foreign commodities, which may be brought from the Chesapeake to the Ohio much cheaper than they are now carried from Philadelphia to Carlisle and the other thick-settled back counties of Pennsylvania.

4. But the current down the Ohio and the Mississippi, for heavy articles that suit the Florida and West India markets, such as corn, flour, beef, lumber, etc., will be more frequently loaded than any streams on earth. The distance from the Scioto to the Mississippi is 800 miles; from thence to the sea it is 900. This whole course is easily run in 15 days, and the passage up those rivers is not so difficult as has usually been represented. It is found by late experiments that sails are used to great advantage against the current of the Ohio, and it is worthy of observation that, in all probability, steamboats will be found to do infinite service in all our extensive river navigation.

Such is the state of facts relative to the natural advantages of the territory described in the annexed map. As far as observations in passing the rivers and the transitory remarks of travelers will justify an opinion, the lands further down, and in other parts of the unappropriated country, are not equal, in point of soil and other local advantages, to the tract which is here described. This, however, can not be accurately determined, as the present situation of these countries will not admit of that minute inspection which has been bestowed on the one under consideration.

It is a happy circumstance that the Ohio Company are about to commence the settlement of this country in so regular and judicious a manner. It will serve as a wise model for the future settlement of all the federal lands; at the same time that, by beginning so near the western limit of Pennsylvania, it will be a continuation of the old settlements, leaving no vacant lands exposed to be seized by such lawless banditti as usually infest the frontiers of countries distant from the seat of gov

ernment.

The design of Congress and of the settlers is that the settlements shall proceed regularly down the Ohio and northward to Lake Erie. And it is probable that not many years will elapse before the whole country above Miami will be brought

and November, will bear a vessel of any burden over the rapids, in their present state, and out to sea.

The following observations, by an English engineer who had explored the western country, were addressed to the Earl of Hillsborough in the year 1770, when Secretary of State for the North American department-at a time when we were British colonies, and our country considered only as the handmaid to Great Britain, in furnishing raw materials for their manufactures.

"No part of North America will require less encouragement for the production of naval stores and raw materials for manufactories in Europe, and for supplying the West India islands with lumber, provisions, etc., than the country of the Ohio, and for the following reasons:

"1. The lands are excellent, the climate temperate; the native grapes, silk-worms, and mulberry trees, abound everywhere; hemp, hops, and rye grow spontaneously in the valleys and low lands; lead and iron ore are plenty in the hills; salt springs are innumerable; and no soil is better adapted to the culture of tobacco, flax, and cotton, than that of the Ohio.

2. The country is well watered by several navigable rivers, communicating with each other, by which, and a short land carriage, the produce of the lands of the Ohio can, even now, be sent cheaper to the sea-port town of Alexandria, on the River Potowmac-where General Braddock's transports landed his troops-than any kind of merchandise is sent from Northampton to London.

"3. The river Ohio is, at all seasons of the year, navigable with large boats; and from the month of February to April, large ships may be built on the Ohio and sent to sea, laden with hemp, iron, flax, silk, tobacco, cotton, potash, etc.

"4. Flour, corn, beef, ship-plank, and other useful articles, can be sent down the stream of Ohio to West Florida, and from thence to the West India Islands, much cheaper, and in better order, than from New York or Philadelphia to those islands.

"5. Hemp, tobacco, iron, and such bulky articles, may be sent down the stream of Ohio to the sea, at least 50 per cent cheaper than these articles were ever carried by a land

carriage of only 60 miles in Pennsylvania, where wagonage is cheaper than in any other part of North America.

"6. The expense of transporting European manufactures from the sea to the Ohio will not be so much as is now paid, and ever must be paid, to a great part of the counties of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Maryland. Whenever the farmers or merchants of Ohio shall properly understand the business of transportation, they will build schooners, sloops, etc., on the Ohio, suitable for the West India or European markets; or, by having black walnut, cherry tree, oak, etc., properly sawed for foreign markets, and formed into rafts, in the manner that is now done in Pennsylvania, and thereon stow their hemp, iron, tobacco, etc., and proceed with them to New Orleans.

"It may not, perhaps, be amiss to observe, that large quantities of flour are made in the western counties of Pennsylvania, and sent, by an expensive land carriage, to the city of Philadelphia; and from thence shipped to South Carolina and East and West Florida-there being little or no wheat raised in these provinces. The River Ohio seems kindly designed, by nature, as the channel through which the two Floridas may be supplied with flour, not only for their own consumption, but also for carrying on an extensive commerce. with Jamaica and the Spanish settlements in the Bay of Mexico. Millstones, in abundance, are to be obtained in the hills near the Ohio; and the country is every-where well watered with large and constant springs and streams for grist and other mills. The passage from Philadelphia to Pensacola is seldom made in less than a month; and 60 shillings sterling per ton freight (consisting of 16 barrels) is usually paid for flour, etc., thither. Boats, carrying 500 or 1,000 barrels. of flour, may go in about the same time from Pittsburgh as from Philadelphia to Pensacola, and for half the above freight. The Ohio merchants could deliver flour, etc., there, in much better order than from Philadelphia, and without incurring the damage and delay of the sea, and charges of insurance, etc., as from thence to Pensacola. This is not mere speculation; for it is a fact, that about the year 1746 there was a scarcity of provisions at New Orleans, and the French settle

under the new Coneritation, by locking 5rward to this object, will, we trust, incaltate and fimlarize the lea. They will, no denkt, at an early period, make a reservation or purchase of a suitable tract of land for a federal town that will be central to the whole, an 1 give some public intimation of such intention to transfor the seat of government, on the occurrence of certain events, oh as comparative population, etc. This would renler such transfer easily practicable, by preventing the ocasion of uneasiness in the old states, while it would not appear to be the result of danger, or the prospect of revolt, in the new.

APPENDIX D.

THE ORDINANCE OF 1787, AND ITS HISTORY, BY PETER FORCE-ORDINANCE FOR SALE OF LANDS IN THE NORTH-WESTERN TERRITORY-ORDINANCE FOR ASCERTAINING THE MODE OF DISPOSING OF LANDS IN THE WESTERN TERRITORY.

[Copied from Appendix I of "St. Clair Papers."]

On the first of March, 1784, a committee, consisting of Mr. Jefferson, of Virginia, Mr. Chase, of Maryland, and Mr. Howell, of Rhode Island, submitted to Congress the following. plan for the temporary government of the Western Territory:

The committee appointed to prepare a plan for the temporary government of the Western Territory have agreed to the following resolutions:

Resolved, That the territory ceded or to be ceded by individual States to the United States, whensoever the same shall have been purchased of the Indian inhabitants, and offered for sale by the United States, shall be formed into additional States, bounded in the following manner, as nearly as such cessions will admit: That is to say, northwardly and southwardly by parallels of latitude, so that each State shall comprehend, from south to north, two degrees of latitude, beginning to count from the completion of thirty-one degrees north of the equator; but any territory northwardly of the fortyseventh degree shall make part of the State next below. And eastwardly and westwardly they shall be bounded, those on the Mississippi by that river on the one side, and the meridian. of the lowest point of the rapids of the Ohio on the other; and those adjoining on the east, by the same meridian on the western side, and on the eastern by the meridian of the western cape of the mouth of the Great Kanawha. And the territory eastward of this last meridian, between the Ohio, Lake Erie, and Pennsylvania, shall be one State.

That the settlers within the territory so to be purchased and offered for sale shall, either on their own petition or on the order of Congress, receive authority from them, with appointments of time and place, for their free males of full age to