freight, and twenty thousand passengers, passed over the road.
Five years before, this line of passage was an untrodden wilderness. The act authorising the commencement of the work passed the Pennsylvania legislature on the 21st of March, 1831. On the 12th of the next month, the tents of the first working party were pitched at the head of the mountain-branch of the Conemaugh. The party consisted of two engineers, a surveyor, twelve assistants and axemen, and a cook. A track, one hundred and twenty feet wide, overgrown with heavy spruce and hemlock timber, had to be cleared, for a distance of thirty miles. The amount of labour was increased as the work proceeded; and, at one time, as many as two thousand men were employed upon the road. On the 26th of November, 1833, the first car traversed the whole length on the single track that was finished. The canals were then closed for the season; but, during the next March the road was opened for a public highway. In another year the enterprise was completed; and in May 1835, the State furnished the whole motive power. The stupendous work was then in full operation.
Our party (of four, one a child) traversed the entire State from Pittsburg to Philadelphia by canal and rail-road, in four days, at an expense of only forty-two dollars, not including provisions. There was then great competition between the lines of canal-boats. We went by the new line, whose boats were extraordinarily clean, and the table really luxurious. An omnibus, sent from the canal, conveyed us from our hotel at Pittsburg to the boat, at nine in the evening; and we immediately set off. Berths were put up for the ladies of the party in the ladies' dressing-room, and removed during the day. We were called early, and breakfast dispatched before the heat grew oppressive; but, though it was now the middle of July, I could not remain in the shade of the cabin: the scenery, during our whole course, was so beautiful. Umbrella and fan made the heat endurable on deck, except for the two hours nearest to noon. The only great inconvenience was the having to remember perpetually to avoid the low bridges, which we passed, on an average, every quarter of an hour. When we were all together, this was little of an annoyance; for one or another was sure to remember to give warning; but a solitary person, reading or in reverie, is really in danger. We heard of two cases of young ladies, reading, who had been crushed to death: and we prohibited books upon deck. Charley thought the commotion caused on our approach to a bridge the best part of our amusement; and he was heard to complain sometimes that it was very long since we had had any bridges, or when one chanced to be so lofty that we might pass under it without stooping. The best of all in his eyes were the horizontal ones, which compelled us to lie down flat.
The valley of the Kiskiminites is like one noble, fruitful park. Here and there were harvest fields of small grain, and of the tasselled Indian corn: and a few coal and salt works, some forsaken, some busy, showed themselves on reaches of the river; but we were usually enclosed by a circle of wooded hills, reposing in the brightest lights and shadows. The canal commonly ran along the base of one of these hills; but it often let us slip into the broad lucid stream of the river itself.
After having left the Kiskiminites behind us, we crossed the Conemaugh by a fine aqueduct, which continued its course through a long dark tunnel, piercing the heart of the mountain. The reflection of the blue light behind us on the straight line of water in this cavern made a beautiful picture. The paths which human hands have piled upon one another here form a singular combination: the river below, the aqueduct over it; and higher still, the mountain road, winding steeper and steeper to the summit. A settler lives on this mountain, the bottom of whose well was dug out in making the tunnel. In the evening there was every combination of rock, hill, wood, river, and luxuriant vegetation that could furnish forth a succession of noble pictures. Charley was as well amused as the rest of us. He understood the construction and management of the locks, and was never tired of our rising and falling in them; and they afforded, besides, an opportunity of stepping ashore with his father, to get us flowers, and run along the bank to the next lock. Of these locks there are a hundred and ninety-two between Pittsburg and Philadelphia, averaging eight feet in depth.
We were called up before four on the second morning, and had barely time to dress, step ashore, and take our places in the car, before the train set off. We understood that the utmost possible advantage is taken of the daylight, as the trains do not travel after dark; it being made a point of, that the ropes should be examined before each trip. After having breakfasted by the way, we reached the summit of the Portage rail-road between nine and ten. There were fine views all the way; the mountains opening and receding, and disclosing the distant clearings and nestling villages. All around us were plots of wild flowers, of many hues.
