibit nothing
but very placid and tranquil scenery. Lake Erie, the shallowest of the
great Canadian fresh-water seas, very soon convinces a traveller to the
contrary; for it is the most turbulent and the most troublesome sea I
ever embarked upon--a region of vexed waters, to which the Bermoothes of
Shakespeare is a trifle; for that is bad enough, but not half so
treacherous and so thunder-stormy as Erie.
Huron is an ocean, when in its might; its waves and swells rival those
of the Atlantic; and the beautiful Ontario, like many a lovely dame, is
not always in a good temper. I once crossed this lake from Niagara to
Toronto late in November, in the Great Britain, a steamer capable of
holding a thousand men with ease, and during this voyage of thirty-six
miles we often wished ourselves anywhere else: the engine, at least one
of them, got deranged; the sea was running mountains high; the cargo on
deck was washed overboard; gingerbread-work, as the sailors call the
ornamental parts of a vessel, went to smash; and, if the remaining
engine had failed in getting us under the shelter of the windward shore,
it would have been pretty much with us as it was with the poor fellow
who went down into one of the deepest shafts of a Swedish mine.
A curious traveller, one of "the inquisitive class," must needs see how
the miners descended into these awful depths. He was put into a large
bucket, attached to the huge rope, with a guide, and gradually lowered
down. When he had got some hundred fathoms or so, he began to feel
queer, and look down, down, down. Nothing could he see but darkness
visible. He questioned his guide as to how far they were from the
bottom, cautiously and nervously. "Oh," said the Swede, "about a mile."
"A mile!" replied the Cockney: "shall we ever get there?"--"I don't
know," said the guide. "Why, does any accident ever happen?"--"Yes,
often."--"How long ago was the last accident, and what was it?"--"Last
week, one of our women went down, and when she had got just where we are
now, the rope broke."--"Oh, Heaven!" ejaculated the inquisitive
traveller, "what happened to her?" The Swede, who did not speak very
good English, put the palm of his right hand over that of his left,
lifted the upper hand, slapped them together with a clap, and said, most
phlegmatically--"Flat as a pankakka."
I once crossed Ontario, in the same direction as that just mentioned, in
another steamer, when the beautiful Ontario was in a towering passion.
We had a poor fellow in the cabin, who had been a Roman Catholic priest,
but who had changed his form of faith. The whole vessel was in
commotion; it was impossible for the best sea-legs to hold on; so two
or three who were not subject to seasickness got into the cabin, or
saloon, as it is called, and grasped any thing in the way. The long
dinner-table, at which fifty people could sit down, gave a lee-lurch,
and jammed our poor _religioner_, as Southey so affectedly calls
ministers of the word, into a corner, where chairs innumerable were soon
piled over him. He abandoned himself to despair; and long and loud were
his confessions. On the first lull, we extricated him, and put him into
a birth. Every now and then, he would call for the steward, the mate,
the captain, the waiters, all in vain, all were busy. At last his cries
brought down the good-natured captain. He asked if we were in danger.
"Not entirely," was the reply. "What is it does it, captain?"--"Oh,"
said the skipper, gruffly enough, "we are in the trough of the sea, and
something has happened to the engine." "The trough of the _say_?"--my
friend was an Irishman--"the trough of the say? is it that does it,
captain?" But the captain was gone.
During the whole storm and the remainder of the voyage, the poor
ex-priest asked every body that passed his refuge if we were out of the
trough of the say. "I know," said he, "it is the trough of the say does
it." No cooking could be performed, and we should have gone dinnerless
and supperless to bed, if we had not, by force of steam, got into the
mouth of the Niagara river. All became then comparatively tranquil; she
moored, and the old Niagara, for that was her name, became steady and at
rest. Soon the cooks, stewards, and waiters, were at work, and dinner,
tea, and supper, in one meal, gladdened our hearts. The greatest eater,
the greatest drinker, and the most confident of us all, was our old
friend and companion of the voyage, "the Trough of the Say," as he was
ever after called.
