As early as the year 1641 a few Jesuit missionaries and fur-traders had reached the rock-bound shores of Lake Superior in their canoes, but it is not until some years later that history makes us acquainted with the first sailing vessels that appeared on the lakes. One of the earliest of these was a schooner of ten tons, built near where Kingston now is by the enterprising French adventurer, La Salle, who had been appointed Governor of Fort Frontenac, and had a roving commission to explore the western wilds of North America. Accompanied by the famous Recollet Father, Hennepin, and some thirty others, La Salle set sail on the 10th of November, 1678, for the head of Lake Ontario. Finding his further passage barred by the Falls of Niagara, he wintered in that neighbourhood and had another vessel built at Cayuga Creek, a few miles above the Falls. This vessel, which he named the _Griffin_, of about sixty tons burthen, was launched in May, 1679, and was probably the first to navigate the upper lakes. On the 7th of August the _Griffin_, equipped with seven guns and a diversity of small arms and freighted with a load of goods, sailed away for Detroit and parts unknown. The Detroit River was reached in a few days, and Green Bay—at the head of Lake Huron—some time in September, when she was loaded with furs and despatched on her return voyage to Niagara, which, however, she never reached, the vessel and cargo having been totally lost on the way. For many years after the loss of the _Griffin_ the navigation of the lakes seems to have been chiefly confined to bateaux, and up to 1756 the construction and use of sailing vessels was largely, if not entirely, confined to Lake Ontario. The first American vessel built on Lake Erie was the schooner _Washington_, built near Erie, Pa., in 1797. After plying on Lake Erie one season, she was sold to a Canadian and carried on wheels around the Falls to Lake Ontario, where she sailed from Queenston for Kingston in 1798 as a British vessel, under the name of _Lady Washington_. In 1816 the whole sailing tonnage on Lake Erie was only 2,067 tons. In 1818 the fleet on Lake Ontario numbered about sixty vessels.