seven cents on the hundred pounds than from New York. This would doubtless make the Gulf route the cheapest from St. Louis to any part of Europe, and enable the merchants of this place to import their goods on better terms for the country than to purchase in the Atlantic cities.

With this road completed we should have nothing to apprehend from Eastern competition; but without it the time consumed, and delays incident to river navigation will cause the principal part of the foreign dry goods consumed in the West to come through the Atlantic cities.

But doubts may arise as to the practicability of making a railroad from St. Louis to New Orleans on the line proposed, and also, as to the probability of raising the means of accomplishing a work of such apparent magnitude. It is true that a part of the route has never been explored with a view to the location of such a work, but we have been seeking information in regard to the country through which the route is proposed for several years, and we are persuaded that from St. Louis to the Iron mountain is the most difficult part of the route, west of the Mississippi. We are informed that a narrow ridge of high land, west of the St. Francis river, extends from the Southern line of Missouri to Helena, and that at the base of this ridge on its Western side the country is almost a dead level, presenting a route as favorable for the construction of a railroad as can be found, perhaps, in the United States. We can say nothing in respect to the character of the swamp opposite Helena: but we imagine that it presents no greater difficulties than the low ground on both sides of the Ohio, at Cairo.

The principal difficulty to be overcome in this, as in the accomplishment of all great works in our country, is that of raising the money required to carry on its construction. Were such a work as a railroad from St. Louis to New Orleans proposed by a single city or State, its accomlpishment might well be regarded with distrust; but when we divide the building of six hundred and fifty miles of railroad between four States, the magnitude of the enterprise diminishes to proportions that might encourage the most timid to embark in it.

The railroad now in contemplation from New Orleans to Jackson, and thence to Holly Springs, Mississippi, which in time will doubtless be built, will probably pass within forty miles of Helena, and it cannot be doubted that the owners of that road

would make a branch to the Mississippi, opposite Helena, in case a railroad should be made from St. Louis to that point. That would leave about 275 miles to be constructed by Arkansas and Missouri. A work about equal in magnitude to the Pacific railroad from St. Louis to the Western boundary of the State. By the people of Missouri this enterprise is to be regarded in a twofold view: first, as a local work calculated to develop the resources of the State by giving encouragement to agriculture, mining, and manufactures; and, second, as a great project calculated to produce a revolution in the present commercial system of the valley of the Mississippi, which will secure to this region the benefits of the boundless wealth provided by the Creator for the enjoyment of its inhabitants. As a local work, penetrating the mineral district of South-eastern Missouri, it would be the means of bringing into active and extensive usefulness the ores of the Iron Mountain and Pilot Knob, among the richest and most abundant deposits of iron which has been discovered upon the surface of the globe. These local considerations are of themselves sufficient, one might suppose, to induce the people of Missouri to lay hold on this work with a will that would insure its accomplishment in the shortest time consistent with a prudent economy in respect to its construction. But these considerations are lost to the mind when we contemplate the infinite benefits that may flow from a work that will bring St. Louis within twenty-four hours travel of New Orleans. Such a work would be the means of establishing the commerce of these two cities upon a basis that would infuse new principles into the economy of the Southern and Western states of this great valley, and secure a degree of prosperity that would astonish the civilized world.

Construct this road, and the gardens and orchards of the South will furnish our tables with the earliest vegetables and fruits of that region. The Gulf and inland waters will supply our markets with many varieties of fish and fowl, all fresh in their proper season; while the substantial commodities of the North will reach our Southern friends with more regularity than now, and in better condition. And thus a community of physical enjoyments, established between the north and the south, will give rise to a community of sentiment; and instead of the prejudices heretofore existing the inhabitants of the entire country watered by the Mississippi will be united as one family, by a common bond of sympathy.

This is not a day-dream, produced at will and fashioned to please the fancy. It is in the power of the people of Missouri and their Southern neighbors to create and establish the principal fact -a railroad from St. Louis to New Orleans-and then the benefits to which we have alluded, physical and social, must follow, as natural and certain consequences.

We oppose no argument to the construction of railroads in an Eastern and Western direction. Such improvements will be highly useful in connection with a system extending from north to south; but it must be obvious to every reflecting mind that they cannot, in the nature of things, produce either the physical or social benefits which roads leading from north to south are calculated to impart.

Commerce and travel from east to west neither exchange the products of the south for those of the north, nor bring the inhabitants of different climates into social intercourse.