Such is tranquil Ontario. I remember a man-of-war, called the Bullfrog,
being once very nearly lost in the voyage I have been describing; and
never a November passes without several schooners being lost or wrecked
upon Lakes Huron, Erie, and Ontario; whilst the largest American
steamers on Erie sometimes suffer the same fate. Whenever Superior is
much navigated, it will be worse, as the seasons are shorter and more
severe there, and the shores iron-bound and mountainous.
Through the Welland Canal there is now a continuous navigation of those
lakes for 844 miles; and the St. Lawrence Canal being completed, and the
La Chine Locks enlarged at Montreal, there will be a continuous line of
shipping from London to the extremity of Lake Superior, embracing an
inland voyage on fresh water of upwards of two thousand miles. Very
little is required to accomplish an end so desirable.
It has been estimated by the Topographical Board of Washington, that
during 1843 the value of the capital of the United States afloat on the
four lakes was sixty-five millions of dollars, or about sixteen
millions, two hundred thousand pounds sterling; and this did not of
course include the British Canadian capital, an idea of which may be
formed from the confident assertion that the Lakes have a greater
tonnage entering the Canadian ports than that of the whole commerce of
Britain with her North American colonies. This is, however, _un peu
fort_. It is now not at all uncommon to see three-masted vessels on Lake
Ontario; and one alone, in November last, brought to Kingston a freight
of flour which before would have required three of the ordinary
schooners to carry, namely, 1500 barrels.
A vessel is also now at Toronto, which is going to try the experiment of
sailing from that port to the West Indies and back again; and, as she
has been properly constructed to pass the canals, there is no doubt of
her success.
Some idea of the immense exertions made by the government to render the
Welland Canal available may be formed by the size of the locks at Port
Dalhousie, which is the entrance on Lake Ontario. Two of the largest
class, in masonry, and of the best quality, have been constructed: they
are 200 feet long by 45 wide; the lift of the upper lock is 11, and of
the lower, 12, which varies with the level of Lake Ontario, the mitre
sill being 12 feet below its ordinary surface. Steamers of the largest
class can therefore go to the thriving village of St. Catherine's, in
the midst of the granary of Canada.
The La Chine Canal must be enlarged for ship navigation more effectually
than it has been. I subjoin a list of colonial shipping for 1844 from
Simmonds' "Colonial Magazine."
NUMBER, TONNAGE, AND CREWS OF VESSELS, WHICH BELONGED
TO THE SEVERAL BRITISH PLANTATIONS IN THE
YEAR 1844:--
Countries. Vessels. Tons. Crews.
Europe--
Malta, 85 15,326 893
Africa--
Bathurst, 25 1,169 215
Sierra Leone, 17 1,148 111
Cape of Good Hope,
Cape Town, 27 3,090 265
Port Elizabeth, 2 201 10
Mauritius, 124 12,079 1,413
Asia--
Bombay, 113 50,767 3,393
Cochin, 15 5,674 275
Tanjore, 33 5,070 257
Madras, 32 5,474 248
Malacca, 2 288 13
Coringa, 17 3,384 126
Singapore, 13 1,543 289
Calcutta, 186 5,1779 2,004
Ceylon, 674 30,076 2,696
Prince of Wales Island, 7 996 51
New Holland--
Sydney, 293 28,051 2,128
Melbourne, 29 1,240 147
Adelaide, 17 864 60
Hobart Town, 103 7,153 724
Launceston, 42 3,150 257
New Zealand--
Auckland, 13 305 42
Wellington, 2 262 32
America--
Canada, Quebec, 509 45,361 2,590
" Montreal, 60 10,097 556
Cape Breton, Sydney, 369 15,048 1,296
" Arichat, 96 4,614 335
New Brunswick, Miramichi, 81 10,143 509
St. Andrews, 193 18,391 918
St. John, 398 63,676 2,480
Newfoundland, St. John, 847 53,944 4,567
Nova Scotia, Halifax, 1,657 82,890 5,292
Liverpool, 31 2,641 163
Pictou, 60 6,929 354
Yarmouth, 146 11,724 637
Prince Edward's Island, 237 13,851 857
West Indies, Antigua, 85 833 220
Bahama, 140 3,252 587
