All the small water courses, which flow into the Hud son, below its confluence with the Alohawk, are precipi tated from a very great comparative height, and reach their common recipient by a series of cataracts. These small streams are generally abundant in the driest sea sons, and afford, it is probable, the most extended con nected lines of manufacturing sites on the globe ; sites placed upon the very brink of one of those extraordina ry channels of inland commerce, which cannot be seen without astonishment.
The protrusion of the Canadian lakes towards the Atlan tic rivers, which we have noticed as remarkable, north of the Susquehanna basin, occurs again in a still more sulk ing manner, with the Hudson and Lake Champlain. The head of the latter approaches tide water in the former, to within 60 miles, with a difference of level of 86.5 feet, and the highest elevation of the intervening valley 142 feet. From the Hudson river, however, below Baker's Falls, to Whitehall on lake Champlain, is about twenty-three miles. This is the route of the northern canal of New York, which will be more particularly no ticed in the sequel. A similar reservation may be made respecting the residue of the basin ; as, in the notice of the Grand Canal, every necessary observation will be in cluded.
Long Island Sound, east of "the mouth of the Hudson, receives, besides the Connecticut river, the Housatonick, and Quinnipiack, between the Hudson and Connecticut ; and the Thames east of the latter. From their elevated origin, and abridged cow ses, those minor strearns con tribute but little to the inland commerce of the sections of country they drain, though New Havcn at the mouth of Quinnipiack, New London near the mouth, and Nor wich near the fork of the Thames, are flourishing com mercial towns.
Connecticut is amongst the most curious of the At lantic rivers. Its extreme northern sources are in a hilly though not mountainous country, at North Lat. 45° 10', interlocking with the sourcts of the St. Francis, branch of St. Lawrence, and with those of the Kennebec, as suming a course of a little west of south, down a valley between two ranges of mountains, separating Vermont from New-Hampshire, to North Lat. 42° 43'. Thence crossing Massadhusetts and Connecticut in a direction of nearly due south, finally at Aliddletown turns to north east, and enters Long Island Sound at North Lat. 41° 16'.
The entire length of the Connecticut basin is 280 miles, with a mean width of about 45 miles, draining 12,600 square miles.
Though the basin of Connecticut is almost entirely on the primitive rock, and though passing one small ridge of mountains near AIiddletown, it is nevertheless naviga ble for vessels drawing ten feet water to the latter place, above the inountain pass 36 miles by the windings of the stream from the mouth ; and by vessels of 71 feet draught to Hartford, 15 miles still higher than Middletown. The latter place is at thc head of ship navigation, but, though considerably obstructed by falls, rapids, and shoals, the navigation of this river has been so much improved by dams, locks, and short canals, as to permit boats of con siderable tonnage to ascend to, and descend from, the fifteen mile falls above Haverhill, upwards of 250 miles, following the stream from Long Island Sound. This is very considerably the deepest inland navigation in the United States, east of the Hudson.
The Connecticut flows down nearly along the middle of its basin, and in all its length comparatively of 280, and by its meanders of near 400 miles, does not receive one considerable tributary branch.
Narragansett and Buzzard's hay are two decp indent ings of the Atlantic coast, between Long Island Sound and that singular peninsula called Cape Cod. The latter, extending nearly in a north and south direction 30 miles, receives from the north-west the Pawtucket, and from the north-east the Taunton river. The city of Provi dence, the third in size in the United States, beyond New York to the north-eastward, stands at the head of Narragansett bay, near the mouth of Taunton river. To its extent the basin of Narragansett presents the most extensive inland commerce in the United States. The bay of Narragansett is, at once, one of the most pic turesque and interesling sheets of water on the Atlantic coast. It is filled with islands rising considerably above the level of the highest tides. Sufficient depth of water is found at the entrance for ships of the heaviest tonnage, and to Providence for merchant vessels of the largest class.