Mexico and Peru-The North American Provinces.

467

based upon the inexhaustible profusion ance has placed them in the foremost
of the precious metals, that the magnifi- rank of nations. A simultaneous de-
cence of the western world became a velopment of the elements of progress
proverb. Old Spain, in the plenitude of was evinced in their courage and ap-
its exchequer and diplomatic success, parent temerity, in daring to be free from
reveled in a glorious triumph over Fran- the antiquated trammels of European
cis I., and the arms of Castile and Arra- power, by shaking off the yoke of foreign
gon were then deemed invincible. Lite- oppression. The influence of intellect
rature flourished, commerce extended, progressed, while that of brutal force was
the arts were encouraged, and the abrogated by the potency of rational
haughty demeanor, the pride and pomp policy, based upon the public will. The
of the Hidalgos, ultimately eclipsed the struggle for supremacy and freedom was
progress of intellectuality. An effemi- long, and severely arduous; victory
nate indolence succeeded the excesses poised the laurel wreath of triumph in
of intoxicated power, and the nobleness doubtful hesitation, until, soaring above
of Castilian chivalry, and a miserable the plains of Yorktown, she dropped the
policy, have sunk the Spanish power to diadem of liberty, and young America
that of imbecility.
was free.

But far away to the north, the silent strategy of the stealthy Gaul trod the shores of Newfoundland and the banks of the St. Lawrence, paddling his bat teau westward on the great lakes, and planting his standard as he progressed. Descending the Ohio, exploring the Missouri, and following the current of the Father of Waters, he reached the Gulf of Mexico, impinging the limits of NewSpain, and circumvallating the territories of another hereditary enemy in the old world-the colonies of England -whose career of progress it is designed to briefly sketch.

The emancipated youth, reared in the forest wilds-was a semi-savage, it was thought! Rude were his thoughts, his manners and his works; but that rudeness was instilled by the supposition of his monitorial teaching that he must recognize a power superior to himself. The idea of British omnipotence was urged so closely home to his consciousness, by the fearful energy and play of its power, that he, unaided by science and art, was depressed by established formulas-the surging sea hemming him in, forbidding him commerce and connection with others of his race. But In the year 1607, under every species looking forward on the stream of proof disappointment and discouragement, gress, the temple of fame, fortune, and the English colonies commenced the per- felicity, loomed in the rugged vista of manent settlement on the banks of the future. His undevelope genius James' River. Thirteen years subsequent to the settlement of Virginia, a handful of exiled fugitives, fleeing from the impaired privileges of religious freedom, sought an asylum on the inhospitable shores of Massachusetts. Amid the gloom of the winter solstice in a northern clime, these "Pilgrim Fathers" landed under the favorable auspices of no patronizing power but that of Providence, in whom alone they put their trust. They struggled long for an existence against the vicissitudes incident to the inclemency of the seasons-starvationand the hostile aggressions of implacable savages, as relentless in their ferocity as they were sanguinary, continually staring them in the face.

With the predetermination of success stamped upon their character, every obstacle to their progress was removed, every obstruction surmounted, until the constancy of an enthusiastic persever

Then

rankled in its recess of the brain, as
on the development it sprung like a
young eagle on the stage of action,
grasping in his talons the electric bolts
of Jupiter, and the emblematic olive
branch of peace and commerce.
he took his flight, his eye fixed upon
heaven, while he skimmed the ocean
wave. The howl of the tempest, the
lightning's flash, the crash and roar of
thunder, the piercing frosts of the frigid
zone, or the fervid heat of equatorial
regions, do not impede his progress-it
is onward still-striking out into a new
sphere of existence, discarding all the
ancient forms and formulas that contract
the powers of mind, for the grand and
true conceptions that elevate the human
powers, and propagate the principles of
political equality; tracing the retard-
ing inferences of these forms, where
they linger among mankind, in order to
appreciate, by contrast, the more refined

and elegant structures of the present rail-road trains that traverse this and age.

other lands. These are the sequences of modern progress the knowledge of investigating science, and its multifarious appliances in new discoveries and inventions in the laboratory, the workshop, and the kitchen.

