The main line, from Albany, on the Hudson, to Buffalo, on Lake Erie, measures 363 miles in length, and cost $7,143,789. The Champlain, Oswego, Chemung, Cayuga, and Crooked Lake canals, and some others, join the main line, and, including these branch lines, it measures 543 miles in length, and cost upward of $11,500,000. This canal was originally 40 feet in breadth at the water line, 28 feet at the bottom, and 4 feet in depth. Its dimensions proved too small for the extensive trade which it had to support, and the depth of water was increased to 7 feet, and the extreme breadth of the canal to 60 feet. There are 84 locks on the main line. These locks, originally 90 feet in length and 15 in breadth, and with an average lift of 8 feet 2 inches, have since been much enlarged. The total rise and fall is 692 feet. The towpath is elevated 4 feet above the level of the water, and is 10 feet in breadth. At Lockport the canal descends 60 feet by means of 5 locks excavated in solid rock, and afterward proceeds on a uniform level for a distance of 63 miles to the Genesee River, over which it is carried on an aqueduct having 9 arches of 50 feet span each. Eight and a half miles from this point it passes over the Cayuga marsh, on an embankment 2 miles in length, and in some places 70 feet in height. At Syracuse, the "long level" commences, which extends for a distance of 69½ miles to Frankfort, without an intervening lock. After leaving Frankfort, the canal crosses the river Mohawk, first by an aqueduct 748 feet in length, supported on 16 piers, elevated 25 feet above the surface of the river, and afterward by another aqueduct 1,188 feet in length, and emerges into the Hudson at Albany. This great work was finished in 1825, and its completion was the occasion of great public rejoicing. The same year that the Erie Canal was begun, ground was broken for a canal from Lake Champlain to the Hudson, sixty-three miles in length. This work was completed in 1823.