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passed up on Sunday and were the first boats ofthe season upbound. They struck a field ofice about seventy miles inlength at the lower end ofLake Erie, but had clear water the rest ofthe way. All the boats left Buffalo atthe same time with the tug Cascade breaking away through the ice until clear water was reached. They had clear water until reaching St. Mary's River, when they stuck fast in the ice and will have toremain there aweek, probably. STEAMER Z,Z?VCQ£,A^BURNED.-Fire broke out in the steamer Lincoln at her moorings. King's dock. Sandwich, Thursday night oflast week and burned tiiat passenger steamer to the water's edge. The fire, which had its commencement mthe hold of the craft, was not noticed until it had got beyond control and the owners are puzzled as to its origin. The steamerErin, which was moored in the near ^cimty ofthe bumed boat, received ascorching and would have suffered alike fate but for the timely arrival ofthe fire tug Detroit. ^e Lincoln was purchased by the Pelee Navigation Co., comprised ofPelee ofSault Ste. Marie and was placed tL M up-the-river route in May of that year JdL in response togitation on the island for aboat to replace the Imperial. She was 133 feet lone 45 to facommodious craft and was agreat convenienceto the islmdere. The Township ofPelee loaned the company $7000 when the boat wa.p«fte money,0 be returned in seven annual paienZr^tSteeT therhewTr'II "^ 'own^Wp will not lose anything asMd afirst hen on the msurance. the amount of which, we undeSd." lona a""" '<>' since coming here. In the snring ofimshe was <mt mto by floating ice at her moorings in Windsor and sunk Sinn quite aloss to her owners to raise, repair and repL. ® At "ffowmS'otheburningoftheimco/n April 21,1905 TIMECRAFT.-(James Hedley. The Monetary Times)-kfler the n .. li- 1 h 1 1 J 1 1 f ,y references last week toearlier steamers ontheGreat Lakes it may now be found of interest to recall the sailing craft of an earlier day. The sailing fleet of 1850 and thereabout was composed ofcanal-sized vessels, fore-and-aft schooners orthree- and-afters, carrying 12,000 to 18,000 bushels ofgrain. When a dozen years had passed and the rapidly settling prairie lands ofthe Westem states were pouring then- crops into Chicago and Milwaukee harbors, the average size of lake vessels increased, as did their symmetry and the variety of their rig, until about 1865 or 1870 the writer remembers thesensation caused bythe advent ofthe "Cream City" a Milwaukee three-master, capable ofcarrying 72,000 bushels ofgrain, atthat time aphenomenal cargo. It was in the sixties, by the way, that the first schooner sailed from Chicago for Liverpool, the "Golden Harvest," laden with wheat, followed shortly by another with an equally fancifiil name and alike decorated with flags and streamers as she came gaily down the River Detroit. But these had been anticipated, ifImistake not, by the schooners "Thomas F. ParF'and "E.S. Adams," which were despatched by their owner, the late John MacLeod, M.P. for Essex, laden with grain and timber, respectively, and destined for an English port to bring back thence salt and other merchandise. These lengthy voyages, however, did not pay and were abandoned after brief trial. The commander of the first-named of the above Canadian vessels. Captain John Duncanson, died in Amherstburg only last month, aged over seventy.' Much did the Old Country salts ofthat day marvel at the daring ofnavigators who would bring a vessel firom the interior of"America" to the Mersey or the Clyde drawing only nine or ten feet water. "It was tempting Providence," they said. The condition of the Rivers St. Clair and Detroit in those days, parts of whose channels afforded no more than nine to ten feet water, precluded, however, deeper draught vessels. Years were to pass before Uncle Sam extended his millions to the Lime-Kiln Crossing and the Flats Canal and the Sault River to make a miiform twenty-foot channel or before Johnnie Canuck deepened the St. Lawrence Canals to fourteen feet on the mitre sill or the Welland to the same. Meanwhile, the designers of the lake ports were using their skill in design to produce ships that should combine carrjdng capacity with speed. The shipbuilders on the New York side ofLake Erie had especial repute as modelling swift sailors. The shipyards at Dunkirk, Conneaut, Lorain, Ashtabula and Sandusky tumed out sailing vessels that Actuallyhe was 82 years old.