Barbadoes, 37 1,640 305
Berbice, 18 854 89
Bermuda, 54 3,523 323
Demerara, 54 2,353 250
Dominicia, 14 502 85
Grenada, 48 812 198
Jamaica, Port Antonio 5 95 22
Antonio Bay, 2 70 13
Falmouth, 5 107 29
Kingston, 68 2,659 359
Montego Bay, 18 849 105
Morant Bay, 9 251 51
Port Maria, 3 86 18
St. Ann's, 1 20 5
Savannah la Mar, 3 153 22
St. Lucca, 2 64 10
Montserrat, 4 100 19
Nevis, 11 178 45
St. Kitts, 35 546 114
S. Lucia, 19 013[*] 132
St. Vincent, 27 1,164 180
Tobago, 7 182 46
Tortola, 48 277 127
Trinidad, 61 1,832 378
----- ------- ------
Total, 7,304 592,839 40,659
[*Transcriber's note: This figure is not correct]
It will be seen, from the foregoing statement, that the tonnage of the
vessels belonging to our colonies is about equal to that of the whole of
the French mercantile marine, which in 1841 consisted of 592,266
tons--1842, 589,517--1843, 599,707.
The tonnage of the three principal ports of Great Britain in 1844 was:--
London 598,552
Liverpool 307,852
Newcastle 259,571
---------
Total 1,165,975
On Lake Erie, the Canadians have a splendid steamer, the London, Captain
Van Allen, and another still larger is building at Chippewa, which is
partly owned by government, and so constructed as to carry the mail and
to become fitted speedily for warlike purposes.
Lake Ontario swarms with splendid British steam-vessels; but on Lake
Huron there is only at present one, called in the Waterloo, in the
employment of the Canada Company, which runs from Goderich to the new
settlements of Owen's Sound.
Propellers now go all the way to St. Joseph's, at the western extremity
of Lake Huron; and the trade on this lake and on Michigan is becoming
absolutely astonishing. Last year, a return of American and foreign
vessels at Chicago, from the commencement of navigation on the 1st of
April to the 1st of November only, shows that there arrived 151
steamers, 80 propellers, 10 brigs, and 142 schooners, making a total of
1,078 lake-going vessels, and a like number of departures, not including
numerous small craft, engaged in the carrying of wood, staves, ashes,
&c., and yet, such was the glut of wheat, that at the latter date
300,000 bushels remained unshipped.
Upwards of a million of money will be expended by the Canadian
Government in protecting and securing the transit trade of the lakes;
and the Canadians have literally gone ahead of Brother Jonathan, for
they have made a ship-canal round the Falls of Niagara, whilst "the most
enterprising people on the face of the earth," who are so much in
advance of us according to the ideas of some writers, have been,
dreaming about it.--So much for the welfare of the earth being co-equal
with democratic institutions, _a la mode Francaise_!
The American government up to 1844 had spent only 2,100,000 dollars on
the same objects, or about half a million sterling, according to the
statement of Mr. Whittlesey of Ohio. But that government is actually
stirring in another matter, which is of immense future importance,
although it appears trivial at this moment, and that is the opening up
of Lake Superior, where a new world offers itself.
They have projected a ship-canal round, or rather by the side of the
rapids of St. Marie. The length of this canal is said to be only, in
actual cutting, three-quarters of a mile, and the whole expense
necessary not more than 230,000 dollars, or about L55,000 sterling.
The British government should look in time to this; it owns the other
side of the Sault St. Marie, and the Superior country is so rich in
timber and minerals that it is called the Denmark of America, whilst a
direct access hereafter to the Oregon territory and the Pacific must be
opened through the vast chain of lakes towards the Rocky Mountains by
way of Selkirk Colony, on the Red River.
The lakes of Canada have not engaged that attention at home which they
ought to have had; and there is much interesting information about them
which is a dead letter in England.
