It is well known that the imports of the colonies into Great Britain have, in former years, excluded those from the United States. The trade is now about equally divided, destined undoubtedly to a yearly increase from this country. The exports of foreign merchandise are greater to the colonies than to any other country except to France, which only exceed those to the colonies by about one hundred thousand dollars. The total exports of domestic produce and manufactures-the true test of the value of the tradeto all the colonies for the year ending June, 1850, were greater than those to France, to Cuba and Brazil, united, and more than the total amount sent to Holland, Russia, Austria, Hayti, and Mexico. Lake Commerce. In pursuing my inquiries into the inland trade of Canada, my attention was imperceptibly drawn to a consideration of our own inland trade, so gradually intertwining with and forming the most extended ramifications with the different trading ports on the Canadian lake frontier-all contributing unitedly to the value and healthiness of our wonderful inland commerce. The great difficulties of obtaining correct returns of our inland trade have been felt for many years; and as those difficulties multiply with the increase of population and trade, the evil cannot too soon be grappled with and remedied by the action of the general government. The great desideratum is a general system of arrangement for furnishing minute details of the imports and exports of goods, foreign as well as coastwise, exhibiting quality, quantity, and value; the entering and clearing of vessels, their country, tonnage, and crews, specifying the build or employment; periodical returns to the Executive under the specified forms; and of an inspector, whose duty it would be to itinerate the custom districts, and see that the general instructions were correctly carried out. No individual, except one with the same personal experience, can realize, as I have done, the necessity of a thorough remodelling of our lake-ports custem-houses. To one fact I deem it my duty specially to call your attention, viz: the practice in several inland ports for each collector, on retiring from office, to carry away with him the books and accounts, on the plea that, having paid for the stationery from his private funds, they are private property-the government not making any allowance for this item of public expenditure. The following extracts from Colonel Abert's able report on the lake trade in 1847 will justify me in earnestly pressing this matter on your consideration: "Our revenue system gives us an exact knowledge of that portion of our productive industry which forms our foreign commerce; but the system has not been extended so as to obtain a knowledge of our internal trade and commerce. This immense amount of national resources and the vast measure of national strength has, as yet, been left-that is, a correct knowledge of it-to individual efforts and to accidental investigation; or, in other words, it is yet in want of some established system by which its details can be collected with the same reliable accuracy as those of our foreign commerce. Considering how essential this knowledge is to the forming of sound opinions of the fiscal or military power of a people, we think it will be readily admitted that a system by which this knowledge shall be obtained cannot be too carefully established or too highly cherished." If it is necessary to add more on this subject to such high authority, permit me to refer to the practice of European nations, particularly to that of Great Britain, whom neither expense nor labor deters from obtaining in every form correct statistical information of the industrial resources of all countries a knowledge so necessary under wise legislation for constructing a basis for the advancement, the happiness, and wealth of a people. The detailed statements herewith of the trade of Ogdensburg, Oswego, Buffalo, and other growing marts of lake commerce, will, I hope, present some new and interesting facts for the consideration of the government; and, while conveying an idea of the importance of those towns as depots of trade, will tend to convince the representatives in Congress of the necessity of liberal appropriations for the improvement and protection of the harbors along this extensive frontier. In my sketch of the lake ports, I allude to the contraband traffic carried on in some, if not in all the custom-house districts, to and from Canada. At one period this traffic amounted to a large sum annually; of late it is considered to be more limited in its extent. But when the great extent of our frontier is considered, as well as the limited number of officers employed to watch over it, and that high duties are exacted on each side of the boundary line, it is evident to the most casual observer that, taking into consideration the almost multitudinous increase yearly of population, an army of custom-house officers would be insufficient to check its progress or curtail its increase. It therefore becomes a matter for the most serious consideration, whether prompt and effective measures should not be adopted, either by arrangements between the two governments or by other means, to check the demoralizing traffic, and remedy the evils to which it naturally gives rise. I have procured and annexed copies of the forms used in the intercolonial trade of the British colonies, and supplied by the government to the masters of their coasting vessels. It enables the coasters to run in and out of harbor at all hours a great saving of time to them in the short season of navigation in these northern latitudes. The plan is simple and efficient. In a book the master of each coaster enters his cargo, inwards and outwards, and once a month, as an opportunity enables him to do so, he submits the same under oath to the collector of the port from which he trades. Every facility is thus offered for the transit of merchandise and the attainment of correct statistical details. It occurred to me that a plan somewhat analogous might be devised to meet the requirements of our lake coasting marine, so long a subject of vexation as regards the statistics of that rapidly increasing trade. This lake commerce, floating along a line of coast of nearly five thousand miles, (including Lake Champlain,) three thousand miles of which are American and two thousand miles Canadian, employing one hundred and seventy thousand tons of American shipping and ten thousand seamen, or an aggregate of American and British Lake tonnage of two hundred and five thousand, and about thirteen thousand men, presents the most remarkable example of the inland resources of this continent; and may be said, as to its rise and progress, to be unparalleled in any era, or in any other quarter of the globe. This wonderful section of our country, unknown