ONTARIO, the easternmost and smallest of 'the five great lakes of North America, lies in 42° 10' to 44° 8' n. lat., and 76° 30' to 80° w long. At its s.w. corner it receives the waters of the upper lakes by the Niagara, and at its n.e. corner it issues into the St. Lawrence; which for some distance below is called the lake of the Thousand Isles. Its surface, which varies a few feet with the seasons, is about 330 ft. below that of lake Erie and 234 ft. above tide-water. Its bottom, therefore, must be considerably lower than the level of the Atlantic, as it is in some places 600 ft. deep. It is 190 in. long, 55 in its widest part, and about 480 in circumference. Sufficiently deep throughout for vessels of thelargest tonnage, it has many convenient awl thriving ports, of which the chief are Kingston, Port Hope, Cobourg, Toronto, Hamilton. on the Canadian shore, and Oswego, Sackett's Harbor, Port Genessee in the United States. Its navie'ation has
been facilitated by the erection of 15 light-houses on the American side, and '13 on the Canadian; while it is connected with lake Erie by the Welland canal, with the Erie canal and New York by the Oswego canal, and by the Rideau canal with the Ottawa. Lake Ontario is subject to violent storms, and it is probably owing chiefly to the con stant notation of its waters that it freezes only for a few miles from the shore. The shores of lake Ontario are generally very flat, but the bay of Quinte, a long, crooked arm of the lake, which stretches about 50 in., possesses some attractive scenery. Burlington bay, on which Hamilton lies, is a large basin, almost inclosed by a natural, but strangely accumulated bank of sand, which forms a beautiful drive.