Their rise and fall is a subject of great interest. The great sinking of
the levels of late years, which has become so visible and so injurious
to commerce, deserves the most attentive investigation. The American
writers attribute it to various causes, and there are as many theories
about it as there are upon all hidden mysteries. Evaporation and
condensation, woods and glaciers, have all been brought into play.
If the lakes are supplied by their own rivers, and by the drainage
streams of the surrounding forests, and all this is again and again
returned into them from the clouds, whence arises the sudden elevation
or the sudden depression of such enormous bodies of water, which have
no tides?
The Pacific and the Atlantic cannot be the cause; we must seek it
elsewhere. To the westward of Huron, on the borders of Superior, the
land is rocky and elevated; but it attains only enormous altitudes at
such a distance on the rocky Andean chain as to render it improbable
that those mountains exert immediate influences on the lakes. The
Atlantic also is too far distant, and very elevated land intervenes to
intercept the rising vapours. On the north, high lands also exist; and
the snows scarcely account for it, as the whole of North America near
these inland seas is alike covered every year in winter.
The north-east and the south-west winds are the prevalent ones, and a
slight inspection of the maps will suffice to show that those compass
bearings are the lines which the lakes and valleys of Northern America
assume.
In 1845, the lakes began suddenly to diminish, and to such a degree was
this continued from June to December, when the hard frosts begin, that,
at the commencement of the latter month, Lake Ontario, at Kingston, was
three feet below its customary level, and consequently, in the country
places, many wells and streams dried up, and there was during the autumn
distress for water both for cattle and man, although the rains were
frequent and very heavy.
Whence, then, do the lakes receive that enormous supply which will
restore them to their usual flow?--or are they permanently diminishing?
I am inclined to believe that the latter is the case, as cultivation and
the clearings of the forest proceed; for I have observed within fifteen
years the total drying up of streamlets by the removal of the forest,
and these streamlets had evidently once been rivulets and even rivers of
some size, as their banks, cut through alluvial soils, plainly
indicated.
The lakes also exhibit on their borders, particularly Ontario, as Lyell
describes from the information of the late Mr. Roy, who had carefully
investigated the subject, very visible remains of many terraces which
had consecutively been their boundaries.
It is evident to observers who have recorded facts respecting the lakes,
that but a small amount of vapour water is deposited by northeasterly
winds from the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the great estuary of that river, of
which the lakes are only enlargements, as the wind from that region
carries the cloud-masses from the lakes themselves direct to the valley
of the Mississippi. For it meets with no obstacle from high lands on the
western littorale, which is low. A north-east gale continues usually
from three to six days, and generally without much rain; but all the
other winds from south to westerly afford a plentiful supply of
moisture. Thus a shift of wind from north-east to north and to
north-west perhaps brings back the vapour of the great valley of the
gulf, reduced in temperature by the chilly air of the north and west. If
then an easterly gale continues for an unusual time, the basin of the
Canadian lakes is robbed of much of its water, which passes to the
rivers of the west, and is lost in the gulf of Mexico, or in the forest
lakes of the wild West.
Perhaps, therefore, whenever a cycle occurs in which north-east winds
prevail during a year or a series of years, the lakes lose their level,
for, their direction being north-east and south-west, such is the usual
current of the air; and therefore either north-east or south-westerly
winds are the usual ones which pass over their surface.
The parts of the great inland navigation which suffer most in these
periodical depressions are the St. Clair River and the shallow parts of
those extensions of the St. Lawrence called Lakes St. Francis and St.
Peter, which in the course of time will cause, and indeed in the latter
already do cause, some trouble and some anxiety.
The north winds, keen and cold, do not deposit much in the valley of the
lakes, whose southern borders are usually too low also to prevent the
passage of rain-bearing clouds.
From that portion of the dividing ridge between the valleys of the St.
Lawrence and Mississippi, only seven miles from Lake Erie, says an
American writer, there is to Fort Wayne, at the head of the Maumee
river, one hundred miles from the same lake, a gradual subsidence of the
land from 700 to less than 200 feet.
