State, and making a large appropriation for that purpose. The charge of this survey was committed to Dr. Douglass Houghton, a man of superior scientific information, and of indomitable energy and perseverance. His reports exhibited the resources of the country on the upper lake in a new light. The early travellers in that country had obtained on the shores of the lake detached specimens of native copper, and the examination of the geologist showed it to be one of the richest mining countries in the world. In copper and iron the ores are unsurpassed in richness, and apparently inexhaustible in quantity.

The region of country in question was ceded to the United States by treaty with the Chippewa Indians in 1842, and in April, 1843, an agent was appointed by the War Department to visit the country, and to ascertain and designate the line of the mineral district. He was also empowered to grant permits to search for minerals, with the right to the persons receiving them to obtain leases subsequently for the premises. On the 6th of May, 1846, the issuing of permits and leases was suspended. The whole number of leases granted previous to that time was 480. The whole number of permits and personal applications for locations was about 1,000. The leases covered tracts of land some one and some three miles square, and secured to the government a per centage of all ores taken from the mines.

From the commencement of the mining operations to the 30th September, 1847, there had been raised from the mines 10,242,200 pounds of ore and metal. Of this, 1,693,805 pounds were shipped and sent out of the country for smelting. After making liberal deductions for such portion as was of little value for smelting, the quantity dug out and remaining at the mines to be smelted when the proper works should be erected is estimated at 7,225,395 pounds, which would produce in pure copper in the refined state from ten to twenty per cent. Of this amount, when smelted, the government will be entitled, under the terms and permits of the leases, in copper or money, to some eight or ten thousand dollars. The total receipts into the treasury for rents of this character, according to the estimates of the officers having charge of the same, will amount on the 30th of September next to some $30,000.

This glance at the mining operations on Lake Superior exhibits at once the interest which the recent developments in that country have excited in the public mind, and the value of its mineral resources. That these are destined to open the way for extensive and profitable occupation of labor and capital, to draw to the shores of this northern lake a numerous popu lation, to supply to the markets of the world an abundance of a metal which has hitherto been found in few localities where it could be worked by miners with profit, is too evident to be doubted; and yet it is apparent that these advantages, so conducive to the public weal, cannot be secured while the water communication between Lake Superior and the lakes below it is cut off by the obstruction at the entrance of the former. Through this entrance all transportation of metal and merchandise must pass. The transhipment at the falls, and land carriage around them, would impose a burden so heavy as to prostrate the enterprise, and destroy the advantages of the wealth which is found in that northern region. It would most assuredly prevent both the working of the mines and the settlement of the country.

The United States have an interest in this enterprise, direct and specific. The title to the lands throughout the whole peninsula south of

Lake Superior is yet in the government. The public surveys have but recently been commenced there, and an office for the sale of lands has been opened only within the last few weeks. The whole region is the property of the government. The same enlightened policy which has heretofore dictated all proper measures to effect the sale of the public domain, and to speed the advance of civilized society into the wilderness, would seem to require that the work under consideration, without which the business and the settlement of an extensive region must be retarded, or perhaps altogether renounced, should receive the aid of the government.

In the report to the Senate, above mentioned, the committee further say that the undertaking in question "is commended by the highest considerations to national favor, and ought to be prosecuted at none other than the national cost. Lake Superior has a coast within American territory of 600 to 700 miles in extent, the whole of which is a boundary of the public domain of the United States. It is, as its name imports, the largest lake in the known world. It is indented with numerous natural harbors, and in that respect possesses advantages for the safety and protection of commerce and navigation far greater than are enjoyed on either of the great lakes forming the chain with which we now propose to connect it. A navigable access to it will cause its broad expanse of waters which now roll in solitary majesty, bearing on their surface but little else than the light bark of the savage, to afford in future times a noble theatre for commercial enterprise, as well as for nautical discipline and adventure. It will bring into market, with a rapid demand for sale, a region embracing twenty millions of acres of the public lands, abounding in extensive fertile tracts, and in exhaustless mineral wealth, which now repose in all the wilderness of unreclaimed nature, and which must, to a great extent, remain so, unless the barrier in the St. Mary's river be overcome by the mode proposed.'

