HUNT'S MERCHANTS' MAGAZINE AND COMMERCIAL REVIEW. JULY, 1848. Art. I.-INTERNAL COMMERCE OF THE WEST: ITS CONDITION AND WANTS, AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE COMMERCE OF MICHIGAN, PRESENT AND PROSPECTIVE. In the pages of this Magazine have recently appeared several articles on "Progress." The same subject is proposed in this article, but the progress of Peace, and not of Conquest-the progress and development of what we possess, and not the subjugation of all we crave. Hardly a section of our new country but stands a living and noble monument to show that "Peace hath her victories No less renowned than war." The vast and incalculable prospects of the great West in their general bearings have been, from time to time, presented in these pages. Statistics, alas! too often too severe a test for many a magnificent theory, when applied to the most enthusiastic calculations relative to the commerce and growth of the Lake and Mississippi basins, exceed every hope and prophecy. These dull details of figures become romance. The arithmetician distances the poet. It is here proposed to devote a few paragraphs to the present condition, and prospective commercial importance of a single State of the West, the new State of Michigan. Michigan embraces two peninsulas. The Upper, lying between Lakes Superior and Michigan, embraces 20,664 square miles; the Lower, lying principally between Lakes Huron and Erie on one side, and Lake Michigan on the other, embraces 39,856 square miles-in all 60,520 square miles, or 38,732,800 acres-an extent of territory larger than England and Wales. The history of the settlement of Michigan is more singular, in many respects, than that of any Western State. While the vast wilderness of Ohio was unknown and unexplored, the circuit of the 'shores of both peninsulas of Michigan had been explored by the devoted Jesuit missionary, and the adventurous and eager fur trader, and settlements and forts been established by the French at Detroit, Mackinac, Sault St. Marie, and other minor points. Although Michigan was and is the most accessible of them all, yet three great States grew up to power and importance in the north-west, while she remained confined to these small military posts. A territorial government was established for the lower peninsula of Michigan in 1807, which had been previously embraced in the old North-western Territory as the county of Wayne. The population at various periods has been as follows: 1810. 1820. 1830. 1834. 4,528 9,048 31,639 87,263 1840. 212,267 1845. 304,285 1848. 400,000 (est.) It will be perceived that the settlement of Michigan did not fairly com. mence till about the year 1833. Up to that period the agricultural and commercial advantages of the State were almost entirely unknown. In geographies, the lower peninsula had been described as an uninhabitable morass; and the very maps, that they might not present to the eye a perfect blank, were variegated by experimental rivers, placed at respectful distances from each other, and fanciful chains of mountains. This delusion was sustained and propagated by a report of Edward Tiffin, then Surveyor General of the North-west, to the general government, 200,000 acres having been appropriated in Michigan as military bounty lands. This report caused the location and final survey of these military lands to be made between the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers, and as this act has exercised a powerful influence over the infant fortunes of two already great States of the Union, the report is given. It is a rich treat, a valua ble curiosity to any one familiar with Michigan as it now presents itself to the eye. SURVEYOR GENERAL'S OFFICE, Chilicothe, Nov. 30, 1815. The surveyors who went to survey the military lands in Michigan Territory, have been obliged to suspend their operations until the country shall be sufficiently frozen so as to bear man and beast. Knowing the desire of the government to have the lands surveyed as soon as practicable, and my earnest importunities to urge the work forward, they continued at work, suffering incredible hardships, until both man and beast were literally worn down with extreme suffering and fatigue. The frost set in early, and the ice covered nearly the whole country, but broke through at every step, and the pack-horses could not be got along with them. They were, therefore, obliged to submit to the climate and its attendant rigors, and desist for a while, intending to attack them again so soon as they think it possible to proceed. I annex a description of the country which has been sent to me, and which I am informed all the surveyors concur in. It was only yesterday I received it, and heard of their return. So soon as their health and strength is recruited, I expect to see them all, only one of them having been here yet. In the meantime I think it my duty to give you the information, believing that it is the wish of the government that the soldiers should have (as the act of Congress expresses) land fit for cultivation, and the whole of the 200,000 acres appropriated in the Territory of Michigan will not contain anything like one-hundredth part of that quantity, or is worth the expenses of surveying it. Perhaps you may think with me, that it will be proper to make this representation to the President of the United States, and he may arrest all further proceedings by directing me to pay off what has been done, and abandon the country. Congress being in session, other lands could be appropriated in lieu of these, and might be surveyed as soon as those in Michigan; for, when the ice is sufficiently strong to bear man and beast, a deep snow would still embarrass the surveyors. I shall therefore wait to hear your answer to this communication before I proceed any further, thinking I should be unfaithful to my trust, if I had lost any time in communicating