From Fort Wayne westward this dividing ridge rises only one hundred and
fifty feet, and then gradually subsides to the neighbourhood of the
south-west of Lake Michigan, where it is but some twenty feet above the
level of that water.
The basin of the Mississippi, including its great tributary streams,
receives therefore a very great portion of the falling vapour, from all
the winds blowing from north to north-east.
The same reasoner agrees with the views which I have expressed
respecting the probability of the supply to raise the level, which must
be the great feeder derived from the south and south-westward invariably
rainy winds, when of long continuance, in the basin of the St.
Lawrence, and generated by the gulf stream in its gyration through the
Mexican Bay, being heaped up from the trade wind which causes the
oceanic current, and forces its heated atmosphere north and north-east,
by the rebound which it takes from the vast Cordilleras of Anahuac and
Panama; thus depositing its cooling showers on the chain of the fresh
water seas of Canada, condensed as they are by the natural air-currents
from the icy regions of the western Andes of Oregon, and the cold
breezes from the still more gelid countries of the north-west.
The American topographical engineers, as well as our own civil engineers
and savans, have accurately measured the heights and levels of the
lakes, which I have already given; but one very curious fact remains to
be noticed, and will prove that it is by no means a visionary idea that,
from the great island of Cuba, which must be an English outpost, if much
further annexation occurs, voyages will be made to bring the produce of
the West Indies and Spanish America into the heart of the United States
and Canada by the Mississippi and the rivers flowing into it, and by the
great lakes; so that a vessel, loading at Cuba, might perform a circuit
inland for many thousand miles, and return to her port _via_ Quebec.
From the Gulf of Mexico to the lowest summits of the ridge separating
the basin of the Mississippi from that of the St. Lawrence or great
lakes, the rise does not exceed six hundred feet, and the graduation of
the land has an average of not more than six inches to a mile in an
almost continuous inclined plane of six thousand miles. The Americans
have not lost sight of this natural assistance to form a communication
between the lakes and the Mississippi.
My attention has been drawn to the subsidence of the waters of the lakes
of Canada by the unusual lowness of Ontario, on the banks of which I
lived last year, and by reading the statement of the American writer
above quoted, as well as by the fact that in the Travels of Carver, one
of the first English navigators on these mediterraneans, who states that
a small ship of forty tons, in sailing from the head of Lake Michigan to
Detroit, was unable to pass over the St. Clair flats for want of water,
and that the usual way of passing them eighty years ago was in small
boats. What a useful thing it would have been, if any scientific
navigators or resident observers had registered the rise and fall of the
lakes in the years since Upper Canada came into our possession! An old
naval officer told me that it was really periodical; and it occurred
usually, that the greatest depression and elevation had intervals of
seven years. Lake Erie is evidently becoming more shallow constantly,
but not to any great or alarming degree; and shoals form, even in the
splendid roadstead of Kingston, within the memory of young inhabitants.
An American revenue vessel, pierced for, I believe, twenty-four guns,
and carrying an enormous Paixhan, grounded in the autumn of last year on
a shoal in that harbour, which was not known to the oldest pilot.
By the bye, talking of this vessel, which is a steamer built of iron,
and fitted with masts and sails, the same as any other sea-going vessel,
can it be requisite, in order to protect a commerce which she cannot
control beyond the line drawn through the centre of the lakes, to have
such a vessel for revenue purposes? or is she not a regular man-of-war,
ready to throw her shells into Kingston, if ever it should be required?
At least, such is the opinion which the good folks of that town
entertained when they saw the beautiful craft enter their harbour.
The worst, however, of these iron boats is that two can play at shelling
and long shots; and gunnery-practice is now brought to such perfection,
that an iron steamer might very possibly soon get the worst of it from a
heavy battery on the level of the sea; for a single accident to the
machinery, protected as it is in that vessel, would, if there was no
wind, put her entirely at the mercy of the gunners. The old wooden
walls, after all, are better adapted to attack a fortress, as they can
stand a good deal of hammering from both shot and shells.
