vailed from the first in the settled sections to the northward. The people of New England and the middle colonies had always showed a tendency to gather into or near compact communities, instead of adopting the plantation and cabin system that chiefly distinguished the lower commonwealths. And just as the southern mode of life found its expression in the exodus to the unknown West, so also did the northern habits of living control the methods by which its advancement toward better facilities of travel was made. The natures of the two sorts of progress that distinguished the two sections were radically variant. One was an outburst of supremely important action founded on a deep-seated impulse that called for wide, free, pioneer movement. The other that of the North-was a slow, long-continued, almost automatic process which had for its purpose the improvement of short paths from one spot to another spot near by. It, in turn, was based on the highly developed gregarious instinct that has always characterized the American man of the North; a dependence on the mass rather than on self; a craving for crowds and to be part of the crowd, no matter what discomfort his desire inflicted on him.'

There were two results of those northern habits of living in groups and constantly treading the same path, and in time they came to shape the entire transportation system of the country and dictate every detail of its operation. One effect was the speedy transformation of a few original primitive routes into successively better arteries of travel as increasing popula

According to the census of 1910 more than forty per cent. of the population of the northern states is concentrated in cities of 25,000 or more. In the South the correspording ratio is about twelve per cent. These figures fairly indicate the relative intensities of the gregarious habit in the two sections during every period of their history.

The quality in question is as pronounced to day as it ever was, and its effect on present travel conditions in congested localities is well known.

tion cried out for such improvement. The other result was the establishment of periodicity and regularity as the primary features of every sort of traffic that moves from one place to another throughout the continent. Those

45.-Advertisement of a stage wagon such as ran regularly between Philadelphia and New York about 1750. Both passengers and goods were carried. Periodicity in the movement of travel conveyances in America had been introduced in 1732, over the same route.

were the things that came to pass because the people of the North originally gathered together in towns and forever trotted back and forth over the same old trails. Such consequences, though slower of ultimate realization and unforeseen by those who brought them about, were to be no less important to the country's future than was the cruption that conquered the wilderness. Each section,

in its own way, did the thing it could best do at a time when there was no coördination of action between them.

North and South had not yet united their conflicting and inharmonious methods and characters into one organ

46.-Mercereau's stage wagon, in 1771, reduced the time between Philadelphia and New York to a day and a half. In celebration of the achievement he advertised his conveyance as "The Flying Machine."

ism, and even when they did so the principal bond of national union, being at first political and arbitrary in character, lacked for a long time the elements that are necessary for the welding of a country into a nation. The day of a real unity in aspiration and action was only to be

reached through the creation of social and economic conditions which would bring to every American a realization that all other men between the oceans, no matter how distant, were nevertheless his neighbors and friends. For the accomplishment of such a result all the inhabitants had to be brought so close together that they could become acquainted with one another, and understand that in fundamental things their best interests and common welfare were not dependent on sectional residence or affected by distance. Those geographical considerations had to be annihilated.

The importance of certain features of life in the northern colonies that finally-in the eighteenth centuryled to the establishment of periodic and regular movement from place to place will thus be seen. The fabric of our modern travel system acquired its vital characteristic at that time. It was through the influence of transportation. methods and their improvement and expansion, rather than by politics or wars, that a real national unity was at last created. Some attention should therefore be given to those conditions out of which grew the new phase of travel history in America.

Previous to about the year 1725, the time at which a traveller set forth on his journey was dependent on his own desire, and the date of his arrival at his destination was altogether a matter of chance. 'He was quite satisfied to get there, and the usual delay of a day or a week in going a hundred miles or so did not seriously bother him. The transaction of all the affairs of life was accompanied by a certain elasticity and vagueness of arrangement whose necessity, due to the uncertainties of communication, was recognized. A man in New York, instead of telephoning to his friend in Philadelphia, "I'll meet you in two hours

and talk it over," sent a letter which said, "I now expect to start one week from to-morrow, and hope to see you by the following Friday or Saturday." Perhaps he did; but if he didn't, no matter; he was reasonably sure to get there by Sunday or Monday, and that would do just as well. If he did not own a horse and could not hire one, he secured passage in one of the big, awkward wagons that had begun to appear on the road across New Jersey between Perth Amboy and Burlington soon after the year 1700. Those wagons were used both for the transportation of passengers and freight. They were drawn by four or six horses, often painted in gaudy colors, and were covered with canvas tops stretched on arched strips of wood. The wheels were big, and had tires from six to ten inches wide made of hard wood or thin iron. The passenger made himself as comfortable as he could, and lodged in the tavern where his conveyance halted for the night. He finished the trip from Burlington to Philadelphia by sailboat, just as he had crossed New York Bay to reach Perth Amboy.

The owners of the wagons had no stated intervals for the trips, but made them whenever sufficient inducement was offered. In the year 1707 this road across New Jersey became the theater of the first American transportation monopoly of which there is any account. Governor Cornbury gave the exclusive right of conducting traffic to a few men acting together. The Assembly protested, and in answer to the complaint Cornbury said: "At present, everybody is sure, once a fortnight, to have an opportunity of sending any quantity of goods, great or small, at reasonable rates, without being in danger of imposition; and the sending of this wagon is so far from

Many of the two-wheeled carts used through all the colonies at an early day had wheels that were sections sawed bodily from a round tree trunk.