We were carried on chiefly by steam power, partly by horse, partly by descending weight, and, at the last, down a long reach, of the slightest possible inclination, by our own weight. The motion was then tremendously rapid, and it subsided only on our reaching the canal at the foot of the mountains.
There was again so much hurry--there being danger of either of two rival boats getting first possession of the next locks, that we of the last car had scarcely time to step on board before the team of three horses began cantering and raising a dust on the towing path, and tugging us through the water at such a rate as to make the waves lash the canal bank. Our boat won the race, and we bolted with a victorious force into the chamber of the first lock.
We had occasionally to cross broad rivers. To-day we crossed the Juniatta by a rope ferry, moved by water-power; and afterwards we crossed the Susquehanna (at the junction of two branches of the Juniatta, the Susquehanna, and two canals) by means of the towing-path being carried along the outside of the great covered bridge which spans the river at Duncan's Island.
The next morning we had to leave the broad, clear, but shallow Susquehanna,--the "river of rocks," as its name imports. I had before travelled almost its whole length along its banks; and, like every one who has done so, loved its tranquil beauty.
The last stage of this remarkable journey was from Columbia to Philadelphia, by rail-road, eighty-one miles, which we were seven hours in performing, as the stoppages were frequent and long. This work, which was opened in 1834, includes thirty-one viaducts, seventy-three stone culverts, five hundred stone drains, and eighteen bridges. Its cost was about 1,600,000 dollars.--The length of this passage from Philadelphia to Pittsburg is 394 miles.
Where, I again ask, would have been these great works, but for the immigration so seriously complained of by some?
The number of considerable canals, varying in length from fourteen to three hundred and sixty-three miles, was, in 1835, twenty-five. Of rail-roads, from fifteen to a hundred and thirty-two miles long, there were fourteen. The cost of these canals was 64,573,099 dollars. The cost of these rail-roads was nearly thirty millions of dollars.
The Dutch are the best people to apply to for capital when any canal work is projected. I heard it said that the word "canal" was enough for them.
The steam-boats of the United States are renowned, as they deserve to be. There is no occasion to describe their size and beauty here; but their number is astonishing. I understand that three hundred were navigating the great western rivers some time ago: and the number is probably much increased.
Among so many, and where the navigation is so dangerous as on the Mississippi, it is no wonder that the accidents are numerous. I was rather surprised at the cautions I received throughout the south about choosing wisely among the Mississippi steam-boats; and at the question gravely asked, as I was going on board, whether I had a life-preserver with me. I found that all my acquaintances on board had furnished themselves with life-preservers; and my surprise ceased when we passed boat after boat on the river, delayed or deserted on account of some accident. We were on board the "Henry Clay," a noble boat, of high reputation; the present being the ninety-seventh trip accomplished without accident. Our yawl was snagged one day; and we encountered a squall and hail storm, one night, which blew both the pilots away from the helm, and made them look "to see the hurricane deck blown clear off;" but no mischief ensued.
