world’s metropolis in the list of the great harbours of the world? And how many know, as well, that within a single night’s ride of the city of Buffalo--within a radius of less than five hundred miles--live sixty per cent. of the total population of North America? [Illustration: A Bird’s-eye View of the Harbour of Duluth, Taken from the Hill. From a Photograph by Maher, Duluth. ] These are only two of the remarkable facts about Buffalo and Duluth, the Alpha and Omega of the Inland Seas. That they are now two of the greatest freight-distributing points in the United States is shown by figures; that within the next generation they will become the two greatest distributing cities in the world is almost a certainty. It is not only Lake commerce that assures their destinies. Logically, they are situated to rule the world of commerce in the United States. Duluth is approximately midway in the continent, with a clear waterway soon to reach to the ocean, and with the great West behind her already webbed, with Duluth as the centre, by thirty-seven thousand miles of rail; and Buffalo, with sixty million people within five hundred miles of her City Hall, with fifteen great trunk-lines entering the city, with the greatest electrical power of the age at her doors, with “one hand on the ocean and the other on the Inland Seas,” holds a position which no other city can ever hope to attain. According to H. C. Elwood, Chairman of the Transportation Committee of the Chamber of Commerce of Buffalo, the combined rail and water tonnage of that city is not exceeded by that of any other city in the United States, with the exception of Pittsburg. And the story of Buffalo’s commerce has just begun. In 1885, Buffalo’s total tonnage of iron ore received by Lake was only a little more than eight thousand,--less than the single cargo carried by one of the great freighters of the Inland Seas to-day! Last year it was five and a half millions. The position that both Buffalo and Duluth hold in the commerce of the Lakes is briefly told in figures. Of the total tonnage of ninety-seven million carried on the Lakes in 1907, more than fourteen and a half million were registered at Buffalo and thirty-five million at Duluth-Superior. In other words, over a half of the total tonnage of the Lakes passed in or out of these two great doors of the Inland Seas in 1907.