have extensive grounds for the reception, storing, and forwarding of merchandise. With only one terminus, it would be impossible to accommodate its immense business without great confusion and delay, and greatly increased cost.

On the western portion of the line, as soon as the Susquehanna valley is reached, important lines radiate from the main trunk, striking the lakes at all the points above named, and at Dunkirk in addition. The more important of these branches are the Syracuse and Binghampton, in connexion with the Syracuse and Oswego road; the Cayuga and Susquehanna, in connexion with the Lake Ontario, Auburn, and New York road; the Canandaigua and Corning, in connexion with the Canandaigua and Niagara Falls road; the Buffalo, Corning and New York, and the Buffalo and New York City railroads.

By means of all these feeders, the trade of the West will be intercepted at almost every important point on Lakes Erie and Ontario, and collected and forwarded to the great trunk line. Measures are also in progress to connect the Erie road with Erie, Pennsylvania, by a line running direct from Little Valley; and with Pittsburg by means of the Alleghany Valley railroad. It is hardly possible to conceive a road with more favorable direction and connexions, possessing capacities for a more extensive business, or one that is destined to bear a more important relation to the commerce of the whole country.

This road was opened for business only on the first of June, 1851. It has not, therefore, been in operation a sufficient length of time to supply any satisfactory statistics as to its probable influence upon western commerce. So far as its business and revenues are concerned, it has exceeded the most sanguine expectations.

In this connexion it may be stated that another very important outlet from the Erie road to tide-water, the Albany and Susquehanna railroad, is about to be commenced; the means to construct which have already been secured. The distance from Binghampton to Albany by this route will be 143 miles, against 224 to New York by the Erie road. From Binghampton, going east, commence the most difficult and expensive portions of the Erie road, involving high grades, short curvatures, and a much greater cost of operating the road per mile than the portion of the line west of that point. From Binghampton to Albany the route is very direct, and the grades favorable; and there can be no doubt that a considerable portion of western freights, thrown upon the Erie road, will find its way to tide-water over the Albany and Susquehanna road. Such, particularly, will be the case with freight which is designed for an eastern market. The large number of railroads converging upon the Susquehanna valley renders the Albany and Susquehanna road highly necessary, to relieve the lower portions of the former from the immense volume of business that will be collected upon the main trunk from all its tributaries.

The best commentary on the importance of the last named project is to be found in the action of the city of Albany, which very recently, in her corporate capacity, made a subscription to its stock to the amount of $1,000,000, in adddition to large private subscriptions.

The following table will show the cost of the public works of New

Amount estimated for completion of Erie canal...

York which have been constructed, or are in progress, with a view to their becoming avenues of the trade between the East and the West:

Erie and Champlain canals..

Hudson river railroad..

$26,000,000

9,000,000

12,000,000

Rochester and Syracuse railroad, (both lines).

6,464,362

NOTE. The cost of the Sodus bay and Southern, and the Lake Ontario, Auburn and New York railroads, cannot, in the present stage of their affairs, be estimated with sufficient accuracy to give them a place in the above table. The cost of the Rochester and Syracuse road is estimated.

Railroads from the city of New York to Montreal, Canada.-The roads that make up the line from the city of New York to Montreal constitute a very important route of commerce and travel. The city of Montreal is the commercial emporium of the Canadas, and is a large and flourishing town. It lies very nearly north, and at a distance of about four hundred miles from New York. The roads which connect these cities lie in the gorge which divides in two the great mountain range extending, unbroken, except in New York, nearly from the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. This basin, or gorge, is occupied by the Hudson river, Lake Champlain, and the outlet of the latter to the St. Lawrence-the river Sorel. The route, as will be seen, is remarkably direct and favorable, as far as its physical characteristics are concerned; and as it connects the commercial metropolis of this continent with the great city of the St. Lawrence, and traverses a constant succession of large and flourishing towns, its importance will be readily appreciated.