Notwithstanding the increase of steam-boats in the Mississippi, flat boats are still much in use. These are large boats, of rude construction, made just strong enough to hold together, and keep their cargo of flour, or other articles, dry, from some high point on the great rivers, to New Orleans. They are furnished with two enormous oars, fixed on what is, I suppose, called their deck; to be used where the current is sluggish, or when it is desirable to change the direction of the boat. The cumbrous machine is propelled by the stream; her proprietors only occasionally helping her progress, now by pulling at the branches of overhanging trees, now by turning her into the more rapid of two currents. She is seen sometimes floating down the very middle of the river; sometimes gliding under the banks. At noon, a bower of green leaves is waving on her deck, for shade to her masters; at night, a pine brand is waved, flaming, to give warning to the steam-boats not to run her down. The voyage from the upper parts of the Ohio to New Orleans, is thus performed in from three to five weeks. The cargo being disposed of at New Orleans, the boat is broken up, and the materials sold; and her masters work their way home again, as deck passengers on board a steam-boat, by bringing in wood at all the wooding places. The "Henry Clay" had a larger company of this kind of passengers than the captain liked. He declared that the deck was giving way under their number. It was a pretty sight to see them twice a day,--very early in the morning, and about sunset,--pour from the boat, when she drew under the shore, form two lines between the boat and the wood pile, and bring in their loads. Most of them were tall Kentuckians, who really do look unlike all other people. I felt a strong inclination for a flat-boat voyage down the vast and beautiful Mississippi; beautiful with islands and bluffs, and the eternal forest; but I have lost the opportunity. If I should ever visit that beloved country again, this picturesque kind of craft will have disappeared, as the yet more barbarous raft is now disappearing; and one more characteristic feature of western scenery will be effaced.
It seems probable that there will be a more rapid increase of ships and schooners than of steam-boats on the northern lakes. These lakes are so subject to gusts and storms that steam-boats cannot be considered safe, and ought to make no promises of punctuality. The captains declare their office to be too anxious a one. A squall comes from any quarter, without notice; and the boat no sooner seems to be proceeding prosperously on her way, than she has to run in somewhere for safety from a sudden storm.
Of all the water-craft I ever saw, I know none so graceful as the sloops on the Hudson; unless it be the New York pilot-boats. The North-River sloops are an altogether peculiar race of boats. They are low, and can carry a great press of sail, from the smoothness of the water on which they perform their voyages. A sloop of a hundred and fifty tons will carry a mast of ninety feet high. I could watch these boats on the Hudson, a whole summer through; moored beside a pebbly strand, in a recess of the shore; or lying dark in a trail of glittering sunshine; or turning the whitest of sails to the sun, startling the fish-hawk with the sudden gleam, so that he quits his prey, and makes for the hanging woods. I saw their graceful forms disclosed by lightning, while I was watching, from the piazza of the West Point Hotel, the progress of a tremendous storm. I saw them as suddenly disclosed at another time; and still more strikingly. From the terrace of Pine Orchard House, on the summit of the Catskill Mountain, I watched, one July morning, at four o'clock, the breaking of the dawn over the entire valley of the Hudson.
The difference between mountain, forest, and meadow, first appeared.
Then the grey river seemed to grow into sight, for the whole length of its windings. It was twelve miles off, and looked little more than a thread. The sun came up, like a golden star resting on the mountain-top; and, on the instant, the river was seen to be peopled with these sloops.
Their white sails came in one instant into view, together with the churches in the hamlets, and the bright gables of the farm-houses in the meadows. The whole scene was made alive by one ray.
There will be no want of markets for produce of all kinds, in the United States, within any time that can be foreseen. If slavery were to be abolished to-morrow, and, in consequence, more corn grown and cattle reared in the slave States, the demand for both from the north-western States would still go on to increase; so vast and progressive would be the improvement in the south. The great cities are even yet ill supplied from the country. Provisions are very dear; and the butcher's meat throughout the country is far inferior to what it will be when an increased amount of labour, and means of transport, shall encourage improvement in the pasturage and care of stock. While, as we have seen, fowls, butter, and eggs, are still sent from Vermont into Boston, there is no such thing to be had there as a joint of tender meat. In one house at Boston, where a very numerous family lives in handsome style, and where I several times met large dinner parties, I never saw an ounce of meat, except ham. The table was covered with birds, in great variety, and well cooked; but all winged creatures. The only tender, juicy meat I saw in the country, was a sirloin of beef at Charleston, and the whole provision of a gentleman's table in Kentucky. At one country place, there was nothing but veal on the table for a month; in a town where I staid ten days, nothing was to be had but beef: and throughout the south the traveller meets little else than pork, under all manner of disguises, and fowls.
