hardly excelled. These waters are so situated, that they spread the means of conveyance, at little distances, throughout almost the whole of this vast tract. The coast, with its windings, extends about seventeen hundred miles. The St. Lawrence, with its lakes, furnishes a navigation of between two and three thousand. The Missouri, of which the Mississippi, the Ohio, the Arkansas, and the Red river, are only mighty branches, is navigable almost four thousand. When to these are added the numerous navigable rivers, which everywhere divide our coast into a succession of peninsulas, it will easily be admitted, that few countries are furnished by the hand of the Creator with more numerous, more universally diffused, or more important accommodations of this kind.

The soil of this vast region is of every kind, and of every degree of fertility. It is also fitted to every species of vegetation found within the same climates.

Considerable tracts are lean; but almost all of them are capable of being made fertile by a skilful cultivation. The great mass is fertile by nature; and the parts, which are not, are less in their extent than the inhabitants will hereafter find to be necessary for furnishing them with timber and fuel.

Throughout a great part of this territory, the surface exhibits all that is beautiful and magnificent in landscape.

The mineral productions, which it contains, are hitherto imperfectly known. Of the metals, we have iron and lead in inexhaustible quantities. On a more limited scale we have discovered gold, copper, bismuth, antimony, zinc, and cobalt.

Coal mines are already found, inferior in quality and quantity to none in the world. Lime-stone, marble, and gypsum, appear to be inexhaustible. Salt springs are wrought in considerable numbers throughout a part of the regions which lie west of a line drawn at the distance of two hundred miles from the Atlantic.

The indigenous vegetation of this country is various, to a degree which it will require many years to ascertain. Most of the productions, which have been thought valuable by man, except a part of those which are the result of agriculture, are included in their number.

The artificial vegetation extends to almost all the valuable productions of the field and the garden, and to a great multi

tude of such as are merely ornamental. The sugar-cane is prosperously cultivated in Georgia, furnishes a large article of commerce in Southern Louisiana, and will soon occupy a great part of the Mississippi territory. From two to three hundred thousand square miles, on the southern limit of the United States, may be considered as fitted to be a prosperous sugar country: a tract sufficient to supply all the demands of the inhabitants for ages to come. Rice, indigo, cotton, tobacco, all the kinds of corn, flax, and hemp, are cultivated with ease and success. Silk is produced with similar ease and success in Connecticut, and may be in every part of the Union. Wool, of every quality, is already furnished in great quantities, and is increasing with astonishing rapidity. All the domestic animals abound. It is unnecessary to mention the variety or the plenty of fruits.

The whole tract, which lies north of the latitude of the Roanoke, except the flat country of Virginia, may be justly considered as healthy; and all the hill country, which is south of that river. The inhabitants within these extensive limits are well made, robust, and hardy; and are fitted for every enterprise which demands energy of body or strength of mind.

The population of the United States amounted, in the year 1790, to 3,950,000; in 1800, to 5,350,066; in 1810, to 7,230,514. In twenty-five years from 1790, that is in 1815, they will amount, according to the same ratio of increase, to 8,050,642; that is, to 150,642 more than double the original number. This, however, is short of the real number, because the ratio of increase advances regularly in an arithmetical progression; being least in the first, and greatest in the last of the twenty-five years. Accordingly, during the first term of ten years, the ratio was thirty-four and a third per cent.; and in the second ten years it was thirty-six and a quarter per cent. During the remaining five it has been greater still; although, as the whole amount is unknown, the ratio cannot be accurately estimated. Probably twenty-four years may be assumed as the period, within which the people of the United States have actually doubled their numbers. But, as I would rather fall short in my estimate of the real number than exceed it, I will assume twenty-five years as this period. In the year 1825, the number of the people in the United States will be

10,700,132; in 1850, 21,400,264; in 1875, 42,800,528; in 1900, 85,610,056: and this, independently of any additions from abroad; the allowance, made at the commencement of this calculation, being much more than a balance for any such additions. With this population, our territory will allow more than thirteen acres of land for the support of an individual; or about eighty-seven acres to a family, consisting of six and a half, which may be assumed as the average number. It will undoubtedly be admitted, that this quantity will be more than sufficient for the sustenance of such a family.

I am, Sir, &c.

LETTER 11.

Enterprize, Ingenuity, Intelligence, Means af acquiring Knowledge; Laws, Morals, Language, and Liberty of the People of the United States. Extent of Country yet to be settled. Institutions of the Country in a state of Improvement. Increase of Evangelical Religion and Catholicism. Future Prospects of the United States.

DEAR SIR;

IN the preceding Letter I have remarked, that the great body of those extensive regions, which form the territory of the American States, enjoy a salubrious climate; and that the inhabitants, already thinly spread over it, are possessed of vigorous constitutions. In this manner they are fitted to be able defenders of their country, and to encounter with success those difficulties, which in the progress of human life so frequently occur, and so imperiously demand firmness of body as well as resolution. The inhabitants of no country, it is believed, unite more strength with more agility.

At the same time no people have more enterprise. There are two important facts, which demonstrate this position in the clearest manner. Antecedently to the commencement of the restrictive system by our government, we were the most commercial nation in the world, except that of Great Britain. Every corner of the earth was visited by our ships, and the tonnage owned by the people of Massachusetts was probably greater than that possessed by any equal number of individuals on the globe, unless where the whole, or a great proportion of them, were inhabitants of some great commercial city.

The other fact, in which our enterprise is decisively discovered, is the conversion of an immense wilderness into a fruitful field. Of the magnitude of this work it is not expected, that Europeans will easily form adequate conceptions. Even

they must acknowledge it to be very great; although it cannot be supposed, that they should comprehend its extent, without actual experience or inspection.

It is to be remembered, that these are the objects by which the enterprise of the Americans will for an indefinite, and it is hoped for a very long period be principally demanded.

My countrymen are also possessed of their full share of ingenuity. This you may perhaps be disposed to question. Were you to reside in the United States a short time, and to make yourself an eye-witness of the many new and successful modes which they have invented for the purpose of facilitating useful business, and which they are every day inventing, the question would be at an end. With this ingenuity they are now adding continually to the number, kind, and degree of their enjoyments; reducing the prices of very many of the products of human labour, and giving the best proofs of still more numerous and important improvements of this nature to be made hereafter. From this cause, to a considerable extent, is derived the extraordinary fact, that the manufactories of the United States have within a few years risen from small beginnings to the amount of two hundred millions of dollars. From this cause, also, my countrymen have built a vast number of bridges over large rivers within a little period; and have carried the arts of building and navigating ships to a degree of perfection, which, it is believed, has not been excelled.

The colonization of these states was begun by civilized men, and not by a horde of hunters nor of shepherds. Those, who directed their affairs, had been educated, in many instances, at universities of high distinction; and brought with them the learning, science, arts, and refinements of their own country. These men laid the foundation of our state of society. The disadvantages, with which they had to struggle, were, I acknowledge, numerous and great. Still they conveyed their own views, spirit, and character into the institutions which they formed, both literary and civil; and sowed effectually in a soil, where they could not fail of taking root, the seeds of future improvement. The fruit, which they have already borne, has been extensive and valuable, and they are now promising to bear much more.

Among the blessings, which they conveyed to succeeding