But to revert to matters more germane to the lakes.
Volney, the first expounder of the system of the warm wind of the south
supplying the great lakes, has received ample corroboration of his data
from observation. The fact that the deflection of the great trade-wind
from the west to a northern direction by the Mexican Andes Popocatepetl,
Istaccihuetl, Naucampatepetl, &c., whose snowy summits have a frigid
atmosphere of their own, is proved by daily experience.
Whenever southerly winds prevail--and, in the cycle of the gyration of
atmospherical currents, this is certain, and will be reduced to
calculation--the great lakes are filled to the edge; and whenever
northern and northeasterly winds take their appointed course, then these
mediterraneans sink, and the valley of the Mississippi is filled to
overflowing.
But the most curious facts are, that the different lakes exhibit
different phenomena. The Board of Public Works of Ohio states that, in
1837-38, the quantity of water descending from the atmosphere did not
exceed one-third of that which was the minimum quantity of several
preceding years.
Ontario, from the reports of professional persons, has varied not less
than eight feet, and Erie about five. Huron and Superior being
comparatively unknown, no data are afforded to judge from; but what vast
atmospheric agencies must be at work when such wonderful results in the
smaller lakes have been made evident!
People who live at the Niagara Falls, and I agree with them in
observations extending over a period since 1826, believe that these
Falls have receded considerably; and, although I do not enter into the
mathematical analysis of modern geologists respecting them, as to their
constant retrocession, believing that earthquake split open the present
channel, yet I have no doubt that the level of Lake Erie is considerably
affected by the diminution of the yielding shaly rocks of their
foundation. Earthquake, and not retrocession, appears to me, who have
had the singular advantage, as a European, of very long residence, to
have been the cause of that great chasm which now forms the bed of the
Niagara, from the Table Rock to Queenston, in short, a rending or
separating of the rocks rather than a wearing; and this is corroborated
by the many vestiges of great cataracts which now exist near the Short
Hills, the highest summit of the Niagara frontier, between Lakes Erie
and Ontario, as well as by the great natural ravine of St. David's. But
this is a subject too deep for our present purpose, and so we shall
continue to treat of the Great Lakes in another point of view.
Chemically considered, these lakes possess peculiar properties,
according to their boundaries. Superior is too little known to speak of
with certainty--Huron not much better--but Erie, and particularly
Ontario, have been well investigated. The waters of these are pure, and
impregnated chiefly with aluminous and calcareous matter, giving to the
St. Lawrence river a fresh and admirable element and aliment.
The St. Lawrence is of a fine cerulean hue, but, like its parent waters
of Erie and Ontario, rapidly deposits lime and alumine, so that the
boilers of steam-vessels, and even teakettles, soon become furred and
incrusted. The specific gravity of the St. Lawrence water above Montreal
is about 1.00038, at the temperature of 66 deg., the air being then 82 deg. of
Fahrenheit. It contains the chlorides, sulphates, and carbonates, whose
bases are lime and magnesia, particularly and largely those of lime,
which accounts for the rapid depositions when the water is heated.
A very accurate analysis gives, at Montreal, in July, atmospheric air in
solution or admixture 446 per cent; for a quart of this water, 57 inches
cubic measure, evaporated to dryness, left 2.87 solid residue.
Grains.
Sulphate of magnesia 0.62
Chloride of calcium 0.38
Carbonate of magnesia 0.27
Carbonate of lime 1.29
Silica 0.31
----
2.87
The waters of the Ottawa, flowing through an unexplored country, are of
a brown or dark colour. Their specific gravity is only (compared to
distilled water) as 1.0024 at 66 deg., the temperature of the air in July
being 82 deg..
The 57 cubic inches of this water gave
0.99 sulphate of magnesia.
0.60 chloride of lime.
1.07 carbonate of magnesia.
0.17 carbonate of lime.
0.31 silica.
----
2.87
The difference of the colours of these waters is so great, that a
perfect line of distinction is drawn where they cross each other; and
there can be no doubt that it is caused by the reflection of the rays of
light from the impregnation of different saline quantities.