Much is said in England about the cheapness of living in the United States, without its being understood what need there is of equalising, (or what appears so to the inhabitants of an old country,) by means of markets. In places where beef and veal are twopence per pound, and venison a penny, (English,) tea may be twenty shillings per pound, and gloves seven shillings a pair. At Charlottesville University, fowls were provided to the professors' families at a dollar a dozen. In the towns of Kentucky, meat is fourpence per pound; in the rural parts of Pennsylvania a penny or twopence; and butter sixpence. At Ebensburg, on the top of the Alleghanies, we staid twenty-five hours. Two of us were well taken care of, had attendance, good beds, two dinners each, supper, breakfast, and a supply of buns to carry away with us; and all for one dollar; the dollar at that time being four shillings and twopence English. The next week, I paid six dollars for the making of a gown at Philadelphia; and all the ladies of a country town, not very far off, were wearing gloves too bad to be mended, or none at all, because none had come up by the canal for many weeks.
At Washington, I wanted some ribbon for my straw bonnet; and, in the whole place, in the season, I could find only six pieces of ribbon to choose from.
Throughout the entire country, (out of the cities,) I was struck with the discomfort of broken windows which appeared on every side. Large farm-houses, flourishing in every other respect, had dismal-looking windows. I was possessed with the idea that the business of a travelling glazier would be a highly profitable one. Persons who happen to live near a canal, or other quiet watery road, have baskets of glass of various sizes sent to them from the towns, and glaze their own windows. But there is no bringing glass over a corduroy, or mud, or rough limestone road; and those who have no other highways must "get along" with such windows as it may please the weather and the children to leave them.
The following laconic dialogue shows, not unfairly, even if it be a mere jest, how acceptable means of transport would be to western settlers.
"Whose land was this that you bought?"
"Mogg's."
"What's the soil?"
"Bogs."
"What's the climate?"
"Fogs."
"What do you get to eat?"
"Hogs."
"What did you build your house of?"
"Logs."
"Have you any neighbours?"
"Frogs."
There are only two methods (besides rare accidents) by which dwellers in such places can get their wants supplied. When a few other neighbours besides frogs, gather round the settler, some one opens a grocery store.
I went shopping near the Falls of Niagara; about a quarter of a mile from which place, there is a store on the borders of the forest. I saw there glass and bacon; stay-laces, prints, drugs, rugs, and crockery; bombazeens and tin cans; books, boots, and moist sugar, &c. &c.
Pedlars are the other agents of supply. It has been mentioned how bibles and other books are sold by youths who adopt this method of speedily raising money. The Yankee pedlars, with their wooden clocks, are renowned. One of these gentry lately retired with a fortune of a hundred thousand dollars, made by the sale of wooden clocks alone. These men are great benefactors to society: for, be their clocks what they may, they make the country people as well off as the inhabitants of towns, in the matter of knowing the time; and what more would they have? One would think there was no sun in the United States, so very imaginative are most of the population in respect of the hour. Even in New York I found a wide difference between the upper and lower parts of the city: and between Canandaigua and Buffalo there was the slight variation of half an hour. In some parts of the south, we were at the mercy of whatever clock the last pedlar might have happened to bring, for the appearance of meals: but it appeared as if the clocks themselves had something of the Yankee spirit in them; for, while they were usually too fast, I rarely knew one too slow.
The perplexity about time took a curious form in one instance, in the south. The lady of the governor of the State had never had sufficient energy to learn the clock. With both clock and watch in the house, she was incessantly sending her slave Venus, (lazy, ignorant, awkward, and ugly,) into a neighbour's house to ask the hour. Three times in one morning did Venus loll against the drawing-room door, her chin in her hands, drawling, "What's the time?"
"Nine, Venus."
Venus went home, and told her mistress it was one. Dinner was hastened; but it soon appearing from some symptom that it could not be so late, Venus appeared again, with her chin reposing as before.