The development of modern science, and its adaptation to the various arts and professions of the times, may be accredited to the Anglo-Saxon race. Great Britain claims the initiative, and the United States, as if by intuition, competes This is certainly a wonderful age! with the parent state, with persevering The ancients subdued the animated ardor and successful emulation, in the powers of the wilderness to their will; race of scientific application and practi- to drag the chariot and to course the cal demonstration of philosophic princi- arid desert, the camel, horse and tardy ples to the requirements of agriculture, ass performed all the labor of mercantile mechanism, manufactures and com- transportation, and the huge elephant merce. With an imperial domain, much was called in requisition for the more of which is unexplored, its vast resources herculean labors of war and civil life, almost dormant, its mineral treasures un- while modern intellect directs the fierce known, the variety of its agricultural elements of fire, of water, and of air, to do products limited, its commerce in in- their bidding. It is an age of iron, yet cipiency, its manufactures but few, an age of gold, of bronze and brassits institutions of learning, science, the an epoch of metallic grandeur, unrivalfine arts, as yet in a state of infancy ed by the gorgeous fancy of the eastern -the genius of Young America has fabled genii. Crystal palaces and iron evinced a precocity of native acumen mansions; long lines of iron ways; iron and talent far surpassing the ordinary bridges span our rivers, and iron ships, progress of juvenility-displaying a ma- of large dimensions, navigate the ocean. turity of mental and physical advance. It would, however, be an endless list that ment that astonishes, while it commands, embraced all its appliances, were it the respect of the most powerful nations. Inferior to no nation in the elements of local felicity, and the peaceful ag. grandizement of her character-she is second to none in the practical de monstration of progressive improvements.

possible to call up the embodied wisdom of antiquity from the dark profundity of the past, and show them modern progress on the real road to science, as it has emerged from the ignorance of the dark ages, or even from that of the last century.

One hundred years ago the colonies that formed the bases of these states Show them a lengthened train of only contained about one million of white twice a hundred loaded wains, gliding inhabitants, which number now a popu- smoothly on the iron trail with the velolation of twenty-five millions. Then they city of an eagle's flight-dragged on were without a foreign trade-now, the like some long, slim, snaky monster by white wings of commerce are spread to its locomotive heads, with eyes of burnevery breeze, urging on with lightning ing fire snorting forth their heated resspeed their laden argosies to every clime, pirations, and at every evolutionary pulto every quarter of the globe. Thousands sation discharging the refuse remnants of of their vessels-as aquatic hunters-are their motive power. Show them a vesbeating up the fin-winged quarry of the sel propelled through the ocean with a great deep in every ocean. A thousand celerity of fifteen or twenty miles an darkening vapors, of fiery creations, hour without the aid of sails, or wind, or mark the trackless way of as many steam;-another force impels the aquatic ships impelled by steam. These, though palace-simply heated air is the coercive now the commercial transports of peace- calorician-power. Show them cities and ful trade, are so constructed as to as- their thousand streets, stores, public sume the hostile aspect of belligerents edifices, and private dwellings, at midin the event of war. The same motive night lighted with the brilliancy of noonpower that urges on this mercantile day by an invisible fluid that is weighmarine through the vasty deep, is like- ed and measured with the same prewise applied to every species of handi- cision as oil, wax and tallow. Show ft or trade. It drives the saw, the them the miniature of a fine lady-a e, the lathe, the forge, the needle, dashing belle-with all her gaudy nill, the press, and those lengthy finery, produced with the most accurate

Modern Discoveries-Freedom and its kindred Institutions.

469

minuteness, without a painter or a pen- zenith with volcanic force into the aërial cil, except the pencils of the solar rays, space. These are more than enough merely by exposing the subject to the for them, yet we look forward to more refractive condensation of the rays of wonderful occurrences. light, through the medium of the camera obscura-imprisoning the reflection on a silvered plate of copper by chemical and galvanic fitters.

times-a rail-road from the Pacific to the Atlantic, connecting these two great oceans by an iron link, lying across the continent of North America, and forming a line of uninterrupted communication between Asia, the United States and Europe, which, from the physical construction of the country, is destined by nature to pass through Texas.

