of the United States of North America, situated on the river of the same name, which separates it on the S. and S.E. from Kentucky and Virginia; on the E. it has Pennsylvania; N., Lakes Erie and Michigan; and on the W., Indiana. It has an area of 39,961 square miles, being somewhat greater than that of the kingdom of Portugal; and, in all respects, it is one of the most important states of the valley of the Mississippi or of the American Union.

The face of the country is delightfully varied, and presents a table-land from 600 to 1000 feet above the level of the sea. A ridge of high lands divides the waters flowing north into Lake Erie from those flowing south into the aspect Ohio. There is a ridge crossing the state in the latitude of Columbus, south of which the surface is diversified by hills and valleys. Swamps and morasses occasionally occur, forming, however, only a twentieth part of the whole surface. The river-bottoms are extensive and very fertile. Prairies are numerous; but the country was originally covered with magnificent forests, which are still far from being extinct.

The Ohio River and Lake Erie receive the waters of the state. Those streams which enter into the Ohio are the Muskingum, Hockhocking, Scioto, Miami, &c. The Muskingum is navigable 75 miles for steamers, and for small boats nearly to its source. The Hockhocking courses through a hilly and beautiful country, and is a deep and narrow stream. The Scioto can be ascended to nearly its source, and has many thriving towns on its banks. Its valley is wide and fertile. The Little Miami is less adapted to navigation than to mill-sites. The Big Miami enters the Ohio in the S.W. corner of the state, after a course of 100 miles. The northern rivers are the Maumee, Sandusky, Cuyahoga, which are in part navigable, but furnish the most abundant water-power for manufacturing purposes. The other streams are the Portage, Black, Rocky, Vermillion, &c.

Over nearly the entire surface of the state there lies a deposit of various thickness, known by the name of alluvium, believed to have been made by currents of water. One of the most important strata is a transition limestone, equivalent to the mountain limestone of Europe. It crops out in places, forming, at small cost, a valuable building material. East of the Huron and Olantangy rivers the lime stratum dips under one of shale or clay-slats; farther east this passes under a stratum of sandstone; still farther, the sandstone is overlaid by a conglomerate, and then by the lower coal series; and, finally, the upper coal series passes beyond the eastern and south-eastern boundary of the state. One-third of Ohio is therefore within the great coal basin, of which Wheeling, Virginia, is the centre. In several of the southern counties are extensive beds of the best iron. In Western Ohio are found gypsum, salt, and lead. It is estimated that the beds of workable coal would be sufficient to last 10,000 years, supposing Ohio to use as much as is now used in England and Wales. By the census of 1850, it appears that Ohio produced as follows:

| Establishments | Capital | Value of products | |---------------|---------|------------------| | Pig iron | 35 | L313,123 | L261,632 | | Iron castings | 183 | 429,923 | 639,444 | | Wrought iron | 6 | 34,331 | 28,632 | | Salt | 32 | 39,320 | 27,558 |

The county of Tuscarawas is 550 square miles in extent, and in every part of it, it is said, coal may be found. Professor Mather, in his report on the geology of the state, estimates the quantity of coal in this county alone at 80,000 millions of bushels! In 1840 the production of coal in Ohio is stated at 2,382,368 bushels, in 1848 at 6,538,968, in 1857 at 40,000,000 bushels; and the production of iron has swelled to the aggregate of 100,000 tons. The coal is bituminous. A belt of ironstone, averaging 12 miles in width, is 100 miles or more in length. Salt springs are numerous, and salt-works are frequent and successful. Marble, freestone, and gypsum occur.

Ohio is noted for the fertility of its soil. Where the transition lime rock is the upper stratum, as it is in nearly half the state, the soil is remarkably adapted to wheat and grass; and, indeed, seven-eighths of the state are considered well adapted to the growth of wheat. What is known as the Connecticut Reserve, having a shale and sandstone basis, is less fertile, yet producing fruits and grains suitable to the climate. About 25,000,000 acres of land in the state could be brought into cultivation, and would support many millions of inhabitants.

On account of its elevation, the climate of Ohio is several degrees lower in average temperature than on the same parallel in the Atlantic states. The summer is subject to tornadoes, but the autumn is always serene and pleasant, though the winters are occasionally severe. Along the valley of the Ohio the temperature is milder than in the interior, but fever and ague prevail to some extent in this section. The climate otherwise is very healthy,—as much so as that of the majority of the states.

In the forests are found black walnut, oak, hickory, sugar and other maple, beech, poplar, ash, sycamore, pawpaw, buckeye, cherry, dogwood, elm, hornbeam. The cypress is almost the only evergreen, and it is but scanty. Medicinal roots, such as ginseng, valerian, columbo, snake-root, blood-root, &c., are found. Fish and game are abundant.