"What's the time?"
"Between ten and eleven, Venus."
Venus carries word that it is eight. And so on.
The race of pedlars will decrease, year by year. There will be fewer carts, nicely packed with boxes and baskets. There will be fewer youths in homespun, with grave faces and somewhat prim deportment, in well-laden gigs. There will be fewer horsemen, with saddle-bags, and compact wooden cases. There will be fewer pedestrians, with pouches strung before and behind, an umbrella in one hand, and an open book in the other. The same men, or their sons, will gain in fortune, and lose perhaps somewhat in mind and manners, by being stationary, or the frequenters of some established market.
The conveying of vast quantities of cotton and other produce towards the southern ports is already a matter of pride to the residents, who boast that they employ the industry of persons a thousand miles off to provide food for themselves and their dependents. The bustle of the great northern markets is also very striking to the stranger who sees to what distance in the interior, the produce of Europe and Asia is to be conveyed. But, a few years hence, the spread of comfort and luxury will be as great as that of industry is now. By a vast augmentation of the means of transport, markets will be opened wherever the soil is peculiarly rich, the mines remarkably productive, or the locality especially inviting.
The object is an all-important one. As it is too late to restrict the territory on which the American people are dispersed, it is most serviceable that they should be brought together again, for purposes of intercourse, mutual education and discipline, and wise co-operation in the work of self-government, by such means as exist for practically annihilating time and space. The certain increase of wealth by these means is a good. The certain increase of people is an incalculably greater. The certain increase of knowledge and civilisation is the greatest of all.
SECTION I.
INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS.
One of the most important constitutional questions that has arisen in the United States is one, regarding Internal Improvements, which has grown out of a failure of foresight in the makers of the constitution.
No set of men could be expected to foresee every great question which must arise during the advancement of a young country; and there is no evidence of its having occurred to any one, in the early days of the republic, to inquire whether the general government should have power to institute and carry on public works, all over the States; and under what limitations. Many inconsistent and contradictory proceedings have taken place in Congress, since the question was first raised; and it remains unsettled.
For some years after the Revolution, the treasury had enough to do to pay the debts of the war, and defray the expenses attendant upon the organisation of the new system. As soon as a surplus was found to be in hand, suggestions were heard about improving the country. In 1796, Mr.
Madison proposed a resolution to cause a survey to be made for a road from north to south, through all the Atlantic States. No appropriation was made for the purpose: but no objection was offered on the ground of the general government not having power to make such appropriation. The difficulty of access to the great western wilderness was represented to Congress under Mr. Jefferson's administration, in 1802; and a law was passed, making appropriations for opening roads in the north-west territory. This was the first appropriation made by Congress for purposes of internal improvement. Many similar acts followed; and road-making and surveying the coast went on expeditiously, and to a great extent. In 1807, Mr. Gallatin prepared the celebrated Report to the Senate, which contains a systematic plan for the improvement of the whole country. In 1812, during Mr. Madison's administration, a survey was authorised of the main post road from Maine to Georgia. Improvement under the sanction of Congress went on with increased activity into the administration of Mr. Monroe, by whom the first check was given. Mr.
Monroe vetoed the bill authorising the collection of tolls for the repair of the Cumberland road. The reason assigned for the veto was, that it was one thing to make appropriations for public works, and another thing to assume jurisdiction and sovereignty over the soil on which such works were erected; and President Monroe did not believe that Congress could assume power to levy toll.[2] By his adoption of a subsequent act, involving the same principles, however, it seemed that he had changed his opinion, or resolved to yield the question.
Mr. J. Q. Adams's advocacy of internal improvements removed some lingering difficulties; and, while he was President, the public works were carried on with great activity. The southern members of Congress, however, were generally opposed to the exercise of this power by the general government: and it has ever since been a strongly-debated question.
President Jackson's course on the subject has not been very consistent.
