THE PIONEERS OF AMERICAN INDUSTRY 31 



doubt but that as much money can be obtained in this country 

 as may be required for the canals on the credit of the states, 

 at an interest of 6 per cent, by the creation of a funded debt. 

 All the earlier loans for the New York canals were made 

 without difficulty; and the capital secured was chiefly, if not 

 wholly, domestic. 



But it was not upon domestic capital alone, or chiefly, 

 that the country had at this time to depend. It was able to 

 draw also upon Europe, and more especially upon England. 

 This circumstance had so great an influence upon the move- 

 ment we are studying that it calls for a full statement of the 

 facts concerning it. We have seen that English capital in the 

 form of trading capital came freely to America in colonial 

 times and after. To some extent also it came in other kinds 

 of investment, at least after the revolution. Thus Hamilton 

 noted in 1791 that several industries were owned largely by 

 Englishmen; Pitkin estimated that $30,000 000 of our national 

 debt was owned abroad in 1815; the United States bank re- 

 ported in 1809 that three quarters of its stock of $10,000,000 

 was held by foreigners; and the commissioners appointed by 

 New York to consider the practicability of a canal through the 

 west said in their report of 1812, that notwithstanding the 

 scarcity of money consequent on the wars which had so long 

 raged in and ravaged Europe, a loan of $5,000,000 could be 

 obtained there on the credit of the states. Obviously, even 

 as early as this England was experiencing more or less diffi- 

 culty in finding at home profitable investments for the great 

 volume of savings which the inventions and improvements of 

 the last part of the eighteenth century enabled her to accumu- 

 late. The pressure of surplus capital was, however, not left 

 in its full force until the close of the wars in 1815. Up to that 

 time the new savings had been absorbed by the growing manu- 

 factures, the agricultural improvements of the time, the ex- 

 panding commerce, the increase of shipping, the building of 

 canals and turnpikes, and, above all, by the expense of the 

 wars. 



There was no place in English industry where so much 

 new capital could be employed. Commerce and the new 

 manufactures continued to absorb a considerable amount 



