MODERN WATER TRAVEL.

James Greenleaf arrived in Duluth, one bright June day, four hundred and five years after the discovery of America. For nearly forty years he had been a missionary among the Indians of the British Northwest, but he had finally been persuaded to take a well-earned rest. Leaving his little settlement of red men, and taking a canoe, he had paddled up stream, carried his canoe over a portage, and paddled down a river until he reached Lake Superior, where a small sailboat had taken him to the flourishing city at the western end of the lake.

At the hotel he found, as he expected, his nephew, Henry Towne. Mr. Towne was a commercial traveler, always "on the road," as he would say, for a large furniture establishment in New York. In a letter to his uncle he had stated that business would call him to Minnesota at just that time, and that he would make the journey with his uncle from Duluth to New York.

The next day the two men started. The nephew had made all the necessary arrangements, having purchased tickets and engaged staterooms on the line of steamboats that connect Duluth with Buffalo. The first sight of the steamboat caused Mr. Greenleaf to exclaim at its size.

"It is not much like the steamboat that I took on the Hudson in the spring of 1856," he said. "I imagine, however, that I shall see greater differences than this, the further I go."

As the two men made a tour through the steamboat, the older gave expression to his thoughts in many ways.

"We did not have the saloon in those old days, when I did my traveling. Whenever we did not care to remain on the open deck there was no parlor to which we could go. No orchestra helped to while away our hours. No piano or organ added the charm of music to our journey."

"But you had a state room to which you could retire," replied his companion, as they came to the rooms numbered 240 and 242, which numbers were on the keys that they had obtained at the purser's.

"Yes," said his uncle, "a tiny room, six feet by six, with narrow little berths, and two small stools. I can assure you that it was nothing like these comfortable sleeping rooms, brilliantly lighted, with regulation beds, convenient toilet arrangements, and carpeted floors. However, I do not imagine that the machinery will let me sleep any better now than then."

The next morning, as the travelers went down to breakfast, the younger man asked, "Well, uncle, how did you sleep?"

"Never better," was the reply. "I tell you, Henry, I want to look at the machinery, after breakfast. It must be somewhat unlike the engine of my day, or the boat, large though it is, would have more of a jar."

When the two men stood above the mammoth engine and noted the smooth working parts, the regular and even motion of the great piston rods in and out of the cylinders, the quietness and gentleness with which each movement took place, the uncle said: "More improvements have been made on the engine of forty years ago than had then been made on that of the Clermont. And we used to think that the steamboats of our day were as much superior to Fulton's boat as his was ahead of Fitch's steam-moved paddles."

We cannot take note of all the novel sensations that came to the old missionary, nor can we pause to relate many of the conversations between the two men. We can record a few only of the greater changes which were discussed as they continued their journey, and mention some of the comments called forth by the scenes through which Mr. Greenleaf was passing.

On the afternoon of the second day the steamboat passed through the locks of the canal at Sault Ste. Marie.

"Uncle," remarked the drummer, "how does this canal compare with the Delaware and Hudson canal, with which you were familiar?"

"How can they be compared?" replied his uncle. "That was a long trench, hardly more than a scratch on the surface of the ground. This is broad and deep, though not long."

"Yes," said Mr. Towne, "but there is no new principle here. This canal is somewhat wider and deeper; its locks and gates are somewhat larger. Still it is only a canal."

"But we could not make such a hole in our day. We could not afford to hire men enough to dig it; it must have required many years to make this excavation."

"Oh; this canal was not made as large as this when it was first built. It has been enlarged since. But you know that we do not do all our digging now by hand. Steam shovels do the work for us. That gives us a great advantage over the day laborer with his pick and shovel."

"What strikes me as most noticeable," said Mr. Greenleaf, "is the number of vessels waiting on both sides of the lock. What causes such a crowd to-day, particularly?"

"This is no unusual number," replied Mr. Towne. "You do not realize what a traffic there is on the great lakes. It is stated that the tonnage passing through this canal is greater than that through any other strait on the face of the globe. This growth is very recent and very rapid."

"But what causes the traffic and where are all the vessels going?" asked the missionary.

"The great bulk of the freight," answered the younger man, "is grain from the Northwest, and iron, copper, coal, and lumber, now being obtained in vast quantities south of Lake Superior. So long as the steamboats can carry freight more cheaply than the steam cars, grain and ores will take this route. Sometime we shall have canals large enough for ocean steamers, which will connect the great lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. Then we can load our freight at Chicago or Duluth and not change it until it is unloaded at some English or European port."

The next day, as the steamboat was lying at the wharf at Detroit, conversation was turned to the great ferryboats plying across the river.

"I notice great changes in the steam ferries, since last I crossed the North River at New York," remarked Mr. Greenleaf.

"Yes," was the reply, "but you see only improvements. The ferryboats are larger and you might almost say clumsier; that is all."

"I do not think so," returned the missionary. "There must be some new invention to enable entire trains, with cars filled with passengers, to be carried across such a river as this."

"Of course," said his nephew, "the boat must be strong and large. However, the ferry docks have been improved. Now, when the boat is fastened, the wharf can be raised and lowered, until it is exactly on the level of the boat. Then not only passengers, but wagons and steam cars can pass from one to the other almost without knowledge of the change."

"How far have these cars come that I see on the ferry?"

"That," said the drummer, "is one of the through trains from Montreal to Chicago. The ferryboat next beyond, going the other way, bears a train containing cars bound for New York and Boston."

"Well, well! This is convenient," said the missionary. "The passengers are saved much trouble by not being required to gather up all their traveling bundles, leave the cars for the boat, and the boat for a new set of cars. We should have thought this a great gain, forty years ago."

"But do you realize what an inconvenience this ferry causes? Much time is wasted, not only because of the slow movement of the boats, but also from the necessary delays in embarking and disembarking the cars."

"Yes, I suppose so. But what would you do? Here is the river and it is too wide for a bridge."

"Oh, no!" replied Mr. Towne. "The bridge could be built, but it would be expensive and would not pay. But what do you think of a tunnel?"

"A tunnel? What do you mean?" said the other man, with a touch of surprise in his voice for the first time. "A tunnel? Where? Not under the river?

"Yes," answered his nephew, "a tunnel under the river. There is one, a few miles north, at Port Huron. There the train, instead of being delayed hours by the ferry, passes at almost full speed directly under the river, proceeding on its way as though the river were not there."

"Is not that something new?" asked Mr. Greenleaf.

"Yes. It was opened only a half-dozen years ago. It is said to be the greatest river tunnel in the world. It is a little over a mile long and is fifteen feet below the bed of the St. Clair River. Half a mile of it is directly under the water, yet no one passing through it would realize that it was different from any one of the hundreds of tunnels through which the railroads of this country pass. It is but a natural following out of such tunnels as the five-mile tunnel under the Hoosac Mountains in Massachusetts, or the three-quarter-mile tunnels in Jersey City, or the score of tunnels on the line of the Southern Railway over the Blue Ridge in North Carolina. It is a great tunnel to-day, of course, but when the North River tunnel is finished, from New York to Jersey City, this will be of little account in comparison."

Detroit was soon left, Lake Erie was reached, and night came on. The next morning the steamboat reached its journey's end at Buffalo. Our friends hastened across the city and were soon seated in a sleeper, on the train for New York.