Thus as, in the old world, the waters of the Shannon are brown, and
Ireland, speaking generally, as Kohl says, is a "brown" country;[8] so,
in Upper Canada, St. Lawrence and the lakes are blue and green; and in
Lower Canada, St. Lawrence and the Ottawa are brown of various shades, a
very slight alteration of the chemical components reflecting rays of
colour as forcibly and perceptibly as, in like manner, a very slight
change of component parts develops sugar and sawdust. Nature, in short,
is very simple in all her operations.
[Footnote 8: Canada is a blue country; for, a very short distance from
the observer, the atmosphere tinges everything blue; and the waters are
chiefly of that colour, the sky intensely so.]
Before we proceed to the lower extremity of these wonderful sheets of
water again, let us just for a moment glance at what is about to be
achieved upon their surfaces, and place the Sault of St. Marie or St.
Mary's Rapids, which separate Superior from Huron, before an
Englishman's eyes. There at present nothing is talked of but copper
mines and silver or argentiferous copper ores.
The Falls of St. Mary are only rapids of no very formidable character,
the exit of Lake Superior into Lake Huron. Fifteen miles from the end of
the Great Lake, as Superior is called, are the American village of St.
Mary and the British one of the same name, on the opposite bank of the
River St. Mary.
The Americans have so far strengthened their position, that there is a
sort of fort, called Fort Brady, with two companies of regulars; and in
and about the village are scattered a thousand people of every possible
colour and origin, a great portion being, of course, half-breeds and
Indians. The American Fur Company has also a post at this place, one of
the very few remaining; for the fur trade in these regions is rapidly
declining by the extirpation of the animals which sustained it.
The American government have projected a ship canal to avoid these
rapids; and, if that is completed, a vast trade will soon grow up.
About a mile above the village is the landing-place from Lake Superior,
at the head of the rapids; there the strait is broad and deep; but,
until steamers are built, sailing vessels suffer the disadvantage of
being moveable out of the harbour by an east wind only, and this wind
does not blow there oftener than once a month. It is probable that a
proper harbour will be constructed at the foot of the lake, fifteen
miles above.
These rapids have derived their French name _Sault_ from their rushing
and leaping motion; but they are very insignificant when compared to the
Longue Sault on the St. Lawrence, as the inhabitants cross them in
canoes.
I cannot describe them more minutely than Mrs. Jameson has done in her
"Summer Rambles." She crossed them, and must have experienced some
trepidation, for it requires a skilful voyageur to steer the canoe; and
it is surprising with what dexterity the Indian will shoot down them as
swiftly as the water can carry his fragile vessel. The Indians, however,
consider such feats much in the same light as a person fond of boating
would think of pulling a pair of oars, or sculling himself across the
current of a rivulet. I was once subjected to a rather awkward
exemplification of this fact. Being on a hurried journey, and expecting
to be frozen in, as it is called, before I could terminate it; I hired
an Indian and his little canoe, just big enough to hold us both, and
pushed through by-ways in the forest streams and portages. We were
paddling merrily along a pretty fair stream, which ran fast, but
appeared to reach many miles ahead of us; when, all of a sudden, my
guide said, "Sit fast." I perceived that the water was moving much more
rapidly than it had hitherto done, and that the Indian had wedged
himself in the stern, and was steering only with the paddle. We swept
along merrily for a mile, till "The White Horses," as the breakers are
called, began to bob their heads and manes. "Hold fast!" ejaculated the
Red Man. I laid hold of both edges of the canoe, firm as a rock, and in
a moment the horrid sound of bursting, bubbling, rushing waters was in
mine ears; foam and spray shut out every thing; and away we went, down,
down, down, on, on, on, as swift as thought, until, all of a sudden, the
little buoyant piece of birch-bark floated like a swan upon the bosom of
the tranquil waters, a mile beyond the Fall, for such indeed it might
be called, the absolute difference of level having been twelve feet.