Before his election, he always voted for internal improvements, going so far as to advocate subscriptions by government to the stock of private canal companies, and the formation of roads beginning and ending within the limits of particular States. In his message at the opening of the first Congress after his accession, he proposed the division of the surplus revenue among the States, as a substitute for the promotion of internal improvements by the general government. He attempted a limitation and distinction too difficult and important to be settled and acted upon on the judgment and knowledge of one man;--a distinction between general and local objects. It is manifestly impossible to draw the line with any precision. The whole Union is benefited by the Erie canal, though it lies wholly within the limits of the State of New York; and a thousand positions of circumstances may be imagined by which local advantages may become general, and general local, so as to confound the limitation altogether. At any rate, the judgment and knowledge of any individual, or any cabinet, are obviously unequal to the maintenance of such a distinction.
In 1829 and 1830, the President advocated such an amendment of the constitution as would authorise Congress to apply the surplus revenue to certain specified objects, involving the general good; and he strongly objected to the general government exercising a power, considered by him unconstitutional, merely because there was a quantity of money in the treasury which must be disposed of. He has since changed his opinion, and believes that less evil would be incurred by even suddenly reducing the revenue to the amount of the wants of the government, than by conferring on the general government immense means of patronage, and opportunity for corrupt and wasteful expenditure.
These changes of opinion in President Jackson prove nothing so clearly as the great difficulty of the subject. It is, however, so pressing and so important that, notwithstanding its difficulty, it must be settled before long.
The opposing arguments seem to me to be these.
The advocates of a concession to Congress of the power of conducting internal improvements plead, with regard to the constitutionality of the power, that it is conferred by the clauses which authorise Congress to make post-roads: to regulate commerce between the States: to make and carry on war; (and therefore to have roads by which to transport troops;) to lay taxes, to pay the debts, and provide for the general welfare of the United States: and to pass all laws necessary to carry into effect its constitutional powers.
The answer is, that to derive from these clauses any countenance of the practice of spending without limit the public funds, for objects which any present government may declare to be for the general welfare, is an obvious straining of the instrument: that, by such methods, the constitution may be made to authorise the spending of any amount whatever, for any purpose whatever: that it is the characteristic of the constitution to specify the powers given to Congress with a nicety which is wholly inconsistent with such a boundless conveyance of power as is here presumed: and that, accordingly, the permission to lay taxes, to pay the debts, and provide for the general welfare of the United States, is limited as to its objects by the preceding specifications: and that, finally, the powers allotted to the State governments exclude the supposition that Congress is authorised to assume such territorial jurisdiction as it has been allowed to practise within the limits of the several States.
This last set of opinions appears to disinterested observers so obviously reasonable, that the wonder is how so weak a stand on the provisions of the constitution can have been maintained for any length of time. The reason is, that the pleas of expediency are so strong as to counterbalance the weakness of the constitutional argument. But, this being the case, the truly honest and patriotic mode of proceeding would be to add to the constitution by the means therein provided; instead of straining the instrument to accomplish an object which was not present to the minds of its framers.
The pleas of the advocates of Internal Improvements are these: that very extensive public works, designed for the benefit of the whole Union, and carried through vast portions of its area, must be accomplished: that an object so essential ought not to be left at the mercy of such an accident as the cordial agreement of the requisite number of States, to carry such works forward to their completion; that the surplus funds accruing from the whole nation cannot be so well employed as in promoting works by which the whole nation will be benefited: and that, as the interests of the majority have hitherto upheld Congress in the use of this power, it may be assumed to be the will of the majority that Congress should continue to exercise it.
The answer is, that it is inexpedient to put a vast and increasing patronage into the hands of the general government: that only a very superficial knowledge can be looked for in members of Congress as to the necessity or value of works proposed to be instituted in any parts of the States but those in which they are respectively interested: that endless jealousies would arise between the various States,[3] from the impossibility or undesirableness of equalising the amount of appropriation made to each: that useless works would be proposed from the spirit of competition, or individual interest:[4] and that corruption, co-extensive with the increase of power, would deprave the functions of the general government.