And, hence, we conclude that no political compromise can remove existing prejudices, and establish sympathy between the people of the Northern and Southern states, upon permanent grounds, so long as the principal currents of commerce continue to flow in an Eastern and Western direction. The sympathy which springs from social intercourse and a community of interests constitutes the bond which binds a free people together under one government. This bond is stronger than written constitutions and legislative enactments. Upon this depends the Union of the States -the grandeur of the nation-and whatever may be his success as a politician, the legislator who overlooks or neglects the means of strengthening this bond, possesses no just claim to the dignified title of statesman.

But how is the money to be obtained to accomplish a work from which we anticipate so many benefits? We know full well that this question must be answered to the satisfaction of prudent and well judging men before they will even give the project their serious consideration.

It appears from the Report of the Commissioner of the General Land Office, made in 1849, that the Government of the United States owned at that time 29,436,942 acres of land in the State of Missouri, and 27,464,603 acres in the State of Arkansas, amounting to more than two thirds of the area of the former, and to more than four fifths of the latter. And in no part of these

States, perhaps, has a less proportion of the public land been purchased than in the region through which the proposed route will pass.

The effects produced on the price of real estate by the construction of railways is so well understood at the present day, that it would be useless to enter into an argument to prove that the money value of the public lands would be more than doubled, for the distance of ten miles on each side of a railway through this region. Then why, we ask, should Congress refuse to give one half of this land to individuals who would make the road? The principle involved in such a grant was recognized by the act donating lands in aid of the Central railroad of Illinois, and the Mobile and Ohio railroad; and we may safely challenge any number of the present Congress to offer one sound and Statesman-like reason against extending the same liberal and just policy to the States of Missouri and Arkansas. Indeed, we hold that the arguments are much stronger in favor of our road: there is a much larger quantity of public land in Missouri and Arkansas, than in Illinois; and, consequently, as a landholder, the Government would be a greater gainer by the operation; the facilities of transportation are more limited here than cast of the Mississippi, and it would be an act of favoritism and gross injustice on the part of the Government to bestow a bounty on the strong, and deny similar favors to the weak.

The policy of the Government in respect to the public lands, in the new States, has been that of a heartless and grinding speculator. Owning from two thirds to four fifths, and in some States even a greater proportion of the land, free from taxation, it refuses to sell the poorest tract for less than the price put on the richest.—Thus holding on to its property, waiting for those who settle in the country to improve its value by clearing the forest, making roads, and establishing schools, under hardships and privations calculated to retard the improvement of their mental and social condition. If individuals who pursue such a course are regarded with feelings bordering on hatred by every community in which they are found, why should the Government be excused from censure? The real estate of the individual is subject to the payment of taxes for the support of government, schools and public improvements, and, may even be taken, just compensation being allowed, for public purposes; the Government, as a landholder, is subject to none of these burthens, while it receives its full proportion of all the benefits accruing from every improvement made by the people. From

these considerations we are fully warranted in looking to the public lands as a source from which at least a portion of the means necessary to construct a railway from St. Louis to Helena should be derived. We would not ask the Government to make the road, or to donate a sufficient quantity of land to defray the entire cost of its construction.

Nor would we even ask that it should contribute its just proportion according to the amount of land it holds in the State through which the route lies. We only claim that it should make an appropriation sufficient to authorize individuals to embark their capital in the enterprise. We ask no more. Let it not be objected that there are now too many applications of this nature before Congress wherever the Government owns land which would be enhanced in value by the construction of a railroad through or near it, there it ought, in justice, to appropriate an amount equal to the benefit which it would derive from the individual labor and capital invested in the work. And so long as this principle is kept in view, and not violated, the number of applications for grants of land in aid of public improvements constitutes no rational ground objection to the action of Congress in their behalf.

Nor should it be objected that a district of country is too new, or, that its resources are not sufficiently developed to authorize the commencement of public works: such districts, more than any other, claim the helping hand of a liberal government. Why wait until the generation who broke the wilderness, and suffered all the privations incident to the settlement of new countries shall have passed away? In a national point of view no class of American citizens is more meritorious than the pioneers who open the wilderness, and prepare the way for civilization to advance. They are men of stout hearts and strong arms, ever faithful to their country, and ready to fight its battles, whenever called on. Indeed, in many respects, the life of the pioneer is one of continual service in the cause of his country; and it is but just that the Government should look to the amelioration of his condition, and aid him in making such improvements as will place him upon an equal footing with the citizens of older States, especially when all this can be done without taking anything from the public treasury, and without violating the principles of the constitution.

The work here proposed is one of such vital importance to the country, and its claims to the aid of the General Government so