The low ground between it and the shore, and between the Niagara escarpment and the water on the Canadian shore, is a celebrated fruit growing district, covered with vineyards, peach, apple and pear orchards and fruit farms. The Niagara river is the main feeder of the lake; the other largest rivers emptying into the lake are the Genesee, Oswego and Black from the south side, and the Trent, which discharges into the upper end of the bay of Quinte, a picturesque inlet 70 m.
The Murray canal, opened for traffic on the 14th of April 1890, extends from Presqu'ile bay, on the north of the lake, to the head of the bay of Quinte, and enables vessels to avoid 70 m.
Thereafter for almost twenty years, Ontario was traversed only by wandering bands of trappers, chiefly belonging to the Hudson's Bay Company; but in 1782 bands of American loyalists began to occupy the fertile country along the Bay of Quinte, and in the Niagara peninsula, the first settlement being made in 1782 at Kingston.
But the strongest argument, and one which has never been attacked by authorities really competent to judge, is that the "griffe de l'aigle" is on the book, and that no known author of the time except Rabelais was capable of writing the passage about the Chats fourres, the better part of the history of Queen Whims (La Quinte) and her court, and the conclusion giving the Oracle of the Bottle.
The Trent valley canal connects Georgian Bay with the Bay of Quinte and Lake Ontario, and a canal system has long been projected to Montreal by way of the French and Ottawa rivers and Lake Nipissing.
