This map illustrates the natural region, or subregion of southwestern Ontario, bounded by Georgian Bay, Lake Huron, the St. Clair and Detroit Rivers, Lake Erie and the Niagara Escarpment. By the mid-1830s London had surpassed St. Thomas as the principal settlement and from then on was the acknowledged metropolitan centre within the region. Note the location of the old capital at Vittoria, beside Lake Erie, and the relationship between London and Hamilton, which was the line of the main trade route.