There is much truth on both sides here. In the first set of pleas there is so much force that they have ceased to be, what they were once supposed, the distinctive doctrines of the federal party. Mr. Webster is still considered the head of the Internal Improvements party; and Mr.
Calhoun was for some time the leader of its opponents. Jefferson's latest opinions were strong against the power claimed and exercised by Congress. Yet large numbers of the democratic party are as strenuous for internal improvements as Adams and Webster themselves; the interests of the majority being clearly on that side.
To an impartial observer it appears that Congress has no constitutional right to devote the public funds to internal improvements, at its own unrestricted will and pleasure: that the permitted usurpation of the power for so long a time indicates that some degree of such power in the hands of the general government is desirable and necessary: that such power should be granted through an amendment of the constitution, by the methods therein provided: that, in the mean time, it is perilous that the instrument should be strained for the support of any function, however desirable its exercise may be.
In case of the proposed addition being made to the constitution, arrangements will, of course, be entered into for determining the principles by which general are to be distinguished from local objects, or whether such distinction can, on any principle, be fixed; for testing the utility of proposed objects; for checking extravagant expenditure, jobbing, and corrupt patronage: in short, the powers of Congress will be specified, here, as in other matters, by express permission and prohibition. These details, difficult or unmanageable amidst the questionable exercise of a great power, will, doubtless, be arranged so as to work with precision, when the will of the majority is brought to bear directly upon them.
It is time that this great question should be settled. Congress goes on making appropriations for a road here, a canal there, a harbour or a light-house somewhere else. All these may or may not be necessary.
Meantime, those who have law on their side, exclaim against extravagance, jobbing, and encroachment on popular rights. Those who have expediency on their side plead necessity, the popular will, and the increasing surplus revenue.
If the constitution provides means by which law, expediency, and the prevention of abuse, can be reconciled to the satisfaction of all, surely the sooner it is done the better. Thus the matter appears to a passing stranger.
FOOTNOTES: [1] "The income of the public works of the State" (South Carolina) "is very small, not exceeding 15,000 dollars per annum, over the cost of management, although the State has incurred a debt of 2,000,000 in constructing them. In many parts of the State, canals have been constructed, which do not yield sufficient to pay their current expenses; and, with the exception of the State road, and the Columbia canal, there is hardly a public work in the State, which, put up at public auction, would find a purchaser."
[2] President Jackson is of opinion that no toll should be levied on ways provided by the public revenue. It should be a complete and final outlay, and none of the people compelled to pay for works effected by the people's money. This seems clearly right.
[3] South Carolina was in favour of Internal Improvements, till it was found how much larger a share of the benefit would be appropriated by the active and prosperous northern States than by those which are depressed by slavery. Since that discovery, South Carolina's sectional jealousy has been unbounded, and her opposition to the exercise of the power very fierce. In her periodical publications, as well as through other channels, she has declared herself neglected, or likely to be neglected, on account of her being southern. The enterprise of the North and depression of the South are, as usual, looked upon as favour and neglect, shown by the general government.
[4] When I was ascending the Mississippi, I observed a light-house perched on a bluff, in a ridiculous situation. On asking the meaning of the phenomenon, I was told that a senator from the State of Mississippi, wishing to make a flourish about his zeal for the improvement of his State, had obtained an appropriation from Congress to build this light-house, which is of no earthly use.
CHAPTER III.
MANUFACTURES.
"The crude treasures, perpetually exposed before our eyes, contain within them other and more valuable principles. All these, likewise, in their numberless combinations, which ages of labour and research can never exhaust, may be destined to furnish, in perpetual succession, new sources of our wealth and of our happiness."
BABBAGE.
The whole American people suffered, during the revolutionary war, from