PAPER CANOE MARIA THERESA.--THE START.--THE DESCENT OF THE HUDSON RIVER.--CROSSING THE UPPER BAY OF NEW YORK.--PASSAGE OF THE KILLS.--RARITAN RIVER.--THE CANAL ROUTE FROM NEW BRUNSWICK TO THE DELAWARE RIVER.--FROM BORDENTOWN TO PHILADELPHIA. [Illustration: From Albany to New York City. Route of Paper Canoe MARIA THERESA From Albany to New York City Via Hudson River Followed by N. H. Bishop in 1874 _Copyright, 1878 by Lee & Shepard_] My canoe of the English "Nautilus" type was completed by the middle of October; and on the cold, drizzly morning of the 21st of the same month I embarked in my little fifty-eight pound craft from the landing of the paper-boat manufactory on the river Hudson, two miles above Troy. Mr. George A. Waters put his own canoe into the water, and proposed to escort me a few miles down the river. If I had any misgivings as to the stability of my paper canoe upon entering her for the first time, they were quickly dispelled as I passed the stately Club-house of the Laureates, which contained nearly forty shells, _all_ of paper. The dimensions of the Maria Theresa were: length, fourteen feet; beam, twenty-eight inches; depth, amidships, nine inches; height of bow from horizontal line, twenty-three inches; height of stern, twenty inches. The canoe was one-eighth of an inch in thickness, and weighed fifty-eight pounds. She was fitted with a pair of steel outriggers, which could be easily unshipped and stowed away. The oars[B] were of spruce, seven feet eight inches long, and weighed three pounds and a quarter each. The double paddle, which was seven feet six inches in length, weighed two pounds and a half. The mast and sail--which are of no service on such a miniature vessel, and were soon discarded--weighed six pounds. When I took on board at Philadelphia the canvas deck-cover and the rubber strap which secured it in position, and the outfit,--the cushion, sponge, provision-basket, and a fifteen-pound case of charts,--I found that, with my own weight included (one hundred and thirty pounds), the boat and her cargo, all told, provisioned for a long cruise, fell considerably short of the weight of three Saratoga trunks containing a very modest wardrobe for a lady's four weeks' visit at a fashionable watering-place. The rain ceased, the mists ascended, and the sunlight broke upon us as we swiftly descended upon the current of the Hudson to Albany. The city was reached in an hour and a half. Mr. Waters, pointing his canoe northward, wished me _bon voyage_, and returned to the scene of the triumphs of his patient labors, while I settled down to a steady row southward. At Albany, the capital of the state, which is said to be one hundred and fifty miles distant from New York city, there is a tidal rise and fall of one foot.