At the last federal census (1850), it appeared that there were in Ohio 143,807 farms, having under cultivation about 10,000,000 of acres, with about 8,000,000 more inclosed, but unimproved. The average number of acres to each farm was 125; average value of farm, L.518; and of farming implements, L.37. Gross value of all the farms in the state, with their implements and machinery, L.77,500,000. The number of horses, asses, and mules, was 466,820; milch cows, 544,490; working oxen, 65,381; sheep, 3,942,929; and swine, 1,964,770. The total value of live stock was L.9,192,027; of animals slaughtered, L.1,549,839. The quantity of wheat raised was 14,487,351 bushels; of rye, 423,918; oats, 13,472,000; Indian corn, 59,078,695; potatoes, 5,245,760; barley, 212,440; buck-wheat, 638,060; hay, 1,443,142 tons; maple sugar, 4,588,000 lb.; tobacco, 10,454,449; wool, 10,196,371; silk cocoons, 1,552; and wine, 11,524 gallons.

Only another of the United States exceeded Ohio in the production of wheat. The other agricultural products are hops; clover and grass seed; pease and beans; market, nursery, and orchard products; flax seed, flax, and hemp. The produce of the vineyards is large, and commands a market in all parts of the Union.

the possession of coal and iron, may be said to have few rivals in capacity as a manufacturing state, when the full fruition of her reasonable hopes are realized. In 1850, she manufactured cotton goods to the value of L.231,462; pig-iron to about the same amount; castings, L.639,353; wrought-iron, L.266,632. She distilled or brewed nearly 100,000 barrels of ale, and 12,000,000 gallons of whisky, &c. The gross statistics of all the manufactures are as follows:—Establishments, 10,622; capital, L.6,045,733; raw material used, L.7,224,586; hands employed, 51,500; wages paid, L.2,805,758; annual product, L.13,051,507.

Ohio being an inland state, must show very low figures in the foreign commerce of the Union. For the inland or home trade she enjoys advantages on account of her position with reference to the Ohio, the Mississippi, and the lakes, together with her great works of internal improvements, enjoyed by few, if any, of the other states. One of her leading authorities says, at the close of 1857, that her production of corn has reached to 90,000,000 bushels, and of wheat to 22,000,000. He estimates the total agricultural, mining, and manufacturing produce of Ohio for that year at L.40,800,000; and says that Ohio is now worth L.200,000,000, and that three-fourths of it have been made out of the profits of labour applied in the industrial pursuits. She exports L.12,500,000 of products, besides enjoying the commerce of her neighbours.

The annual statement of commerce, published at Cincinnati, shows that the total produce received at that city in 1856-57 reached L.16,000,444; and that the exports were L.11,800,447. In the city and vicinity 500,000 barrels of whisky are distilled, consuming 8,000,000 bushels of corn and other grain. Number of hogs packed, 344,512. The city is increasing as a wheat, flour, and tobacco mart. Over 500,000 gallons of wine are produced from the vineyards in the vicinity, giving employment to a large number of persons, and producing large returns to capital.

The Ohio Canal was completed in 1832, from the Ohio Internal River to Lake Erie, 307 miles. Its branches or feeders improve, —the Columbus branch, 10 miles in length; the Lancaster branch, 9 miles; the Athens extension to Hocking, a prolongation of the Lancaster, 56 miles; the Zanesville branch, of 14 miles, connects the Ohio Canal with the Muskingum improvement, by which another channel is opened to the Ohio River at Marietta; the Walhonding branch is 25 miles in length.

The Miami Canal connects Cincinnati with Lake Erie, 270 miles, and was completed in 1832, with several branches. The whole number of miles of canals constructed by the state is 827, at a cost of over L.3,000,000. The other canals, which are private property, are the Sandy and Beaver, 76 miles, extending from the Ohio Canal to the Ohio River, at the mouth of the Beaver; the Mahoning Canal, 77 miles. The canals have, however, in part yielded to the railroads, and are in general far from being works of the first class.

The oldest railroads are the Little Miami, from Cincinnati to Springfield, 84 miles; the Mad River, from Lake Erie to Springfield, 134 miles; the Mansfield and Sandusky; the Lake Erie and Kalamazoo, from Toledo, on Lake Erie, to Adrian, forming a junction with the Michigan Southern Road, to which it forms an outlet to the roads of Ohio, 35 miles. It would occupy too much space, however, to enter into a detail of the numerous railroad routes now in operation in Ohio. They constitute several great lines, running through the States from east to west, and from north to south, bringing nearly every county and town in its limits within reach of railroad improvement. Perhaps one of the most important of all these great works is the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad, 330 miles in length, which has been lately completed, and connects by a direct route the cities of Cincinnati and St Louis. The railroads in progress or in operation in Ohio, at this time, make up an aggregate length of 3000 miles; the surface of the country being most favourable to their construction. There are no lines of pre-eminent importance, because it is said that trade and commerce are not, as in other states, forced into peculiar channels by the natural configuration of the country.

