agricultural products toward the Straits of Mackinaw. Will it be said that this new region of the Northwest is less productive in agriculture? The contrary, for the great element of breadstuffs, is likely to be true. Attentive observers of agricultural production have remarked, that the different grains _produced most on the northern edge of the belt_, in which _they will grow at all_. Is it not so in Europe? The _isothermal line_ of Mackinaw passes in the midst of those countries which alone produce the surplus grain of Europe, viz., Prussia, Pomerania, Poland, Southern Russia. As if to place this beyond a doubt, the crops of Canada West have, in fact, failed much less frequently than those of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. In regard to agricultural production, it will be difficult to show that the country drained by Chicago, has any advantage over that which will be drained by the Straits of Mackinaw. In regard to commerce--the natural position of Mackinaw is far superior to Chicago. Mackinaw is at the _head_ of Lake Michigan--Chicago, at the _foot_. Mackinaw is at the junction of _three_ great lakes; Chicago at the foot of one. Mackinaw will concentrate the navigation of _eighty thousand_ square miles of water _surface_; Chicago of _twenty-four thousand_. Mackinaw is three hundred and fifty miles nearer the Atlantic by water; three hundred miles nearer the upper extremity of the lakes, and as much nearer any of the Eastern Lake ports which are points of distribution. The comparison need be made no further, for whoever looks upon the map will see, that, while Chicago touches one end of a single lake, a world of waters gather round Mackinaw. For an internal water commerce, it has no equal. It will be said, that railroads now carry commerce. This is true, but, railroads do not carry commerce over the surface of lakes, and the multiplication of vessels on the lakes proves that _that_ commerce will ever be great and increasing. But what railroad commerce can be greater than that which will concentrate at Mackinaw, when it connects, in a direct line, not only with the cities of the Ohio Valley, but with those of the far South. To Cincinnati, to Louisville, to Charleston, Savannah, and Pensacola, will the cars move, laden with the people and products of the North. Lastly, neither Chicago nor any other point can be superior to Mackinaw in the elements necessary to support manufactures, the great support of cities, these elements we have already exhibited in detail. Copper, iron, lead, coal, wood, timber, bread, in fine, everything which can feed machinery, give material for its work, or feed the people who gather in the great workshops of industry, and distribute the products of labor. Here materials all lie near enough for the purposes of either work or distribution. Birmingham, Manchester, Lyons, and Cincinnati, have their materials no nearer. There, if anywhere, is a site peculiarly proper for a manufacturing town.