CHAPTER I. (Page 1.) INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. CHAPTER II. (Page 40.) DISTINGUISHED VISITORS TO THE STATE IN ITS EARLY DAYS. CHAPTER III. (Page 76.) DISTURBANCES AND BRITISH AGGRESSION ON THE NORTHERN FRONTIER FROM 1791 TO 1798 AND verMONT'S PART THEREIN. CHAPTER IV. (Page 108.) ACCEPTANCE AND RESIGNATION OF OFFICIAL POSITIONS-EXTRADITION OF FUGITIVES FROM JUSTICE -COLONIZATION SOCIETY-SLAVERY. CHAPTER V. (Page 131.) INCIDENTS, LEGISLATION AND INTERNAL AFFAIRS OF VERMONT FROM 1791 To 1808. CHAPTER YI. (Page 149.) INCIDENTS, LEGISLATION, EMBARGO, SMUGGLING AND INTERNAL AFFAIRS OF VERMONT from 1808 TO 1836. CHAPTER VII. (Page 173.) BRITISH AGGRESSION AND CAUSE OF THE WAR OF 1812 AND VERMONT'S ATTITUDE RESPECTING IT. CHAPTER VIII. (Page 196.) VERMONT IN THE WAR OF 1812-1814. CHAPTER IX. (Page 225.) WAR OF 1812-1814.-CONTINUED. CHAPTER X. (Page 284.) CLAIMS OF INDIANS TO LAND IN VERMONT. CHAPTER XI. (Page 315.) THE PLACE OF HOLDING THE LEGISLATIVE SESSIONS, THE CAPITOL AND LIBRARY BUILDINGS, AND SUPREME COURT ROOMS. CHAPTER XII. (Page. 340.) BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF PIONEERS OF THE NEW HAMPSHIRE GRANTS AND VERMONT. CHAPTER XIII. (Page 359.) BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF PIONEERS OF THE NEW VERMONT.-CON CHAPTER XIV. (Page 380.) LIST OF TREASURERS, SECRETARIES OF STATE, AUDITORS OF ACCOUNTS, SPEAKERS OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, CLERKS OF THE HOUSE, SECRETARIES OF THE SENATE, AND LEGISLATIVE SESSIONS IN VERMONT SINCE 1777. CHAPTER I. INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. N the admission of Vermont as one of the ON members of the Federal Union, the calamities of war and warlike preparation and the excitement of controversy, had passed, which was welcome, and propitiɔus to the pursuit of private business and the prosecution of public concerns. The State government was placed in the hands of men whose talents and virtues the people had the utmost confidence in-the control of men of undoubted courage and capacity. Governor Chittenden, as a magistrate and as a man, had long been endeared to the people of the State, and his characteristics were such as a new State required. The great need for the security and advancement of the people was the improvement of the natural and civil advantages which were already in their possession. The resources of the State were to be developed. New towns were to be granted, roads to be laid out and worked, manufactures and commerce to be fostered, and schools and learning encouraged. Were the people equal to the task? A disinterested Virginian, who visited Vermont in the summer of 1791, wrote to a friend in Bennington in September of that year and gave a description of Vermont and its people, as follows, viz: "Before I left Virginia, I had conceived but a very indifferent opinion of the Northern States, and especially of the State of Vermont. I had formed the idea of a rough barren country, inhabited by a fierce, uncivilized, and very unpolished people. I made my tour up Connecticut River, east of the Green Mountains, near the northern boundary of your State, and returned on the western side, by the lake, through Bennington. I must confess I was surprised and astonished beyond measure, to find a fertile, luxuriant soil, cultivated by a virtuous, industrious and civilized set of inhabitants; many of whom lived in taste and elegance, and appeared not unacquainted with the polite arts. The rapid progress in population and improvement, and the many surprising incidents that have taken place since the short period of your existence as a State, will furnish material for some able historian, to give the world a history that shall be both entertaining and instructive." This writer might have also, in truth, referred to extraordinary opportunity of extending and developing her manufacturing interests by reason of her water power facilities along her rivers. The attention of Ira Allen, Levi Allen, and other leading Vermonters was early turned toward the project of improving the waterway between Lake Champlain and the river St. Lawrence by cutting a canal. It is stated in Ira Allen's history of Vermont that Lake Champlain is a noble sheet of water and so deep that ships of war have sailed in it. It is sprinkled with many beautiful, fertile and well inhabited isles, but it is to be lamented that the wealth of its waves should be merely confined to the fishermen, when they might be converted to the noblest purposes of trade and useful navigation, for the mutual benefit of millions, by a navigable cut to the river St. Lawrence. In consequence of an application made by Ira Allen of this State to Governor Haldimand, Governor of Canada, in 1784 and 1785, General Haldimand thought so highly of the proposition that he appointed Captain Twist, the engineer of that province, to make a survey and estimate the expense of the canal. The captain began his survey at the rapids of St. Johns and carried it on along the side of the river Sorel to Chamblee. His estimate of the expense sufficient to bear vessels of two hundred tons burthen was £27,000 sterling. He said it was impossible to calculate the advantages of the undertaking in a commercial point of view; such an undertaking would promote agriculture, population, arts, manufactures, handicrafts, and all the business of a civilized State. Ira Allen, in an interview with his Grace, the Duke of Portland, laid down the advantages that would mutually result to the two countries, if such a communication should be carried into effect, but his Grace objected to his government paying any share of the expenses. He expressed a readiness to receive, and to consider proposals for carrying the project into execution. Allen offered to cut the canal at his own expense on condition that he should be secured for the money expended by an order from government by the assignment |