templated canal at Fort Stanwix of any value, the charter should stretch to the Seneca lake, and to the harbor of Oswego, as suggested in my journals, which you have perused; and in conformity to our conversations, so as to admit the commerce of the great lakes into the Hudson river, and vice versa.

"I am well aware the whole extent of this great enterprise cannot be accomplished, perhaps, in this generation; but rest assured, Sir, if the charter or act of incorporation can be so shaped, as to embrace the whole extent of the objects we contemplate, and a period of sufficient extent, say twenty years, is allowed for their completion, the plan would be held up constantly to the view of a new generation, which will rise in the west like magic. And this very enterprise will be one means of producing that effect in a certain degree, as I have no doubt the canals will keep pace with the progress of population. In other words, if a fair experiment is made, and it shall be found useful to the community and encouraging to the adverturers, (for I fear the State will not dare to embark, although a state object) we can have no reasonable apprehension but it will succeed. I have conversed very fully with James Watson, and my uncle, Judge Hobart, on this great enterprise: they appear deeply impressed with the importance of our views, although they appear to want faith. They think we are too sanguine, and half a century too soon in the project. I think not: and I am so well convinced to the contrary, that I am determined to do my utmost to co-operate with your enlarged views on this very important subject; and I will, if you deem it necesary, proceed to New York again, to afford you every aid in my power, I am, Sir,

"E. WATSON."

Replying to Elkanah Watson, in a letter dated New York, March 4, 1792, General Schuyler wrote:

"SIR-The letter which I had the pleasure to receive from you would have been acknowledged at a more early day: sickness was one cause which prevented; and another, proceeded from a wish to be able to communicate something decisive on the subject of your letter.

"A joint committee of both Houses (of which committee I was not one) had been formed: this reported a bill for incorporating two companies, one for the western, and another of the northern navigation. The former was to have been carried no farther than the Oneida lake. The bill contemplated a commencement of the works from the navigable waters of the Hudson, and to be thence con

tinued to the point I have mentioned, and it obliged the corporation, in a given number of years (which was intended to be ten) to the completion of the whole western navigation. When this bill was introduced into the Senate, the plan generally appeared to me so exceptionable, that I thought it incumbent on me to state my ideas on the subject at large. They were approved of unanimously by the committee of the whole house, and I was requested to draught a new bill. This was done, and it has met with the approbation of the committee of the whole, and will be completed tomorrow by filling up the blanks. By this bill two companies are to be incorporated, one for the western, and the other for the northern navigation. It is proposed that each shall be opened by commisioners at New York and Albany; that the books shall be kept open a month; that if more than one thousand shares are subscribed, the access [excess] shall be deducted from each subscription pro rata, so, nevertheless, as that no subscriber shall have less than one share, that every subscriber shall pay at the time of subscription, say thirty dollars; and that the directors of the incorporation shall, from time to time, as occasion may require, call on the subscribers for additional monies to prosecute the work to effect: whence the whole sum for each share is left indefinite.

"The western company are to begin their works at Schenectady, and to proceed to Wood creek. If this part is not completed in years, say six or eight, then the corporation is to cease; but having completed this in years more, say ten, they are to be allowed for extending the works to the Seneca lake and to Lake Ontario. And if not completed within that term, then the incorporation to cease so far forth only as relates to the western navigation from Wood creek to the two lakes. The State is to make an immediate donation of money, which I proposed at ten thousand pounds for each company, but which I fear will be reduced to five thousand pounds for each company. I thought it best that the operations should begin at Schenectady, lest the very heavy expense of a canal either directly from Albany to Schenectady, or by the way of the Cahoos or Halfmoon, might have retarded, if not have totally arrested, at least for a long time, the navigation into the western country: and conceiving that, if the navigation from Schenectady to the Cohoos was completed, the continuation of it from Schenectady to the Hudson would eventually and certainly take place. A given toll per ton will be permitted for the whole extent from the Hudson to the lakes, and this toll will be divided by the directors to every part of the canals and navigation in proportion to the distances which any boat may use the navigation. Provision is made, that if the toll does not pro

duce, in a given time, six per cent., the directors may increase it until it does; but the corporation is ultimately confined to a dividend of fifteen per cent. Both corporations are in perpetuity, provided the works are completed in the times above mentioned.

"The size of the boats which the canals are to carry is not yet determined. I believe it will be, that they shall draw, when loaded, two and a half feet of water. This is substantially the bill, as far as it relates to the western navigation.

