LINCOLN SOCIETY. 121 



months of absence, was every irregular mail watched, with the 

 expectation of the promised letter detailing the adventures of 

 the tedious journey ! In very many instances not only months 

 but years passed before any intelligence could be obtained 

 from absent friends, and when the long looked for letter came> 

 very different was the account given, from the expectations be- 

 fore their departure. 



Plow different the situation of the country now ! Every State 

 in the Union is connected with its sister State by the iron arm 

 of the railroad, transporting news from one extreme to another 

 of this vast republic in a few days, making neighbors of those 

 whose residences are thousands of miles asunder, and affording 

 opportunity for exchanging the products of one section of the 

 country for those of another, without waste, deterioration, or 

 loss of time, furnishing means of supplying the vast interior 

 with the fish of the Atlantic, fresh and in a perfect s^tate of 

 preservation, carrying the same article to the extreme south, 

 enveloped in the pure ice of our northern lakes, and bringing in 

 return their rich vegetable productions almost in the freshness 

 of their gatheriuo-. 



Almost every town is so far under the electric or nervous 

 influence of the telegraph, that the least event in any village 

 may be almost instantly felt through this great nation, produc- 

 ing its effect through the almost boundless ramifications of this 

 ganglionic, iron, nervous system, carrying our will on its super- 

 ficial structure through the great organized body of the United 

 States from the Pacific to the Atlantic, where it is about hidimr 

 itself in the deep waters of the ocean, to convey the same intel- 

 ligence to the eastern world, which it does almost with the 

 speed and certainty that the will of an individual is conducted 

 from the brain to the different members of the body. 



Let this system of telegraphic communication be extended 

 and perfected, let steamboat and railroad transportation bo 

 encouraged, let fares be reduced, and afford every possible 

 facility for conveyance. Educate young men in our common 

 schools in "agricultural chemistry," and finish their primary 

 studies by sending them into different parts of the country. 

 Let them analyze the soil carefully, compare the productiveness 

 of different locations, and calculate the present state of their 



