The Sun.
London, England, 1865-09-12 00:00:00

The British American Provinces•

(From the Special Correspondent of the Times)
OTTAWA, Aug. 2.
Ottawa may or may not grow into a populous
city, in virtue of the greatness thrust upon it by a
late Canadian Administration and her Majesty Queen
Victoria, who several years ago selected it as the
political metropolis of the two Canadas. However
the future may decide in this respect, it admits of
less doubt, if its people had sufficient enterprise and
capital to turn the rapids and falls of the Ottawa to
proper account, that it might become the seat of a
prosperous and varied manufacturing industry. No
one, however unpractical his turn of mind may be,
can stand upon the Suspension Bridge over the
chasm formed by the big river, or, better still, upon
the ledge of rock under the saw-mill, and survey the
surging, seething masses of foam that dash down a
wall of broken and irregular rocks, varying from 15
to 25 feet in height, to the lower level which,withlthe
exception of two slight runs or rapids, the Ottawa
occupies until its junction with the St. Lawrence at
Lachine, without coming to the conclusion that there
is water power enough within a space of 300 or 400
yards from the bridge on each side of the river to
turn the wheels of 1,000 factories. On one side is a
raging whirlpool, aptly named the " Chaudiere," in
which above a third of the descending waters are

lost in the bowels of the earth, to reappear no more,

so far as human research has yet discovered. The
remainder surges and boils over a wide expanse of
rock, and forms not one, but apparently a hundred,
waterfalls of various degrees of power and beauty.
On the other side, farthest removed from the city,
towards the suburb of New Edinburgh, the waters
roll in a series of independent falls into a deep
crevice between two precipitous limestone walls,
and are lost in another fathomless pit, familiarly
known as the " Devil's Hole"—lost without turmoil
and commotion, as if the very centres of the earth
were open to receive them, and could contain
10,000 Ottawas without overflowing. The saw -
millers have taken advantage of this immense
" water privilege," and done their utmost to force

the utilitarian aspect of the river more prominently
into the landscape than the lover of nature would
approve. Fortunately, however, all the efforts of
man are powerless to destroy either Niagara or the
Ottawa, and the mills and factories remain as evi-
dence of his industry, without greatly affecting the
sublimity of the scene into which his enterprise has
thrust him. As yet the principal mills on the Ottawa
derive their uses from the lumber trade—of which

the city is, next to Quebec, the principal emporium
_ _

in Canada. The lumber establishments on the river
convey :to the markets of the United States and
Europe a large amount of the finest timber for
building purposes which America produces, and add,
perhaps, more than any other industry—except that
of the farm—to the wealth and resources of the
colony. The Ottawa drains an area of 80,000 square
miles, and from its source in the wilderness around
Grand Lake on the borders of the Hudson's Bay
territory runs a course, inclusive of the Lakes La
Quinze and Timiscamingue, through both of which
it flows, of nearly 1,000 miles. Beyond Ottawa
City the settlements extend for little more than 200
miles, and these settlements are but poor villages
and hamlets, the abodes of lumbermen and trappers,
and the small traders who administer to their wants
in the supply of dry goods, groceries, and the irre-
pressible drinks without a due (or undue) modicum
of which the European in America, whether he be
Celt or Anglo-Saxon, seems to find it impossible to
live. Ottawa is in fact the last city towards the
North Pole. All beyond are mere outposts of civi-
lisation, which may become cities in twenty or
thirty years or less ; but they are meanwhile
but a congeries of huts and shanties, with a
grocery, a church, and:possibly a printing-office,
whose proprietor looks forward to the day
when the little weekly journal which he prints,
edits, and publishes shall be transformed into a daily
paper, and wield all the political influence and catch
in his net all the advertisements of the district. There
arrives annually at Ottawa the produce of the forests
in the far interior along its banks and those of its
tributaries the Gatineau, the Rideau, and other
smaller streams, according to the published estimate
of Mr. Allan Gilmour, of Pollock, Gilmour, and Co.,
of Port Glasgow, an amount of red and white pine,
pine deals, and sawn lumber of the value of $3,144,166,
or up'Wards of £627,000 sterling. Thirteen million
cubic feet of white pine, 2,250,000 cubic feet of red
pine, 60,000,000 of superficial feet of sawn lumber,
and upwards of two millions and a quarter of pine
deals, make up the items which represent this value.
The total exports of lumber and other productions
of the forest from the whole of Canada during the
seven years from 1857 to 1863 inclusive amounted
to $66,912,739, or an annual average of $9,558,962,
thus showing, according to Mr. Gilmour's calcula-
tion, that nearly a third of the whole trade passes
through the city of Ottawa. The importance of the
lumber trade becomes further apparent from a state-
ment in the returns of the Board of Trade and Navi-
gation during the same years, which represents the
value of the exports of all other agricultural produce,
inclusive of potash and furs, both of which might
strictly be claimed as productions of the forest, to
have been but $53,474,211; an annual average of
$7,639,173; or an annual difference in favour of the
lumber trade of $1,919,789, or £400,000. The
people of Ottawa and the settlers up the river, so
largely interested in this traffic, look with some ap-
prehension to the non-renewal of the Reciprocity