the information received. DESCRIPTION OF THE MILITARY LANDS IN THE TERRITORY OF MICHIGAN. The country on the Indian boundary line, from the mouth of the great Auglaize river, and running thence for about fifty miles, is (with some few exceptions) low wet land, with a thick growth of underbrush intermixed with very bad marshes, but generally very heavy timbered with beach, cotton-wood, oak, &c.; from thence continuing north, and extending from the Indian boundary line eastward, the number and extent of the swamps increases with the addition of numbers of lakes from twenty chains to two or three miles across. Many of the lakes have extensive marshes adjoining their margins, sometimes covered with a species of pine called tamarack, and other places covered with a coarse high grass, and uniformly covered from six inches to three feet (and more at times) with water. The margins of the lakes are not the only places where swamps are found, for they are interspersed throughout the whole country, and filled with water, as above stated, and varying in extent. The intermediate spaces between the swamps and lakes, which is near one-half of the country, is, with very few exceptions, a poor barren sandy land, on which scarcely any vegetation grows, except very small scrubby oaks. In many places that part which may be called dry land is composed of little short sand hills, forming a kind of deep basins, the bottom of many of which are composed of a marsh similar to those above described. The streams are generally narrow, and very deep compared with their width, the shores and bottoms of which are, with a very few exceptions, swampy beyond description, and it is with the utmost difficulty that a place can be found over which horses can be conveyed. A circumstance peculiar to that country is exhibited in many of the marshes, by their being thinly covered with a sward grass, by walking on which evinced the existence of water, or a very thin mud immediately under that. Their covering sinks from six to eighteen inches from the pressure of the foot at every step, and at the same time rising before and behind the person passing over. The margins of the lakes and streams are in a similar situation, and in many places are literally afloat. On approaching the eastern part of the military lands towards the private claims in the straits and lakes, the country does not contain so many swamps and lakes, but the extreme sterility and barrenness of the soil continues the same. Taking the country altogether so far as has been explored, and to all appearances, together with the information received, concurring, the balance is as bad, there would not be more than one acre out of a hundred, if there would be one out of a thousand, that would in any case admit of cultivation. With great respect, I am your obedient servant, To the Hon. JOSIAH MEIGS, Commissioner of the Land Office, Washington.* This report sealed Michigan for the present. Her settlement was retarded some twenty years. It is not too much to say, that the State would now have contained nearly a million of inhabitants, had it not been for this ludicrous and appalling report. Not content with his first geographical essay, the sharp-scented and conscientious old surveyor general thus pursued his duty on the 11th December: "I am very anxious to hear from you since my representation of Michigan went on. Subsequent accounts confirm the statements, and make the country out worse (if possi ble) than I had represented it to be." It has been shrewdly hinted that the old French settlers out-Yankeed the Yankee, and put a very successful and profitable joke upon the surveyors. Hospitable and kind and officious, they entertained the surveyors at the River Raisin and Detroit, and occasionally lent them guides, who led them over almost impassable marshes, through swamps and over sand knolls, till their minds were properly im pressed in regard to the capabilities of Michigan. In subsequent years the secret has been slyly let out, that the fur trade, doomed to certain destruction by the inundation of settlers, was too valuable a prize to be relinquished if it could be saved a few years longer by wit or stratagem. It is true that a belt of heavy timbered, level, but very rich and fertile soil, *The above was copied from the original copy, in the office of the Surveyor General at Detroit. surrounds the lower peninsula. The throng of settlers who began to penetrate beyond, some dozen or fifteen years since, emerged from this belt upon the table land of the peninsula in what are called openings. Often, as far as the eye could see, the ground was covered with high grass, a few straggling trees here and there, the whole scene presenting the appearance of a cultivated park. Towards the south and west they occasionally came upon small open prairies of most remarkable beauty and fertility, perfect gems, varying in area from 40 to 40,000 acres each. Occasionally, also, they crossed dense forests, whose majestic solitudes had been undisturbed by civilized man since the fiat of the Almighty brought the universe into existence. Every county contained more than land enough of the finest description to have satisfied the military bounties. The tide of emigration was setting strongly over the State, when those years of infatuation, inflation, and folly came along from 1835 to 1837. No State was ever settled faster than Michigan for about three years. Her citizens and her State government were whirled along in the wild eddies. Capitalists and politicians, traders and farmers, vied with each other in appropriating her soil at government prices. Of the twenty-five millions paid into the National Treasury for public lands in 1836, five millions were paid for lands in Michigan. The mechanic who had never bought an acre of land, and the millionaire whose sagacity in anticipating the course of events in New York