This great route is made up, for a large portion of the distance, of two distinct lines. The first link, from New York to Albany, is composed of the Hudson river and Harlem roads; the second, from Albany to Rutland, Vermont, is made up of the Troy and Boston, and Western Vermont roads, and the Albany and Northern, and Rutland and Washington roads. From Rutland only one line is in operation, composed

of the Rutland and Burlington, Vermont and Canada, and Champlain and St. Lawrence roads. A road is also projected upon the west bank of Lake Champlain, which, when completed, will give two distinct lines for the whole distance between New York and Montreal. From Albany and Troy a railroad is in operation to Whitehall, the southern terminus of the lake. A road is also in operation from Montreal to Plattsburg, a distance of about sixty miles, and a comparatively short link only is wanting to constitute a new and independent route between New York and the St. Lawrence river; which there is every reason to believe will soon be supplied.

The above line of road, though recently opened, already commands an amount of travel fully equal to the importance of the connexions it sustains. Its through-freight business is not so large as its passenger travel, for the reason that a large portion of the line follows the immediate bank of an excellent navigable water-line, which, in the summer season, commands the heavy freight. In the winter it will become the channel of trade as well as of travel. As a pleasure route it presents uncommon attractions, which will secure to it a large business in the dull season for freight. The inland lines in Vermont and New York, however, traverse sections of country capable of supplying a very large local traffic both from their agricultural and mineral resources.

Among the most remarkable topographical features of this country is the severance of the great Alleghany range by the Hudson and Mohawk rivers, on the one hand, and Lake Champlain on the other. So deep are these indentations that the "long level" of seventy miles on the canal, occupying the summit of the ridge which divides the waters running into Lake Ontario from those flowing into the Hudson river, and which corresponds to the crest of the Alleghanies, is nearly one hundred feet below the surface of Lake Erie, and might, with some additional expense, have been fed from that source.

Lake Champlain is only eighty-seven feet above the ocean, and the summit between it and the Hudson is only one hundred and fortyseven feet above tide-water, and only twenty-three feet above the latter where the Champlain canal intersects it. In approaching New York from the interior, which is in the direction of the heavy trade, the above routes are the most favorable to economical transit, nothing being lost in overcoming adverse grades. It is these facts that constitute these routes keys to an important portion of the commerce of the country, and have rendered New York the commercial metropolis.

They are as well adapted to railroads as to canals; and as these depressions are bounded by high ranges of hills, the basin at the head of navigation on the Hudson must be regarded as one of the most important interior points in the railroad system of the country. Albany and Troy are the cities of the eastern States, lying upon tide-water, the most accessible from the interior, and are consequently the radiating points of some of our most important lines of improvement. The trunks of these to tide-water are the Hudson river and Harlem roads, which bear the same relation to the roads occupying the routes above described, as does the Hudson river to the Erie and Champlain canals. These facts

are a sufficient illustration of the important relations borne by the Hudson river and Harlem roads to the railroad system of the country.

Railroads from Lake Champlain to the St. Lawrence.-The Champlain and St. Lawrence and the Plattsburg and Montreal railroads have already been briefly described. The third and most important line of road uniting the above waters is the Northern, connecting the lake with the river St. Lawrence, at Ogdensburg, a point above the falls on that river. This road, though in the State of New York, is properly a Boston work, as it was planned and the means furnished for its construction by that city. It is regarded as the key which opens to the roads terminating there the navigable waters of the lakes.

An important extension of this road is under contract from its southern angle, near Potsdam, to Sackett's Harbor, on Lake Ontario. The completion of this link will form a complete chain of railroads through the northern portions of New York, connecting Lake Champlain with all the important ports on the eastern shore of Lake Ontario.

The three leading lines already described constitute, with their branches, the great routes of railway travel and commerce in the State of New York. In addition to the through business, they all traverse routes capable of supplying a lucrative local traffic; particularly the lines in western New York. The description of the trunk lines will convey a sufficiently accurate idea of the objects and characteristics of their respective branches without a special notice of the latter.

