packet boat

The canal currently has an 1870s reproduction packet boat at Great Falls, in Potomac, Md., and 1890s reproduction launches in Williamsport.

It’s named after the packet boats that used to ply the Erie Canal, which cuts through Lockport.

Teams of horses and mules would pull canal packet boats along the towpaths of the canal as regular traffic flowed from Richmond to Lynchburg and as far west as Buchanan.

It’s not Bangladesh, where overcrowded packet boats heave up and down the riverine plains and cavalier crews play fast and loose with passenger safety at the cost of many lives each year.

Hence, any vessel; usually with some epithet descriptive of its use or mode of propulsion; as, pilot boat, packet boat, passage boat, advice boat, etc.