RETURN FROM PITTSBURG 327 



Baltimore has already drawn to itself the whole trade 



* 



of southern Pensylvania, that part lying this side the 

 Susquehannah, and also the greatest part of the trade 

 of back- Virginia ; because the inhabitants of these dis- 

 tricts (as well as those of the eastern peninsular and 

 of the whole of Maryland) find here the most con- 

 venient market and many willing buyers for their very 

 considerable produce ; for, Philadelphia excepted, there 

 are nowhere in that country so many merchants 

 gathered together, and ready to take up what is offered. 

 Old experience has been here recently confirmed, that 

 the more the commerce of a state is assembled in one 

 place, so much the more is gained for the common 

 good in manifold ways. The few merchants of the 

 province were formerly scattered here and there about 

 the country, and were in no position to carry on busi- 

 ness with energy ; as in some measure is still the case 

 with the state of Virginia, which had not, nor has, 

 any large trading towns, and continually looks to 

 foreign lands for the most of its needs. Thus Balti- 

 more, soon after its establishment, got to itself the 

 name of one of the most important trading-towns in 

 the whole of Chesapeak Bay. But nothing was so 

 favorable to the commerce of the place as the last war. 

 The situation of the harbor assured it against the 



o 



sudden attacks of hostile craft ; larger ships could not 

 approach without circumspection and danger, and 

 smaller dared not venture alone as far as the end of so 

 spacious a bay. So Baltimore became the general 

 depot of imports and exports for the middle part of the 

 American states. Dunne: the first vears of the war the 



* 



Congress for some time fixed its seat here. From 

 these and other causes, the population, the consump- 