When at ease again, I looked at the imperturbable savage and said, "What
made you take the Fall? was not the _detour_ passable?"--"Yes, suppose
it was! Fall better!"--"But is it very dangerous?"--"Yes, suppose,
sometime!"--"Any canoes ever lost there?"--"Yes, sometime; one two, tree
days ago, there!" pointing to a large rock in the middle of the
narrowest part above our heads.--"Did you come down there?"--"Yes,
suppose, did!"
Then, thought I to myself, I shall not trust my body to your guidance in
future without knowing something of the route beforehand; but I
afterwards got accustomed to these taciturn sons of the forest.
The Falls of St. Marie are celebrated as a fishing place; and the white
fish caught there are reckoned superior to those taken in any other part
of Lake Huron. The fishery is picturesque enough, and is carried on in
canoes, manned usually by two Indians or half-breeds, who paddle up the
rapids as far as practicable. The one in the bow has a scoop-net, which
he dips, as soon as one of these glittering fish is observed, and lands
him into the canoe. Incredible numbers of them are taken in this simple
manner; but it requires the canoemanship and the eye of an Indian.
The French still show their national characteristics in this remote
place. They first settled here before the year 1721, as Charlevoix
states; and, in 1762, Henry, a trader on Lake Huron, found them
established in a stockaded fort, under an officer of the French army.
The Jesuits visited Lake Superior as early as 1600; and in 1634 they had
a rude chapel, the first log hut built so far from civilization, in this
wilderness. At present, the population are French, Upper Canadians,
English, Scotch, Yankees, Indians, half-breeds.
The climate is healthy, very cold in winter, with a short but very warm
summer, and always a pure air. Here the Aurora Borealis is seen in its
utmost glory. In summer there is scarcely any night; for the twilight
lasts until eleven o'clock, and the tokens of the returning sun are
visible two hours afterwards.
The extremes of civilized and savage life meet at St. Mary's; for here
live the educated European or American, and the pure heathen Red Man;
here steamboats and the birch canoe float side by side; and here
all-powerful Commerce is already recommencing a deadly rivalry between
the Briton and the American, not for furs and peltry, as in days gone
by, but for copper and for metals; and here a new world is about to be
opened, and that too very speedily.
Here are Indian agents and missionaries, with schools, both the English
and the United States' government considering the entrance to the Red
Man's country, whose gates are so narrow and still closed up, to be of
very great importance, both in a commercial and a political point of
view; but it is notorious that, after the French Canadians, the Red Man
prefers his Great Mother beyond the Great Lake and her subjects to the
President and the people, who are rather too near neighbours to be
pleasant, and who have somewhat unceremoniously considered the natives
of the soil as so many obstacles to their aggrandizement.
I shall end this sketch of the lakes, by a few observations upon the
magnetic phenomena regarding them, and respecting the variation of the
compass.
Fort Erie, near the eastern termination of Lake Erie, and close to the
Niagara river, presents the line of no variation; whilst at the town of
Niagara, on the south-west end of Lake Ontario, not more than thirty-six
miles from Fort Erie, the variation in 1832 was 1 deg. 20' east.
The line of no variation is marked distinctly on the best maps of
Canada, by the division line between the townships of Stamford and
Niagara, seven miles north of Niagara.
At Toronto in 43 deg. 39' north latitude, and 78 deg. 4' west longitude,
twenty-four miles north-east of Niagara, the variation in 1832 was more
than 2 deg. easterly.
The shore of Lake Huron at Nottawassaga Bay, forty miles north-west of
Toronto, is again the line of no variation.
Thus a magnetic meridian lies between Fort Erie and Nottawassaga.
A magnetic observatory is established by the Board of Ordnance at
Toronto, near the University, and placed in charge of two young officers
of artillery, which says a good deal for the scientific acquirements of
that corps. I shall perhaps hereafter advert to this subject more at
large, as the volcanic rocks have much to do with the needle in Canada
West.
END OF VOL. I.
Frederick Shoberl, Junior, Printer to His Royal Highness Prince Albert.
51, Rupert Street, Haymarket, London.