being furs and grain. To portage these goods around Niagara Falls kept
fifty or more farmers' waggons busy every day during the summer. A team
of horses or oxen could haul twenty "pieces," of one hundred weight
each, for a load. The entire length of the portage from Lake Ontario to
Lake Erie was practically a street, full of all the bustle and activity
that a scattered country population of 12,000 conferred upon it. Two
churches, twenty stores, a printing house, six taverns and a scholastic
academy supplied the varied wants of Niagara's 500 citizens who
overfilled its one hundred dwellings.

From Lake Ontario, Newark, as it had been called, presented an inviting
appearance. The brick-and-stone court-house and jail and brightly
painted Indian council-house and cottages rose in strong contrast
against the green forest. On the river bank was Navy Hall, a log retreat
for seamen, and on Mississaga (Black Snake) Point a stone lighthouse
flashed its red signal of hope to belated mariners. Nearer the lake
shore, in isolated dignity across a mile of common, stood Fort George, a
dilapidated structure with wooden palisades and bastions. Half-acre lots
in the village were given gratis by the Government to anyone who would
build, and eight acres outside for inclosures, besides a large
"commonty" for the use of the people. A quite pretentious wharf lined
the river, and from this, on any summer afternoon, a string of soldiers
and idle citizens might be seen--among whom was Dobson--casting hook and
troll for bass, trout, pickerel and herring, with which the river
swarmed. On one occasion Brock helped to haul up a seine net in which
were counted 1,008 whitefish of an average weight of two pounds, 6,000
being netted in one day.

Side-wheel ferries, driven by horse-power, plied between the river's
mouth and the Queenston landing. The paddle-wheels of these were open