or Ohio had secured him a great fortune, were equally eager to secure these domains. The new State recklessly created a brood of banks, exempted by the act of incorporation from redeeming their notes in specie whenever they should be organized-an unparalleled piece of quackery. The State authorized a loan of $5,000,000, and her bonds were sold by her Governor, acting as commissioner, in so unguarded and heedless a manner, that a large portion of their amount was never realized. Soon reverses followed. It is hard to tell whether the speculator, or the citizen, or the State suffered most. The enormous purchases of lands being blocked in together, the settlers, fearful lest they might be held for a long period, declined to settle that portion of the lands which were purchased for occupation. The State was charged with repudiation. Steamboat combinations, eager to secure their passengers for the whole route from Buffalo to Wisconsin and Illinois, were interested in practising the most gross deceptions upon immigrants and travellers. But as lands have become cleared and productive, as order and law, and more cautious legislation, have controlled affairs, public attention is again concentrating on the State, and the tide of population is again setting in with great rapidity. Everything indicates that one of those periodical inundations which visit the new States is now overflowing Michigan. As a specimen, around one nucleus, in the counties of Allegan and Ottowa, a colony of Hollanders are gathering, comprising already 2,500 souls, said to be excellent representatives of the intelligence, thrift, and industry of that people. It is but the germ of future colonization, and they expect immediately accessions who will increase this single colony to 10,000. They bring with them their mechanics and professional men, all their personal effects and property, the very Penates of their old Holland hearths. Most of the passengers by the Phoenix, 175 of whom were lost at the burning of that ill-fated vessel during the last fall, were bound for this colony. The State has divested herself of her railroads, and the Michigan Central Railroad is being pushed across the State from lake to lake, through the most densely-settled portion of the State, with great energy. It bids fair to be one of the most substantial, perfect, and profitable railroads in the United States. Staggering under the heaviest embarrassments and almost bankruptcy, her resources most recklessly managed and squandered, Michigan yet holds her head erect, and avows in every way her determination to pay her indebtedness, and to pay all that is due from her in equity or law. A burden which ground her to the dust a few years since, will press in future years with a feather's weight. Much ignorance exists as to the public debt of Michigan. She has never repudiated, though her position has been too equivocal. The truth is briefly this. In 1838, Governor Mason sold five millions of the bonds of the State-one-quarter to the Morris Canal and Banking Company, and onequarter to the United States Bank of Pennsylvania. He very strangely (to use no harsher term) surrendered the bonds, and contracted to receive payment in instalments of one million annually, at the rate of $250,000 per quarter. A portion of the bonds passed into the hands of bona fide purchasers at par. Such bonds have been recognized, principal and interest, and to the holders tardy justice will be done. About $3,300,000 passed into the possession of the United States Bank of Pennsylvania, on which instalments were paid to the amount of nearly $1,000,000. At this juncture the Morris Canal Company and United States Bank had become bankrupt, and the part paid bonds of Michigan were hypothecated by Mr. Jaudon in Europe at about thirty cents to the dollar. The people of Michigan believe so, and that the bondholders are not in law innocent holders, but cognizant when the pledge was made, that a full consideration had never been received by the State. If such is the fact, the State has not only an equitable, but a legal defence against the payment of their full face. That our position is not defined, and the rights and duties of the parties determined, and the State remained so long in apparent dishonor and disgrace, is probably owing to the timidity of politicians, who are not very anxious to probe before the eyes of the people so offensive an ulcer on the body politic. The governor, in his last annual message, urges a vindication of the dignity and character of the State; and the Legislature have passed an act, tendering new bonds at the rate of about 40 per cent, for the part paid bonds, being the amount of principal and interest they admit the State to be indebted upon them. It is but just to the population to say, that the writer has never heard the doctrine of repudiation avowed or defended by a single citizen of the State. Her false position has arisen from the causes cited, and from hitherto irremediable poverty. That the exact indebtedness of the State will be ascertained, and principal and interest fully paid, there can be no doubt. The people well understand that the reproach which stains the escutcheon of the State reflects discredit on the individual citizen, and withers his name and fame; and they demand that the credit and character of the State be placed on an immutable basis, worthy of her origin, her dawning prosperity, her glowing hopes, her unmistakeable destiny. In 1837, large importations of breadstuffs and provisions were made from Ohio, for the sustenance of the people. From the crop of 1838, not ten years since, the first agricultural exports were made. The crops have each year, in one portion or another of the State, suffered from blight or disaster, one crop being almost entirely cut off. There have, in fact, been but two universally good grain crops in the State. All other existing |