GROWTH OF FLAX.

371

possibility of profitably conducting a direct traffic with England in Canadian flour was proved by the fact, that, while I was at Montreal, a vessel from the Ontario, containing seventeen thousand bushels of the best Toronto white wheat, lay opposite Goold's Mills—one of those of which I have spoken as being superior to the average of the Rochester and Oswego mills to be ground, on merchants' account, for the Liverpool market. If properly cultivated, this trade may, I think, make both the growers and grinders of Canadian wheat very indifferent as to the 20 per cent duties of the States.

Among the articles of export from Lower Canada, linseed is one which used formerly to occupy a not unimportant place, though now, so far as I can learn, the export of this grain to England has almost ceased. The French Canadians used formerly to grow flax extensively for home consumption; and most of the Lower Canadian farmers still raise enough to employ and clothe their own families. The diminution in the growth and export of seed may be owing, in some degree, to the gradual substitution of cotton for linen in articles for domestic use; partly to the general exhaustion of the soil, of which I have spoken; and partly to the growing taste for finer cloth, which will necessitate the growth of a finer quality of flax. The first and third of these causes are probably the most influential. Now, it is known to all flax-growers that hitherto a fine fibre has been considered incompatible with a strong, rank, heavy crop of flax, or with the ripening of the seed. Hence the taste for fine flax would cause the sowing of much seed, that the plant might spring up thick-the selection of poor or exhausted land that it might not come up rank, or grow tall and strong—and the pulling of the plant before the seed was ripe. The more these practices for the improvement of the fibre were followed,

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EXPORTATION OF LINSEED.

the less would be the quantity of linseed brought to

market.

It is one of those advances which the arts owe to scientific research, and deserves the consideration of those who affect to despise, or altogether deny, the use of science to agriculture, that the new method (Schenck's) of steeping flax in hot water promises to render all these precautions unnecessary, to extract as fine a fibre from the rank coarse ripe flax-plant, as from the slender unripe plant hitherto privileged alone to yield the finer thread. This method of steeping is certain and constant in its results, and is performed in. as few days as the old method required of weeks.

The general introduction of this method of manufacturing the plant will simplify the farmer's treatment of the crop, will enable him to cultivate flax as he does any other plant he grows, to reap a profit from it in proportion to its total weight, and, as in other crops, to ripen his seed either for home use or for exportation. It may regenerate the flax-husbandry in Canada, and revive, without exhausting the land, the ancient trade in the seed as an article of export.

I have said that the average freights from the Canadian ports, direct to Liverpool and other ports in Great Britain, cannot be greater than the cost of transmitting produce from the shores of Lake Ontario, through the port of New York. This direct freight ought in reality to be less; and in a few years it will almost certainly become so. This statement naturally leads me to make a few remarks on the navigation of the St Lawrence, its importance to Canadian interests, and the influence it is destined hereafter to exercise on the general revenues of the Canadas.

* Canadian seed ought to be as good as Riga flax seed, of which 5000 barrels have been imported into Newry, and 15,000 into Belfast, during the present season.

The natural outlet of the vast region of North America, which is drained by the great lakes and their tributary streams, is, as I have already remarked, by the river St Lawrence. This was early recognised; but the natural obstructions which existed in the channel of this river, have, with other obstacles, hitherto prevented it from being so easily and generally available as it is now likely to become.

In the first place, the rapids and falls of Niagara prevented the passage of vessels between the lakes Erie and Ontario. Thus, the Lower St Lawrence was inaccessible to the rapidly-settling western portions of Pennsylvania and Ohio. The idea of a canal from Lake Erie to the Hudson, through the low country of western New York, was therefore suggested, and was finally entertained by the New York State Legislature. The Erie Canal was the result; and up to nearly the present time this canal has formed the high-road between the upper lakes and the Atlantic, and has been a source of great wealth, and the cause of a very rapid prosperity, not only to the city, but to the whole State of New York. As the western country was cleared, and its population increased, the traffic along this canal augmented in a degree which the most sanguine had never contemplated, and extraordinary exertions have been made, from time to time, to facilitate the traffic, and to hasten the passage of the vessels with which it is crowded. The degree of expertness to which the working of this canal has been brought may be judged of from the fact, that, in the single month of October 1847, 6930 lockages were executed above Schenectady, which gives less than 6 minutes for each lockage, Sundays included.

But every year causes new increase of traffic, and new delay in the transmission of produce and merchandise, and larger quantities are, in consequence, detained over winter, when the frost has put a stop to the navigation

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CANADIAN CANALS:

of the canal. The great traffic, and already immense population of the Western States, and the mineral and other produce of the upper lakes, now demand other ways of access to the Atlantic and to Europe.

Meanwhile the Canadian authorities, those of Upper Canada especially, have not been idle. Indeed, I believe they have done more to promote internal water-communication than any State of the Union-I may safely say, than any country in Europe-considering the infancy of their country, the extent to which its material resources have been developed, and the actual amount of its revenue and population.

First, the Welland Canal has been constructed, by which a direct communication for large vessels is established between the lakes Erie and Ontario. Thus the borders of the upper lakes were connected by a single freightage with the ports of western New York and with those of Upper Canada, along the borders of the Ontario, and down the St Lawrence, as far as Prescott on the Canadian, and Ogdensburg on the New York side, below which places the first rapids on that river occur. Upon this great work about £1,400,000 currency have been expended; and, though still incomplete, it is already yielding a revenue of £30,000 a-year.

Next, the numerous rapids on the river, between Prescott and Montreal, have been flanked by canals, shorter or longer according to circumstances, by which the transit for large and loaded vessels, either upwards or downwards, has been rendered easy and secure.

Of these canals, the most important are :—

MONEY EXPENDED ON THEM.

375

Below Montreal, the works in Lake St Peter cost £75,000, and the harbour of Montreal itself £131,000. I do not include, of course, as executed by the province the Rideau Canal, between the foot of Lake Erie and the upper waters of the Ottawa, as this was executed by the Home Government. It is a hundred and thirty miles in length, has forty-seven locks, and cost £800,000. Though intended chiefly as a military work, it will prove of immense benefit to the future development of the natural resources of the more northerly parts of Upper Canada in the great basin of the Ottawa.

Altogether, on the execution of canals and riverimprovements necessary to the direct navigation of the St Lawrence from the upper lakes to the Atlantic, upwards of £3,000,000 currency, or twelve millions of dollars, have been expended by the Legislatures of Upper and Lower Canada. This sum is not only large absolutely or in itself, but it is especially so, compared with the amount of revenue hitherto at the disposal of the provincial Legislature of the Canadas. When we consider, also, that the whole canal debt of the State of New York is under seventeen millions of dollars, while the Canadas have burdened themselves with a debt of twelve millions, we shall be willing to allow that the amount of energy displayed by the people north of Lake Ontario and of the Thousand Isles is not less than has been manifested even in the State of New York, nor their faith less in the future growth and greatness of their rising country.

The result of all these improvements has been, that more and more of the direct European traffic with the great lakes has been making its way every year down the St Lawrence, instead of by the Erie Canal-even while that canal has been still able to overtake the whole of the traffic. But now that it has become evident that this canal, however it may be enlarged,