before many years a prosperous city. By the middle of the nineteenth century Duluth, the most remote gateway of the Great Lakes, had begun its history as a town. In 1825 Henry Clay, speaking on the bill to grant lands for the building of the Soo Canal, had mentioned these great waterways as “beyond the furthest bounds of civilization,--if not in the moon.” Six years later Edward Everett enunciated the principle of the future, declaring that “intercourse between the mighty interior West and the seacoast is the great principle of our commercial prosperity.” The cities of the Great Lakes--Buffalo, Cleveland, Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, and Duluth--recognized their opportunity to become the connecting links in this inevitable chain of intercourse. Their sites were strategic, but they had much to do to meet the demands of the rapidly increasing commerce. Their citizens were alert and eager to fulfil these demands. Buffalo gained her position as the terminus of the Erie Canal because public-spirited citizens gave bonds that her harbor should be improved. Every city spent large sums in constructing and improving her natural facilities. The fresh needs of every new decade have been met, and to-day the lake system is on the eve of even greater achievements. These cities have a background of which they may well be proud,--a background of men who, in pioneer times of hardship and poverty, were men of prescience, of courage, and of action. To-day the six cities have a population of nearly four million people. United by their common bond of harborage on the Great Lakes, but situated in six states of the Union, these cities and their smaller neighbors are taking a prominent part in the nation. Men of vision and of energy still walk their streets, planning and guiding their present and future. Their sites are being beautified and improved; their social and economic problems are being solved; and they are keeping themselves fit gateways for the prosperous states they represent on the great inland seas of North America. CHAPTER XVIII THE STORY OF A ROAD