in a commercial point of view a few years ago, is now the land of promise to vast masses of emigrants from many countries, and, by its productive power, creates an amount of wealth alike beyond the calcula tions of the political economist and the foresight of the statesman; none can form an estimate of the extent to which such commerce may be increased. If we view it, stretching from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the extreme verge of Lake Superior, uncontrolled, unfettered, and unre stricted, we may anticipate the period when it will rival the commerce of Britain, as Great Britain has rivalled and overleaped the conimeice of Venice, of Holland, and of Portugal. Concluding remarks. The population of all the North American colonies now exceeds two millions of souls. As a people, they are intelligent, industrious, and enterprising, and if permitted fully to exercise self government, would soon assume an equality in commercial activity with the citizens of the United States and Great Britain. Occupying a most extensive country, of an area of nearly five hundred thousand square miles, stretching from the 42d to the 50th degree of north latitude, abounding in forests of the finest timber and minerals of great value, and with a soil fitted to afford exhaustless supplies of food to man; a country, moreover, blessed with a healthy and invigorating climate, favored with unparalleled facilities for sea, river, and lake navigation, watered throughout by streams which furnish an unlimited amount of water-power, and are stocked with the most valuable descriptions of fish; bordered by a seacoast indented with bays and admirable harbors, which are open to the most valuable seafisheries in the world;-possessing such superabundant resources, and sustained and stimulated by an energy of character which they have inherited with us from a common source, these colonists are destined to become a great and flourishing people, and to exercise no mean influence on the interests of our northern continent. It is a question of serious consideration to our own statesmen what relation these colonies shall hereafter have with this country; whether their prosperity shall become identified with our own by the reciprocal exchange of mutual benefits, or whether the barriers between the two countries, now partially removed, shall be rebuilt and strengthened. The Canadian government has proposed to our own to establish a reciprocal free trade with us in certain articles, the natural products of both countries. It remains with the American government to determine whether the leading principle of Mr. Pitt's celebrated bill of "equal and honest reciprocity," after having been buried for nearly three quarters of a century under the accumulated rubbish of narrow and selfish enactments, shall become resuscitated, and form the basis of a more liberal legislation. I cannot refrain from expressing my convictions that this measure recommends itself strongly to Anerican interests and magnanimity. It is true that objections against reciprocity with Canada have been urged from sources which entitle them to high consideration; but it is believed, that while the advantages to Canada will be immediate, the disadvantage to us, if any, will be local and temporary, and will be wholly counterbalanced by ultimate benefits. It is a measure, moreover, which has once received the sanction of the popular branch of our na tional legislature, and has been advocated in past years by our most distinguished statesmen of both political parties. The North American colonies are the most natural foreign outlets for American manufactures and the products of other countries, purchased by American merchants with the produce of our own labor. These colonies are geographically united with the United States, and geographically separated from all other countries. Whoever examines the position of these countries, with respect to each other, must be convinced that there is a physical adaptation of the surface of the northern continent to a commercial union of the people inhabiting it. It is impossible to erect sufficient barriers to illegal traffic where nature has created not only open roads and by-paths, but has plainly marked out great leading highways for an unrestricted commerce. It cannot be denied that a prominent source of the prosperity of the United States has been the existence of an unrestricted commerce between the people of the separate sovereignties. What State would now endure the least restriction upon commercial intercourse with a neighboring State? With the conclusive example before us of the benefits of reciprocity with our sister States, why should we deny ourselves equal advantages from a freer intercourse with our colonial neighbors ? It is acknowledged by political economists that the home trade of a country, as it is to a considerable extent freed from the taxes for transportations and commissions to merchants, is vastly more important to a country than the foreign trade. The American domestic trade has been estimated, upon good authority, as high as $92 50 for each individual of our population, while the foreign trade is in the ratio of only $7 50 for each individual. The trade with the colonies, if unrestricted, would partake of the character and advantages of a home trade. There is a peculiar adaptedness in American manufactures and products for colonial consumption, as they are suited for a people having the same necessities and personal and domestic habits as our own. Our mechanical and farming tools, our cotton and woollen fabrics, our stoves and castings for machinery, supply the wants of the colonists better than those from any other country could do. While the colonies, having a sparse population and a want of surplus capital, have made comparatively little progress in manufactures-especially those of textile fabrics-we have our establishments already erected, and have the skill and capital to direct and employ them. The returns submitted show that of our exports of domestic manufactures, a larger amount and greater variety is sent to the colonies than to any other country. The exports to Canada alone, in 1850, were equal to the whole amount exported to Sweden, Prussia, Holland, Portugal, and Mexico, united. It will be seen that the trade of the United States with the colonies has increased to a surprising extent since 1830, and particularly since 1846, while that of the colonies with Great Britain has proportionally declined since discriminating duties in favor of British manufactures have been abolished. The colonial merchants have advantages in the trade with our great Atlantic cities, which, if proper facilities are afforded, will enlarge the trade to the whole extent of their means of purchasing and paying for goods. It is well known that, thirty or forty years ago, the merchants in |