1 HE preceding Iheets having been fub- mitted to my friend Mr. Charles Thomp- fon, Secretary of Congrefs, he has furniflied me with the following obfervations, which have too much merit not to be com- municated.
(A.) p. 31. Befides the three channels of communication mentioned between the weftern waters and the Atlantic, there are two others to which the Pennfylvanians are turning their attention; one from Prefque- Ifle, on Lake Erie, to Le Boeuf, down the Alleghaney to Kifkiminitas, then up the Kifkiminitas, and from thence, by a fmall portage, to Juniata, which falls into the Suf- quehanna: the other from Lake Ontario to the Eaft Branch of the Delaware, and down that to Philadelphia. Both thefe are faid to be very prafticable: and, confidering the enterprifing temper of the Pennfylva- nians, and particularly of the merchants of Philadelphia, whofe objeft is concentered in promoting the commerce and trade of one city, it is not improbable but one or both of thefe communications will be opened and improved.
(B.) p. 36. The refleftions I was led into on viewing this paflage of the Patowmac through the Blue ridge were, that this country muft have fufFered fome violent convulfion, and that the face of it muft have been changed from what it probably w^as fome centuries ago: that the broken and ragged faces of the mountain on each fide the river; the tremendous rocks, which are left with one end fixed in the precipice, and the other jutting out, and feemingly ready to fall for want of fupport, the bed of the river for feveral miles below ob- ftrufted, and filled with the loofe ftones carried from this mound; in (hort, every thing on which you caft your eye evidently demonftrates a difrupture and breach in the mountain, and that, before this happened, what is now a fruitful vale,