Among the cities are Cincinnati, which is known as the City "Queen of the West," supposed now to have a population of over 200,000, making it the fifth city of the American Union; Columbus, the capital of the state, is the centre of a rich country, which is daily adding to its opulence and extent; Dayton is at the meeting of various railroad lines, and is therefore accessible from every point; Zanesville, on the Muskingum, is in the midst of a rich and populous valley region; Chillicothe, on the Scioto, is inclosed by picturesque hills; Springfield is at the junction of the Mad River and Lagonda Creek, which affords every variety for mill-sites; Steubenville and Portsmouth are on the Ohio; Sandusky city is on Lake Erie; and Toledo on the Maumee River, at the terminus of the Wabash and Erie Canal.

The amount appropriated for schools in Ohio from the Education, several state funds reached, in 1855, L.544,540. The religious, whole number of common schools was 12,012; number &c. of scholars attending, 357,547 males, and 311,477 females. Total number of school-houses 7830, which had been erected at a cost of L.464,561. There are 91 high schools, having about 4000 scholars; and 88 schools for coloured children, with about the same number of attendants. There were also a large number of German schools, adapted to that class of population.

Twenty-six daily newspapers were printed in 1850, 10 tri-weekly, 201 weekly; total of all classes, 261, printing annually 30,447,407 copies. The total number of libraries, other than private, was 352, having 186,828 volumes. The whole number of paupers reported was but 1673.

There is a lunatic asylum at Columbus, which had at the last statement 261 inmates. Two other institutions of like character have been opened at Newburg and Dayton. The Ohio penitentiary at Columbus has about 600 inmates. A library and schools are attached to the prison, and the convicts are instructed in the elementary branches. The state derives a small revenue from the institution. There is a deaf and dumb asylum, with 148 occupants; and a blind asylum, containing 72.

The value of church property in Ohio, by the census of 1850, was L2,413,812, and the number of the church sittings was 1,457,769; the Methodist being the predominating sect, giving, with the Baptists, one-half of the whole number of seats.

There were, in 1850, 26 colleges, with 3621 pupils; 206 academies and private schools, with 15,052 pupils; 66,020 persons in the state over twenty years of age were incapable of reading and writing, or about 3 per cent. of that class, which compares very favourably with other western states.

Revenue.

The total revenue of the state of Ohio in the year ending with January 1856 was L756,492, and the expenditure L731,681. The state cannot, by its constitution, contract debt for internal improvement. Total debt in 1856, L3,390,334; value of the real estate at the same time, L120,387,191; and of the personal estate, L58,962,250. Total taxes of all sorts, L1,765,520.

History.

After the western exploration of Marquette (1673) from Canada, and the expedition of D'Iberville to the mouth of the Mississippi and up its stream, the French began the construction of forts throughout the extensive region which they embraced. Thus was founded their claim to Ohio; whilst the English, on the other hand, claimed it from grants made by their crown, which extended from sea to sea, and from a cession made by the six nations of Indians, who claimed the entire sovereignty of the Ohio valley. The English Ohio Company having made a settlement on the Great Miami, it was destroyed by the French in 1752, at which time war occurring between the two nations, many hostile expeditions were conducted with different results. The defeat of Braddock was followed by the victories of Dunmore. On the return of peace in 1763, the whole of Canada was ceded to England, and with it all the territory to the east of the Mississippi River. After the War of Independence the whole of the western lands held by the several states were ceded to the federal government. Surveys and sales of these lands being at once made, the Ohio New England Company purchased a tract lying adjacent to the Scioto and Muskingum rivers, where, in 1788, Marietta was begun, the first permanent settlement in Ohio. Governor Arthur St Clair was appointed territorial governor.

In 1787 John Cleves Symmes purchased from Congress a million of acres in Ohio, northward from the Ohio River, and between the two Miamis, in which region was founded the second settlement at Columbia, about five miles distant from the present city of Cincinnati. Mathias Denman purchased for 500 dollars the site on which Cincinnati is built, and the first cabin was erected in 1788. Other settlements immediately followed. The Indians, in despite of all treaty stipulation, continued to harass the settlers. Block-houses were constructed; and in 1789 Fort Washington, as a means of protection, was begun. These aggressions continuing, General Harmer, with 1300 men, marched against the Indian towns, but was compelled to retreat. In 1791 General St Clair, at the head of an army of 3000 men, undertaking a similar enterprise, was attacked by a combination of nearly all the north-western tribes, and after a gallant struggle, sustained a most disastrous defeat. The result of those reverses was severely felt in the settlement, and for some time the tide of emigration actually ceased. In 1794 General Wayne assembled an army at Greenville, and soon obtained a decisive victory over a force of 2000 warriors, at the rapids of the Maumee. Not until the country was laid waste, and forts on every hand were seen springing up, did these hardy warriors abandon their futile struggles. "When we consider," says an authority, "the fierce and unrelenting warfare waged by the Indian tribe upon the white settlements of the West, during thirty-seven years of almost uninterrupted conflict from 1757, when the first white man was killed in Kentucky, down to the period of Wyne's victory, we may form some faint idea of the toil and perils and sufferings of the bold and hardy race of the pioneers who effected the colonization of the Western World. An Indian chief, at the conclusion of a treaty yielding up the right of soil in Kentucky, said to Boone,—Brother, we have given you a fine land, but I think you will have trouble to settle it;" and his prediction was fully verified there and elsewhere."