It will be recollected that the forests on the borders of the upper lake may also be made sources of great wealth, and subjects of profitable investment and labor; but lumber cannot be manufactured and transported to market until the canal in question shall be completed.

The fisheries of this lake already employ many men, and the business awaits only the removal of this obstruction to increase many fold the quantity put up for market. The committee have no means of ascertaining the amount of the annual product of the fisheries on this lake; but in a statement now before them, prepared with great care for the public eye, 22,500 barrels of fish, worth $112,700, are stated to have been exported from this place and Mackinac in 1847. The facilities for an uninterrupted transportation only are required to increase this branch of labor into an extensive and lucrative business.

Notwithstanding the many disadvantages of its isolated location, there are already several vessels and steamboats in the waters of Lake Superior, plying between its several ports and the falls at the outlet. Some of these were built above the falls, and others, at enormous expense, were transported overland around them on temporary ways laid upon the shore. It will be recollected that the boundary line between the United States and Great Britain passes through the middle of the lake, leaving to that nation an extent of waters and of bordering territory equal to that on the American side. The same general characteristics of country and of resources are found in the territory of both nations. The developments of

mineral wealth are the same on the British as on the American side, and have already become the subject of exploration and of mining operations. The imports and exports of the British portion of the entire region must also pass through the straits of St. Mary's. An actual survey has been made for a canal on the British side of the falls, where the land is favorable to the construction of the work, and the provincial government has had its construction in contemplation. It would seem to be due to our own interest to secure the advantages which the command of such a work-the key to so extensive a country, that which must control so many interests, and may become so essential for the preservation of our national rights— will inevitably confer on the party which shall cause the work to be executed.

An examination and survey of the route for the canal was made by John Almy, esq., a competent engineer, under the State authorities in 1837, and in 1848 another estimate of the cost of the work was made in accordance with a resolution of the United States Senate, under the direction of the bureau of topographical engineers. Mr. Almy estimated the cost $112,544. This estimate is for a work of much smaller dimensions and less permanent in its character than would be required to accommodate the increasing navigation of the lakes. The estimate made at the topo graphical bureau is for a larger and more permanent work, adapted to navigation by steam vessels of the largest class, and requiring the canal to be 100 feet wide and 12 feet deep, and the locks to be 200 feet long and 50 feet wide. The estimate for the total expense of such a work, constructed in the most permanent mauner, with the necessary extensions into the waters above and below the terminating points of the canal, is stated in Colonel Abert's report at $454,107 66. The fall to be overcome is twenty-one feet, which it is proposed to divide into three lifts, and the above estimate embraces double sets of locks. The length of the canal as surveyed is 4,560 feet.

It is

The legislature of Michigan, unable for the want of means to prosecute the undertaking as a State work, yet aware of its great importance to the public interests, in 1847 granted a charter to a company for that purpose, reserving the right at any time to resume the work, on paying to the company the amount of their expenditures upon it, with interest. doubtful whether, under these auspices, the canal will ever be constructed, and, in the opinion of the committee, the control of a work of so much importance should not be put out of the power of the public authorities. As the company has as yet made no expenditures under their charter, and the rights granted by it may, under its terms, be at once resumed by the State, the committee have deemed it most advisable to recommend that a cession of the right of way for the canal over the public land be made directly to the State, and that a grant of land, in some respects commensurate with the cost and importance of the work, be made to the State, to aid in its construction.

The same principles which have authorized and sanctioned numerous grants to the States, for turnpikes, canals, and railroads, through, or leading to, the public domain, designed to promote the sales of government lands, to facilitate the settlement of a new country, to develop new resources of public wealth, and to open new fields for enterprising labor, apply, in the opinion of the committee, in the fullest extent, to this case. And when it is considered that the State of Michigan, a frontier State, and

now for eleven years a member of the Union, has never, since the act by which she was admitted, with the exception of a small grant in common with the other new States, received an acre of the public domain to aid in any work of internal improvement, while such grants have been made to most of the other new States; when it is recollected that her authorities early undertook to execute the work in question, and were prevented, first, by the troops of the United States, and subsequently by the embarrassments of her treasury; when the interests of the United States, as the great owner of all the wealth within our territorial limits on the land and the water in that portion of the country, are regarded, the committee feel constrained earnestly to recommend the grant of 500,000 acres of land, as provided in the bill here with reported.