from the Providence Institution for Savings "The Old Stone Bank" History of Rhode Island, Vol. III by John Williams Haley, "The Rhode Island Historian" published by Providence Institution for Savings, 1939. pp. 194 - 196: "THE BLACKSTONE CANAL. On the morning of July 1, 1828, the pages of the 'Rhode Island American', a local newspaper, carried the following story: 'At about 10 o'clock in the morning, the 'Lady Carrington' started from the first lock above the tide water (opposite the jail), on Canal Street. A salute of artillery announced her departure, seconded by the cheers of those on board, and the shouts of hundreds of spectators who crowded the banks and surrounding eminences to witness this novel spectacle. The boat is of the largest size that can be admitted into the locks, being about seventy feet long, nineteen and a half wide, and as high as will admit of a safe passage under the bridges crossing the canal. She is covered on the top, having below a cabin nearly the whole extent of the boat, conveniently and neatly arranged. Her draft, when filled with passengers, does not exceed eight or nine inches. Among the passengers were His Excellency the Governor, two of the Rhode Island Canal Commissioners, and about fifty citizens. The boat was drawn up the Canal by a tow-line attached to two horses that travelled with rapidity on the straight levels (of which there are some very beautiful ones before you come to the Blackstone River). She might be conveyed with ease at the rate of four or five miles per hour. 'Between the water and the Albion Factory, nine granite locks, of the most substantial masonry, were passed. Just before entering Scott's Pond, a beautiful basin of deep water, there are three continuous locks, by which you ascend an elevation of twenty-four feet. The novelty of ascending and descending from the different levels was particularly gratifying to those who had never before witnessed the operation. The boat glides into a solid iron box (so to speak) in which she is enclosed by the shutting of the folding gates. The water is then admitted through wickets in the upper gates, and the boat is rapidly raised to the level she is to ascend; the upper gates are then opened and she passes on." continued in part 2.