"The northern company is to commence its work at Troy, and to deepen the channels at Lansingburgh, so as to carry vessels of greater burthen to that place than are now capable of going there. The blank for this purpose I think will be filled up with two feet; that is, the channel is to be deepened two feet. From Lansingburgh the navigation is to be improved by deepening the river by locks and canals to Fort Edward, or some point near it, and thence to be carried to Wood creek, or some of its branches, and extended to Lake Champlain. Tolls, &c., are to be on the same principles as in the western navigation. A clause was proposed for preventing any canals to the Susquehannah, but it was lost: it being conceived improper to oblige the inhabitants of the western country to make Hudsons river, or the commercial towns on it, the only markets.

"In the prosecution of these capital objects, I have to combine the interests of the community at large with those of my more immediate constituents. What the result will be, time must determine. I shall, however, be happy if my ideas on the subject shall meet the approbation of gentlemen more conversant with those matters than I can be supposed to be.

"Excuse the many incorrections of this scrawl: I have not time to make a fair copy. And be so good as to communicate the contents to such gentlemen as feel an interest in the completion of those great objects which are the subject of it.

"I am, Sir, with regard, your obedient servant,

"E. WATSON, ESQ."

"PHILIP SCHUYLER.

Undoubtedly, General Philip Schuyler, who had served as a member of the joint commission, appointed on February 15, 1791, composed of both Senate and Assembly, to inquire how the obstructions to navigation in the Hudson and Mohawk rivers might be overcome or remedied by the construction of artificial waterways, seconding their natural advantages, of which commission he was chairman, acquired

valuable information as to the topography of the country and the desirability of opening up navigation between Wood creek and the Mohawk river and between Lake Champlain and the Hudson river; and this information, together with that laid before him in the report of Elkanah Watson, furnished the basis for his remarks on the occasion of the introduction of the bill by General Williams, entitled "An Act for constructing and opening a canal and lock navigation in the northern and western parts of this State,” in which speech he appears to have convinced the Senate that the plan as presented by General Williams, ought to be modified in certain respects, and General Schuyler was requested to embody his views in a bill, which he did, and the same was entitled "An Act for establishing and opening lock navigations in this State."

General Philip Schuyler was a descendant of the Dutch of Holland. They were familiar with the canals of that country, which had been in operation several hundred years, and it might have been expected that so distinguished a citizen of New York, familiar as he was from his travels abroad, with canal construction in Europe, would take a deep interest in establishing water communication through the interior of this State. He became the chief advocate on the floor of the Senate of the act which bears his name, and which resulted in the incorporation of the Western Inland Lock Navigation Company and the Northern Inland Navigation Company, in 1792. They were the earliest canal laws passed by the State of New York, and are interesting in the history of New York's canal system as an evidence of the interest taken at that early day by some of her foremost citizens in a policy destined to make New York the chief commercial State of the Union.

The bill was put into its final form by General Schuyler, passed the Legislature on March 24th and the Council of Revision on March 30, 1792, and became Chapter 40 of the Laws of 1792, entitled "An Act for establishing and opening lock navigation within the State."

Two corporations were formed, one for the purpose of opening a lock navigation from the navigable part of the

Hudson river to Lake Ontario and Seneca lake, to be known by the name of "The president, directors and company of the Western inland lock navigation in the State of New York"; the other for opening navigation from the navigable portion of the Hudson river to Lake Champlain, and to be known by the name of "The president, directors and company of the Northern inland lock navigation in the State of New York," each with a capital stock of one thousand shares and with boards of commissioners authorized to open books for subscriptions to the capital stock.

General Schuyler headed the list of the boards of directors of both of these companies. These corporations were authorized to exercise the power of condemnation, to impose tolls upon the traffic not exceeding "the sum of $25 for every ton of the burden of such boat or vessel" passing between the Hudson river and Seneca lake and Lake Ontario, and between the Hudson river and Lake Champlain.

The Western company was required to complete its work from Schenectady to Wood creek in five years, and the boats navigating the locks were to draw two feet of water, and their length not to exceed forty feet, their width not to exceed twenty feet. In the event these water communications were not made within fifteen years, then all rights of the company were to cease and their corporate property revert to the people of the State.

Such act further provided that the State would appropriate to the said corporations a subsidy of $12,500 when they had each expended the sum of $25,000, which subsidy was to be expended in the further development of the undertaking.

During the second session of the Legislature in the year 1792, another Act was passed, known as Chapter 8, amending the original Act incorporating the companies in several material respects. Among other things it provided that the locks should not be less than ten feet in width nor less than seventy feet in length, and the water in the locks should be of sufficient depth to allow vessels drawing two feet of water to pass through them.