Mississippi. The proportions of these four grand

natural departments are thus estimated :

The whole territory is a little larger than Europe to the westward of Russia. The Atlantic States are about equal to Spain and France united. The eastern division, which is rapidly advancing in culture and civilization, contains a superficial extent equal to that of Mexico; while the western, which is almost entirely wild and unpeopled, is a territory as large as that of the Republic of Colombia.*

The natural and political boundaries of the United States, eastward and westward, are now fixed and incontestable. On the south-east also, the Gulf of Mexico forms a limit not less determinate. On the south-west, the boundary (according to the treaty with Spain, ratified in 1821) extends from the Gulf of Mexico along the western bank of the Sabine river to latitude 32°; thence, by a line due N. to the river Arkansas, and along the southern bank of that river to its source; and finally, from a point in the Rocky Mountains in latitude 42° N., longitude 108° W., it passes along the forty-second parallel to the Pacific Ocean. On the side of the British possessions, the line of demarcation has never been finally adjusted.

Humboldt's Personal Narrative, vol. vi. pp. 179–181.

On the north-east, a conventional line, drawn from the mouth of the St. Croix to the forty-eighth parallel, separates the American State of Maine from New Brunswick, embracing the head waters of the river St. John. A part of this tract, however, is claimed by the British Government; and the question remains for arbitration.* From this extreme northern point, the frontier line passes, in a south-westerly direction, along the ridge of mountains to the fortyfifth parallel, and is continued along that parallel till it strikes the river St. Lawrence 120 miles below Lake Ontario. It then proceeds up that river, and through the great lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron, and Superior ; whence it runs along the river La Pluie, to the most north-western point of the Lake of the Woods. From long. 95° W., it passes along the forty-ninth parallel to the Rocky Mountains. On the western side of that

* Several distinct questions of boundary remained to be determined by Commissioners on both sides, in pursuance of the provisions of the Treaty of Ghent. The first related to the islands in Passamaquoddy Bay, of which the decision of the Commissioners (Nov. 24, 1817) assigned to the United States, Moose Island, Dudley Island, and Frederic Island, and to Great Britain, all the other islands in the Bay. A more important question respects the boundary between the States of Maine and Vermont and the British territory. It is contended on the part of the American Government, that "so much of the line established prior to the year 1776, as being in the latitude of 45°, and the boundary between the then provinces of New York and Quebec, as had been actually surveyed prior to that year, under the joint authority of the two provinces," ought still to remain the boundary, notwithstanding the subsequent provisions of the Treaty of Ghent. There is a question also respecting the construction of the terms of that treaty, as regards the "north-west angle of Nova Scotia," from which the boundary was to be drawn. The territory claimed by the British Government, as belonging to New Brunswick, is something under 7,000,000 acres. In the Quarterly Review, it is erroneously stated at 10,000,000 of square miles!-See North American Review, April 1828, Art. 5, North-eastern Boundary. Ib. Oct. 1828, Art. 11.

range, the Americans lay claim to the country between the forty-second and the forty-ninth parallels; * but a counter claim has been made by the British Government to the territory near the mouth of the Colombia river, and the question is still pending. The American Government has proposed to continue the boundary along the parallel of 49°; and should that line strike the navigable waters of the Colombia, they have offered to make the navigation of that river free to the British. This arrangement, though not hitherto acceded to, will probably be the issue.†

About three-fourths of North America are still in possession of the aboriginal tribes. "If we begin on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in latitude 30° N., and draw a line along that parallel till it strikes the meridian of 94° W., and then due N. along that meri, dian to the parallel of 47° N., and thence due E. along that parallel to the Atlantic Ocean,-nearly all the continent south and east of this line is in the possession of the whites; while the Indians possess nearly all to the north and west of this line. That is to say, the Indians still own all the northern part of what has been termed Spanish America, the western part of the United States, and nearly the whole of British America." From the eastern division of the United States, they are fast disappearing. Dr. Morse states, as the result of his inquiries, that there were in 1822,

* M. Malte Brun states, that, "on the west side of the mountains, the Americans have an unquestioned claim to the country from the 42nd to the 49th parallel, and a more doubtful claim, which is disputed by Russia, to the country from the 49th to the 60th parallel."-vol. v. p. 151. This representation disposes of the British claims rather too summarily.

+ See American Review, No. Ixi. pp. 501-512.

+ Carey and Lea's Atlas, No. 3.

only 8387 Indians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania; 120,283 in the country east of the Mississippi; and about 470,000 all together in the whole territory of the United States. Within the British American dominions, it has been estimated, that the Indians number 9500 warriors, or 34,550 souls. In New Mexico and New California, where the population is only in the proportion of seven inha

* Malte Brun, vol. v. pp. 151, 223. The following are the details of the latest calculation furnished by Dr. Morse :

In a message communicated to the Senate by the President of the United States in 1825, the total number of Chippewas and Ottowas inhabiting the territory of Michigan, is stated at 18,473; and in an official report made the year before, the number of Chippewas inhabiting the southern shores of Lake Superior and the sources of the Mississippi, is stated at 7324. This tribe alone, therefore, must still amount to nearly 30,000. The Sioux are estimated by Pike at 21,675. The Six Nations were reduced, in 1814, to 6330. The Creeks, Choctaws, Chickasaws, and Cherokees together amounted to somewhat less than 50,000. Of the western tribes, the most numerous are the Osages, the Pawnees, and the Ietans and Padoucas.-Warden, vol. iii. pp. 527-566. James, vol. ii. p. 134. Pike, pp. 134, 258. North American Review, No. lx. pp. 97, 98. Hodgson's Letters from N. Amer. vol. ii. p. 394.

† Warden, vol. iii. p. 566. This estimate is from the report of Mr. John F. Schermerhorn, who supposes the boundary line between the United States and the British possessions to run along the ridge which separates the waters of the Mississippi from those that flow into Lake Winnipeg and the Saskatchiwine river.

bitants to a square league, and in the mountainous territory of Mapimi, occupied by the Appaches, the Indians may amount to between 60,000 and 70,000 souls. Their total numbers, therefore, may be roughly estimated at rather more than half a million, or less than 600,000 souls. To the west of the Mississippi, the population of the United States is only eight persons to the square league.

The aboriginal inhabitants of New England were the great nation of Mohekaneews or Muhheakunnuks, whose language, the Algonquin, was spoken by all the tribes between the Potowmac and the St. Lawrence, the Mississippi and the Atlantic, with the exception of the Iroquois, who were a distinct race of intrusive conquerors.* Under the appellation of Chippeways, tribes of this same great family are scattered over the north-west territory of the United States, from the western side of Lake Huron to the sources of the Mississippi, round the Red Lake, and on the Red River of Lake Winipeg. The Chippewa or Algonquin language, which Major Pike characterises as one of the most copious and sonorous of all the North American dialects, serves as the medium of communication in great national conferences, as well as in all mercantile transactions, among all except the Sioux tribes, from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the Lake just mentioned. The Delaware

or Len.

Dwight, vol. i. pp. 85, 86; 102. To this family, the learned Writer states, belonged the Pequods in Connecticut; the Narrhagansetts in Rhode Island; the Wampanoags, Nipnets or Nipmuks, Nashuas, and Stockbridge Indians in Massachusetts; the Pigwacket and Coos Indians in New Hampshire; the Tarrateens, Abenaquis, and Aberginians in Maine. See also North American Review, No. lxiii. p. 361.

† Pike, p. 133. The Algonquins Proper, from which tribe the language of the Chippeways derives its name, are dispersed along the northern sides of Lakes Ontario and Erie.-Pike, p. 131.