Constant streams of population began now to pour into Ohio. Connecticut sent many to her reserved tract bordering on Lake Erie. In 1798 the inhabitants of the territory numbered 5000, with eight organized counties. The first meeting of territorial legislature was held in September 1799. William Henry Harrison, then secretary of the territory, and afterwards president of the United States, was at that time elected to Congress. In 1802 the federal government authorized a convention to form a state constitution. It sat at Chillicothe; and Ohio was admitted into the Federal Union soon after. The first legislature met in the same place in 1803; and two years later the United States acquired, by another Indian treaty, the reserve west of the Cuyahoga River, and subsequently the Maumee and Sandusky region. In 1811 the Indians were defeated by General Harrison at Tippecanoe; and in 1816 the seat of government was removed from Chillicothe to Columbus, where it now is.

| Population | |------------| | Whites | 1800 | 1810 | 1820 | 1830 | 1840 | 1850 | | Coloured | | | | | | | | Total | 45,335 | 230,700 | 581,434 | 937,903 | 1,519,467 | 1,980,929 |

Density to the square mile in 1840, 38-02; 1850, 49-55. Of the total population, but 1,219,452 were born in the state, and 538,134 in the other American states; and 218,512 were born in foreign countries. Of these, about 120,000 were of German origin.

river of the United States of North America, is formed by the confluence of the Alleghany and Monongahela, which rise in the Alleghany Mountains, and unite at Pittsburg, in the west of Pennsylvania. It then flows generally towards the S.E., separating the states of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, on the right, from those of Virginia and Kentucky, on the left; and falls into the Mississippi 1216 miles above its mouth; N. Lat. 37° W. Long. 89° 10'. Its whole length is more than 950 miles; but its length in a straight line is not more than 614. At the confluence of the two great branches, the Ohio is somewhat more than 600 yards wide, and it immediately assumes that broad, placid, and beautiful aspect which it maintains to its junction with the Mississippi. Its breadth varies exceedingly, being in some parts 1400 yards, whilst in others it is only 400 yards across. Between Pittsburg and its mouth it is diversified with about 100 considerable islands, besides a great number of tow-heads (or barren sandy islands overgrown with willows) and sand-bars, which in low stages of the water greatly impede navigation. Some of these islands are of exquisite beauty, and afford most lovely situations for retired farms. The passages among them, and the sandbars at their head, are great difficulties in the navigation of the river. Notwithstanding these obstacles, however, it is well adapted for boat navigation, the current being remarkably smooth and gentle, excepting at Louisville in Kentucky, where it is broken by falls, the water running for several miles with great rapidity, although not so much so as to be insurmountable by boats. A canal round these falls, a work of great magnitude and utility, has been completed. The annual range of the Ohio, from low to high water, is about 50 feet; the extreme range is 10 feet more. When lowest it may be forded at several places above Cincinnati. Throughout the year it is subject to sudden and very considerable elevations and depressions. Generally, the navigation is obstructed by floating ice for five or six weeks in winter. When the river is at its mean height, its current is about 3 miles an hour; when higher and rising it is more; and when very low it does not exceed 2 miles an hour. The Ohio and all its tributaries cannot, it is believed, have less than 5000 miles of waters navigable for boats; and taking all circumstances into account, few rivers in the world can vie with it, either in utility or beauty. From its very commencement it affords most delightful prospects. Rivers of a romantic and beautiful character flow into it almost at equal distances, like lateral canals. The aspect of the country on the banks has much grandeur, softness, and variety. Of the rivers and creeks which join it, the following are all navigable by steamboats for considerable distances, viz., the Muskingum, Great Kanawha, Big Sandy, Scioto, Miami, Kentucky, Green, Wabash, Cumberland, and Tennessee. The last is by far the largest and most important tributary of the Ohio, watering considerable portions of Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky. Of creeks and smaller rivers there are probably nearly two hundred which enter the Ohio; but a list of them would only be a dry catalogue of uncouth names. The area watered by the Ohio and its affluents is estimated at 200,000 square miles.