III. as conclusive evidence of former mis-trading; and CHAP. the fact is an essential one to establish, as satisfactorily accounting for the calamities that ensued calamities that no acts of the executive, however impolitic, could well have produced, if they had had to act on a sound state of things; hence a recurrence of them is less likely to happen: and the facts above recorded are less detrimental, perhaps, to the financial credit of the country, seeing that in one case it would be at the mercy of a single individual, and that, in the other, the good sense of a whole nation must again be led astray before a recurrence of the same disasters can take place. The fact of the exports of domestic produce having fallen off much less in proportion than the imports for home consumption is attributable to the assistance which it has been shown the suspension of specie payments allowed the banks to afford to the growers of the great staple productions of the country. Through the aid which the banks were still thus able to extend to the cotton planters, the quantity produced in 1837-8, as well as the quantity exported to Europe, exceeded that of all former years. renewed prosperity. It is in the reduced consumption of the produce Causes of of foreign industry, joined to the well maintained efforts of their own, that we trace the means by which this country has thrown off the effects of the commercial embarrassment which has been described above. In August last, the northern banks, as they were the first to suspend specie payments, so they set the first example of resuming them; and E III. CHAP. before the end of the year, out of 829 banks and branches, upwards of 800 had either resumed, or had made arrangements to do so, early in January of the present year. If, in this sketch of the financial history of the United States, the fact of the liquidation of its public debt has afforded a strong proof of the resources of the country, the rapid manner in which it has recovered from the commercial distress to which it was afterwards exposed will tend much to confirm it. The luxuriant soil, the value of its products, and the industry of the people in turning these advantages to account, will, by the statements that have been made, be seen to have been the undoubted causes of the fortunate issue in both instances. Having thus exhibited the resources of the country in general, I shall proceed to examine how these are apportioned among the different states, so as to show the comparative means of each to meet its individual engagements. 51 CHAP. IV. ADVANTAGES OF THE EASTERN OVER THE WESTERN STATES. FIRST SETTLERS IN NEW ENGLAND. ATTACHMENT OF THE AMERICANS TO THEIR INSTITUTIONS. THE WESTERN STATES. RICHNESS OF THE SOIL.-FA CILITIES FOR THE TRANSPORT OF PRODUCE.- RAPID PRO- THEIR APPLICATION. IV. tages of the In comparing the states which lie to the east of the CHAP. Alleghany mountains with those which lie between that range and the Mississippi, the most im- Advanportant difference, perhaps, in favour of the former eastern arises out of the greater length of time which they have been established, and the greater stability which their institutions have in consequence acquired. states. Although these colonies, before the declaration State of of their independence, were far from having reached before the colonies CHAP. that point of wealth and prosperity which, as IV. states of the Union, they have since attained, independ- they had even at that time made a progress to ence. which, in the opinion of no incompetent judge, Mr. Burke, nothing in the former history of mankind could be compared. "For my part," says that eminent statesman, "I never cast an eye on their flourishing commerce, and their cultivated and commodious life, but they seem to me rather ancient nations grown to perfection through a long series of fortunate events, and a train of successful industry, accumulating wealth in many centuries, than the colonies of yesterday; than a set of miserable outcasts, a few years ago, not so much sent as thrown out, on the bleak and barren shore of a desolate wilderness, three thousand miles from all civilised intercourse." "After the war, and in the last years of it," he continues," the trade of America had increased far beyond the speculations of the most sanguine imaginations. It swelled out on every side. It filled all its proper channels to the brim. It overflowed with a rich redundance, and, breaking its banks on the right and on the left, it spread out upon some places where it was indeed improper, upon others where it was only irregular." With this unquestionable testimony to the prosperous condition of the colonies at that period, we have now the advantage of being sufficiently removed from it to be able to judge of the results of the political changes which were then only in preparation, and, by the guide of principles founded IV. on better data, to trace them to their fundamental CHAP. These will be found in the earliest pages causes. of their history. of the first New Eng land. If the first emigrants to the bleak and barren Character shores of New England, driven as they were from settlers in the comforts of their homes, to incur the sufferings of exile, may in this respect be termed, in Mr. Burke's language, "miserable outcasts," it must be remembered that no motives of worldly advantage, but the operation of a higher principle, had forced them to abandon the place of their birth for a country where they could follow their peculiar religious views without fear of disturbance; that they were not only men possessed of much intelligence, but that all, without exception, had received a good education, and that many of them were of no small repute at home for their talents and acquirements. The emigrants, whose numbers are variously stated, at from 101 to 150, had intended to plant a colony on the shores of the Hudson; but they were forced by adverse circumstances to land, in the depth of winter, on that arid coast where the town of Plymouth now stands. By the return of spring more than one half of them had been cut off by diseases or famine; but "they were well weaned," according to their own description, "from the delicate milk of their mother country, and inured to the difficulties of a strange land*: they were knit together in a strict and sacred band, by virtue of which they held themselves obliged to * They had previously taken refuge in Holland. |