The most considerable line of road, not particularly alluded to, is the Long Island road. This was one of the earliest works of the kind in the State, and was constructed chiefly to accommodate the travel between the cities of New York and Boston. It is a somewhat remarkable fact that the pioneer work should be now entirely abandoned as a route of travel between the above cities. It is now only used to accommodate the local business upon its line, and consequently cannot be regarded as a work of much importance.

Delaware and Hudson canal.-This work was constructed for the purpose of opening an outlet for the northern Pennsylvania coal-field. It extends from Roundout to Honesdale, in Pennsylvania, a distance of 108 miles, and is connected at that place with the coal-fields by a railroad. It is a well-constructed work, of large capacity, and has proved a very useful one, not only on account of its coal trade, whence its chief revenue, but from its local traffic.

Measures are also in progress for the construction of two considerable lines in the western portion of the State-one from the city of Rochester, following the valley of the Genesee river, to Olean; and the other from Buffalo, probably to the same point. The objects inducing the construction of these roads, independent of local considerations, are the communications which they promise to open through the Alleghany valley road with Pittsburg and the coal-fields of northern Pennsylvania. Both routes traverse districts of great fertility, which cannot fail to afford a good business. The value of a railroad connexion between Buffalo and Rochester, the two most important cities

of western New York, and Pittsburg, which is at the head of navigation on the Ohio, will be readily appreciated.

An examination of the accompanying map will show how complete is the system of public works in New York, constructed with a view of commanding the trade of the interior of the country. As previously stated, a large portion of this trade naturally falls upon the great lakes, from the facilities they offer for reaching a market. The importance of this great water-line is still farther increased from the fact that most of the leading works of the West, designed to be routes of commerce, rely on it as a base. The commercial or business outlet for the lakes, as well as of the works connected with them, has been the Erie canal. That work comes in contact with the lakes at only two points, Buffalo and Oswego. The railroad, on the other hand, by the greater facility of its construction, opens as many outlets from the lakes to tide-water as there are harbors upon the former accessible to its commercial marine. New York is now profiting to the utmost by her advantages in reference to western trade. Nearly every good harbor, as well on Lake Erie as on Ontario, either is or soon will be connected with tide-water by railroads, actually constructed or in progress. Already such connexions are formed with the harbors of Cape Vincent, Sackett's Harbor, and Lewiston, on Lake Ontario; and roads are in progress from Great and Little Sodus bays and Charlotte, with similar objects. On Lake Erie, roads already extend from Tonawanda, Black Rock, Buffalo, Dunkirk, and Erie, Pennsylvania, to tide-water; so that, instead of only two outlets for the trade of the West, at Buffalo and Oswego, there are to be at least six times that number in New York alone. The facilities given to the commerce of the country by all these lines must prove not only of utility to this commerce, but to the trade and prosperity of the State and city of New York. The additional avenues to market, already opened and in progress, will, by a healthy competition, reduce the cost of transportation to the lowest possible point, and stimulate the movement of property and merchandise to an extraordinary degree. While every region of the United States is making extraordinary exertions to turn to themselves the interior trade of the country, New York is preparing for the most formidable competition with her rivals, and makes the most of the means within her reach to maintain her present preeminence.

RAILROADS OF NEW ENGLAND.

State of Massachusetts.-Population in 1830, 610,408; in 1840, 737,699; in 1850, 994,514. Area in square miles, 7,800; inhabitants to square mile, 127.49.

State of Vermont.-Population in 1830, 280,652; in 1840, 291,948; in 1850, 314,120. Area in square miles, 10,212; inhabitants to square mile, 30.76.

State of New Hampshire.-Population in 1830, 269,328; in 1840, 284,574; in 1850, 317,976. Area in square miles, 9,280; inhabitants to square mile, 34.26.