What is the cause of the unparalleled progress of the last fifty years?-Freedom, and its concomitant institutions, education, commerce, industry and enWe almost hear them exclaim, as terprise. The bright prospects of the they shrink from the picture, "Hold! future seem to expand over the region of let us return to the darkness of the past, the Southwestern states; the lustre of a and be again shut up from the modern glorious halo already surrounds their world of witchcraft, magic and enchant- path of progress, if they are only true to ment!" Detain them for a few minutes, themselves. Alabama, Mississippi, and and desire them to take a peep through Louisiana are already on the track of Rosse's or Craig's telescopes, while they improvement. But the young giant of take a sweep across the firmament. the South has not yet decided to fall into They find the haze of distance dissolved; the ranks of self-aggrandizement, for the barriers to mortal vision vanished; which nature has designed this great the veil of the universe withdrawn; the state. The people of Texas are evidently splendor and magnificence of celestial inclined to harmonize with the conscenery, with all its grandeur, displayed temporary movements of this progressive to human understanding at a glance; age. A union of sentiment is all that the siderial fields of space passing, like is wanting to form, accelerate, and cona panorama of suns and worlds, with summate the grandest conception of the their satellites and rings, brilliant orbs, and opaque planets, on the majestic march of time. We imagine a spirit of uneasiness and a desire to quit this lower sphere, and ascend to planets that they recognize as their local habitations in the spirit world, on the acromatic field. They may be persuaded to stay, and look upon the operation of the electric post. A London correspondent demands from Paris, Berlin or Vienna, the character of the Bourse, the rise or fall of stocks, prices of exchange, &c., and while gazing on the operator's motions, he reads the instantaneous response. At ten o'clock the New-Orleans broker receives a bulletin of the packet just ten days from England to New-York, in ten minutes after her arrival. Show them twenty thousand mammoth sheets of news thrown off from the press in sixty minutes. Show them yonder hill obstructing the progress of the grading laborers of a new rail-road; the rock bound base is charged already, and ignited by the merest movement of a tiny wire, connected with alternate layers of zinc and copper plates submerged in acid; a vast explosive sound bursts upon their ears, and the mountain rocks are flying in mid-air. Present a similar explosion in the depths of Hell Gate, and the heaving surge gives way, and the sub-marine obstructions are riven from their foundations, shooting upward to the

The fabrics of every country, the productions of every clime, will be transported upon it. Merchants of all nations will be its subsidiaries. The trade of the world will concentrate at two points on this continent. The terminus of this road on the Pacific will become the great mart of the East. There will be offered for sale or transportation her rich manufactures, her gums, her drugs, her tropical fruits, her gems. At some point on the Gulf of Mexico, where the best harbor may be found, will be the commercial emporium of European goods intended for the consumption of the East. The future Rothschilds, Barings and Astors, will congregate at these points, as the immediate localities from which the other markets of the world can be scanned and controlled. Capital will be amassed and wielded in sums beyond the pale of all former antecedents. Mercantile operations will assume gigantic forms; and the adventures will exceed the wildest dreams of by-gon

days of speculation. The financial short in the attempt to delineate the

kings of to-day will dwindle into insignificance before the imperial dynasties that will rise up, as it were, to-morrow. The pen, aided by fancy, might even fall

prosperity, the wealth, the refinement— in fact, the abundance of all the elements of greatness and happiness clustering around a future like this.

ART. VII-COMMERCIAL PROGRESS OF BALTIMORE. [We continue to present statistical returns showing the growth of the great American cities. We are indebted to the annual statement of the Baltimore Prices Current and Ballimore American for the facts we now give.]

of Mr. Robb, and her construction has already reached an advanced stage. Earnest appeals are being made daily to our merchants and the merchants of Savannah to establish a line of steamers between Baltimore and that port; and of late the subject has come so palpably before them, that we cannot but indulge the hope that we may, in a few months, put afloat two more steamers to follow in the wake of our pioneer line to the South.

A REVIEW of the business operations of may now be looked upon as completely Baltimore for the year just elapsed, al- established-the Palmetto, sailing to though it may not afford any very strik- Charleston, is to have a consort of 1,300 ing feature with regard to actual in- tons, the largest steamer ever built at crease, will show a regular and healthy Baltimore-she is building at the yard condition of things, with an abundant money market, and an absence of speculation generally; and there is to be observed every element of future growth and prosperity, with the promise that so soon as our carrying facilities are perfected, an extent of inland as well as foreign trade, equal to the desires of the most zealously ambitious, must be realized. With regard to the progress made toward enlarging and facilitating our trading operations, it is a source of unfeigned pleasure to know that within the past twelve months a number of most important objects, which only require time to carry out and develop with entire success, have been commenced under very auspicious circumstances. In the train of these we think we can see many other objects of nearly equal moment, as affecting the future of our city, taken up and as ably and energetically managed. Since we last presented an annual statement of our trade and commerce, appropriations have been made by Congress and by our City Council for the improvement of our harbor and ship channel. This is an all desirable object, for which our Board of Trade had been assiduously laboring, and we are in hopes that the general government will follow up its acknowledgment of the propriety of our petition by a further appropriation, and one more commensurate with the character of the object. In the mean time, it is hoped our State Legislature will imitate the example of our City Council by making an appropriation towards improving the Patapsco beyond the city limits.

