Lawrence and Great Lakes from that of the Mississippi and the Hudson made feasible the succession of canals completing the “Great Belt” of inland navigation from St. Lawrence and New York bays to the Gulf.  Albert Gallatin’s famous report of 1808[673] pointed out the adaptation of the three low divides to canal communication; but long before this, every line of possible canoe travel by river and portage over swamp or lake-dotted watershed had been used by savages, white explorers and French voyageurs, from Lake Champlain to Lake Winnebago, so that the canal engineer had only to select from the numerous portage paths already beaten out by the moccasined feet of Indian or fur-trader.

[Sidenote:  Rivers and railroads.]

The cheapness and ease of river travel have tended to check or delay the construction of highroads and railways, where facilities for inland navigation have been abundant, and later to regulate railway freight charges.  Conversely, riverless lands have everywhere experienced an exaggerated and precocious railroad development, and have suffered from its monopoly of transportation.  Even canals have in most lands had a far earlier date than paved highroads.  This has been true of Spain, France, Holland, and England.[674] In the Hoang-ho Valley of northern China where waterways are restricted, owing to the rapid current and shallowness of this river, highroads are comparatively common; but they are very rare in central and southern China where navigable rivers and canals abound.[675] New England, owing to its lack of inland navigation, was the first part of the United States to develop a complete system of turnpikes and later of railroads.  On the other hand, the great river valleys of America have generally slighted the highroad phase of communication, and slowly passed to that of railroads.  The abundance of natural waterways in Russia—­51,800 miles including canals—­has contributed to the retardation of railroad construction.[676] The same thing is true in the Netherlands, where 4875 miles (7863 kilometers) of navigable waterways[677] in an area of only 12,870 square miles (33,000 square kilometers) have kept the railroads down to a paltry 1818 miles (2931 kilometers); but smaller Belgium, commanding only 1375 miles (3314 kilometers) of waterway and stimulated further by a remarkable industrial and commercial development, has constructed 4228 miles (6819 kilometers) of railroad.

[Sidenote:  Relation of rivers to railroads in recent colonial lands.]

If we compare the countries of Central and South America, where railroads are still mere adjuncts of river and coastwise routes, a stage of development prevalent in the United States till 1858, we find an unmistakable relation between navigable waterways and railroad mileage.  The countries with ample or considerable river communication, like Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia and Paraguay, are all relatively slow in laying railroads as compared with Mexico and Argentine, even when allowance is