The greatest fall of water and rise of the freshet, in this valley, known at Concord, New Hampshire, occurred in August, 1826.  This storm notably caused the land-slide in the Saco valley, which buried the Willey family.  The next was in early October, 1869, which caused the slide of seventy-five acres of land on the western side of Tri-Pyramid Mountain into Mad River, in Waterville.

Messrs. Rand, McNally, and Company, of Chicago, in their Atlas of the World, give data to illustrate the two river systems of the country spoken of.  Names of sixty-seven lakes are given in Maine, and beside these are ponds almost innumerable.  By census statistics given, her reservoir and land areas are as 1 to 13.  New Hampshire is accredited with three hundred and sixty-two lakes and ponds, being as 1 acre to 41 of land.  Vermont has forty-one lakes and ponds, including Lake Champlain, being as 1 acre to 24 of land.  Massachusetts, forty-seven lakes and ponds; Rhode Island, forty-seven; Connecticut, eighteen; New York, two hundred and sixty, beside her great lakes; New Jersey, ten; Pennsylvania (chiefly northeastern portion), fifty-eight; Michigan, ninety-eight lakes, and ponds in great number; Wisconsin, seventy-two lakes, and a large number of ponds; Minnesota, one hundred and forty-two lakes, and ponds innumerable; Dakota, fifteen lakes, and a great number of ponds; and Iowa, forty-eight lakes.

In contrast, Virginia has only Lake Drummond—­really a part of the Dismal Swamp; West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee, none; Indiana, eleven lakes, and Illinois, eight,—­all on northern water-shed.  The Carolinas, Georgia, and Alabama have no reservoirs.  Lagoons exist in the States bordering the Mississippi River and the Gulf, which are filled by the overflow of the rivers.

A consultation of any good atlas of our country will confirm these statements.

The two sections are thus contrasted.  The Northern States have reason to be very thankful for their more equable system, for the motive power its reservoirs furnish, and for exemption from disastrous floods, as well as from cyclones and tornadoes.

* * * * *

THE BOSTON TEA-PARTY.

[This account of the Boston Tea-Party is taken, verbatim, from “The Boston Evening Post, Monday, December 20, 1773.  Thomas and John Fleet, at the Heart and Crown, in Cornhill, Messi’rs Printers.”  It adds another link in the chain of evidence to prove that the patriots were disguised as Indians.—­ED.]

Having accidentally arrived at Boston upon a visit to a Friend the evening before the meeting of the Body of the People on the 29th of November, curiosity, and the pressing invitations of my most kind host, induced me to attend the Meeting.  I must confess that I was most agreeably, and I hope that I shall be forgiven by the People if I say so unexpectedly, entertained and instructed by the regular, reasonable and sensible conduct and expression of the People there collected, that I should rather have entertained an idea of being transported to the British senate than to an adventurous and promiscuous assembly of People of a remote Colony, were I not convinced by the genuine and uncorrupted integrity and manly hardihood of the Rhetoricians of that assembly that they were not yet corrupted by venality or debauched by luxury.