Our steam connection with the South

Much has been said within the year upon the subject of direct trade with Europe. However zealous we may be in our efforts to place Baltimore upon such a footing as will render it unnecessary for southern merchants to go to the North for their purchases, the truth cannot be disguised that our water facilities are such as to preclude the possibility of establishing Baltimore as the importing point for the present. What we want most now is aid in perfecting our water facilities, so that vessels of even present average tonnage may arrive and depart ad libitum. Let us renew and redouble our efforts for the improvement of our harbor and river; when we are ready the South will take us by the hand.

The Baltimore and Ohio Rail-road is completed to Wheeling! Who but the citizens of Baltimore can fully appre hend the import of those words? Though it be not our vocation to indulge in panegyric, on this occasion, at least, an excuse must be permitted us if we soar somewhat with the bright wings which hope has lent us in the contemplation of that great event. We have reached

Baltimore and Ohio Rail-road-Coal-Guano-Iron Furnaces. 471

Years:

1852.

1851.

1850.

From Rio de Janeiro...224,082...266,240...150,194
La Guayra..
16,241... 21,081... 24,040

66

554... 5,873... 2,754

Porto Cabello..

Maracaibo..

West Indies

8,535

46

Coastwise

8,114.. 6,532 4,280... 3,885... 3,934

the threshold and the stepping-stone of Imports of Coffee at this Port for the last Three
our true commercial destiny, and there
is nothing now can turn us back. The
wide and far West has opened her am-
ple arms to receive us, and bids us God-
speed in our efforts to secure the prize
which nature has so long and patiently
held out to us. Who will say that the
prize is not already ours? The hope
deferred through a protracted series of
years is finally resolved into a complete
reality, and the most sanguine calcula-
tions of those by whom it was first en-
tertained are on the eve of being entirely
verified.

COAL-Cumberland-This article is rapidly becoming one of the leading features of our trade, having established itself in favor wherever its qualities have been tested. The increased use of steampower, particularly on the ocean, and the growing preference for cheap bituminous coal for domestic purposes, have caused an extraordinary demand for Cumberland, and our routes of transportation have been taxed to their utmost within the past year in order to meet the wants of the different companies working mines in the Alleghany region. The trade, in the early part of the year, opened under some disadvantages, owing to the failure of the largest company then in operation, the late Maryland Mining Company, and continued depressed until May, when it revived, and has continued since then with great activity. The demand for transportation by the rail-road company has exceeded its ability to provide cars, and at this time the amount brought to this market for shipment and consumption is at the rate of about 300,000 tons per annum, although the business of the Company's year ending 1st October, 1852, did not exceed 206,000 tons. The rail-road company having made preliminary alrangements for the accommodation of the coal trade, the exceedingly active demand now prevailing warrants us in the belief that the receipts of 1853 will reach not less than 500,000 tons.

Total........

.253,692...305,103...187,454

The receipts of cotton at this port for the last three years have been as follows, as near as can be ascertained:

GUANO.-The imports of Peruvian at Baltimore the past year do not much exceed those of 1851, amounting to about 25,500 tons. This is accounted for by the fact that the agents of the Peruvian government have imported a considerable quantity into Norfolk and AlexanThe demand dria, for the first time.

was active the past season, and prices ruled high, from dealers, on account of the scarcity of the article. The importers' prices remained unchanged at $46 20 per ton during the year.

We embrace this opportunity of correcting a recent statement in the Boston Journal, in which the total imports of guano into all the United States. in 1851, The imare put down at 23,153 tons. ports of Peruvian guano at Baltimore alone amounted to 25,000 tons, and we Receipts of Coal at Baltimore for the past Eight are quite certain that at least 10,000