FARMERS^ REGISTER— INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. 



85 



allowed by our general assembly to the [wstmaster 

 general of the. provinces, for establishing a mail, 

 tor -t-vvelve months, from Sutlbllc to the southern 

 boundary ol' this province; probablj", the only mail 

 then within our limits. In 1765, the following year, 

 a committee of the assonibly was raised to contract 

 with the postmaster general tor a mail Irom Siifiblk 

 to S. Carolina. As latQ asthe'year 1804 or 1805, 

 the mail was transported irom "Petersburg to the 

 South, in a sulky or gig, twice a Aveek. Now, 

 daily post coaches ply between Petersburg and 

 Raleigh tor the. conveyance. of letters and passen- 

 gers, and a rail road extends part of" the route from 

 Petersburg to the Roanoke river, on. which there 

 is a transit at an average speed of filleen miles per 

 hour. And inclusive of the route through Raleigh 

 there are no less than six lines of ])ost coaches 

 crossing the state from north to south' three times 

 a week, two to theeastAvardof Raleigh, and three 

 to the westward. Besides, there are several Imes 

 ol'i)o^^ioaches running west and east from Raleigh, 

 and oiie running from the head of the Petersburg 

 railway west; and there are lateral lines connected 

 with these great routes. By the northern lines, 

 the passengers reach Washington City in three 

 days, Philadelphia in tour, and New York in less 

 than five days from Raleicjh. It must be, that a 

 system of conveyance which has sprung into such 

 consequence as a public convenience, and on 

 which such an amount of capital has found profit- 

 able investment in the short space of thirty years, 

 demands that it should be further improved by 

 adopting the best roads and machines for locomo- 

 tion which the genius of man has de\ise.d. If in 

 this short period, we have passed from the humble 

 conveyance of a gigon a single road, bringing a 

 few antiquated letters at a rate, (stoppages includ- 

 ed) perhaps not averaging a mile an hour, to 

 havino; every considerable town in our state, visit- 

 ed dail}', or at most in every two or three days, by 

 four horse coaches,loadedwith persons and intelli- 

 gence ti-esh from every quarter of the globe, we 

 may, nay must, (we should say) venture upon an 

 expense necessary to construct rail roads travelled 

 by steam power, which would not only cany us 

 and bring our letters and periodical literature at a 

 s))eed of from 240 to 360 miles in the twenty-four 

 hours, but would transport hundreds of tons of our 

 products and of our imports in foreign necessaries 

 and luxuries at the same rate, with perfect safety 

 and with the most definite certainly as to time. 

 Such an amount of stage coach travelling conduct- 

 ed into the state, on one or more railways from and 

 to proper points, on our northern and southern and 

 eastern and western boundaries, would surely pay 



tinning it along the same travelling route to llie 

 south, fiTom whence. the Petersburg railway has 

 received its principal traveUing patronage. That 

 the Petersburg railway receives from the carriage 

 of passengers profits larger in amount, and at a 

 higher rate, than fi-om produce, is not an anomal- 

 ous fact and confined to that road, but it is in 

 coincidence with tlic experience on other similar 

 works. Such was the result, contrary to expecta- 

 tion, on the great railway 1)etween Manchester 

 aad Liverpool, as it is also on that between Phila- 

 delphia and New York. In laying down railwajs 

 with us, this law of their profits should not l^e lost 

 sight of! The routes should always be chosen 

 Avith a view to the transit of passengers, that from 

 them, excessive profits being made, as light a toll 

 as ])ossible may be taken tor the carriage of jn-o- 

 duce and merchandize. For it is our great desid- 

 eratimi, in the pursuit of wealth, that our agricul- 

 tural products sliould not only be relieved from the 

 enhancement of their value to us, by reason of the 

 greater cost of their transportation, but that as to 

 some of them, our scantiness of crop from an un- 

 favorable soil and climate should be countervailed 

 by a cheaper and quicker carriage to market. 



The plan devised by the general convention 

 does not admit in our view of any improvement in 

 its outline. Its details might be changed so as to 

 obviate objections that have been made to them. 

 According to this plan two routes of transport fi'om 

 north to south, are proposed, the first partly by 

 canals and partly by railway across the eastern 

 part of the state, and the other passing through 

 the centre of the state. These lines are to be in- . 

 tersected by a railway, from the head of the west- 

 ern waters, in this state, to tide water. The calcu- 

 lations for the cost of these improvements made 

 vuider the sanction of the convention are doubtless 

 correct, and can be shown to be so if any are hardy 

 enough. to impeach them. The sums to be raised 

 lor the purpose woi'e also shown by the convention 

 to be entirely within our means, nay to be a very 

 light undertaking tor the state. 



It only remains on tiiis part of the subject to say, 

 that the experiment may be made at very incon- 

 siderable risk. Let a raihvay be extended to Fay- 

 etteville, or to our southern boundary from the head 

 of the Petersburg railway, and let it also be connect- 

 ed with the Noriblk raihvay, so as to embrace the 

 transportation of the LTnited States mail and all the 

 IraveUing on the centre routes of post coaches and 

 such part of that on the routes east and west of. 

 the centre as Avill be invited to it Irom its .superior 

 accommodatians, safety and speed. Let it also be 

 understood, if this road succeed, that a general 



tolls on passengers and letters and papers at so plan of inland transport is to be gradually but 

 high a rate that our exports and imports might be speedily adopted, equal to the wants of the whole 



carried at a proportionably low rate. They might 

 thus be relieved from the enormous tax with which, 

 according to the present mode of carriage they are 

 burthened. On this part of the subjecr, it is per- 

 tinent to remark, that our internal improvement 

 convention had information before them on which 

 they could implicitly rely, that the stock of the 

 Petersburg railway was profitable, and that of its 

 daily or weekly profits, the laro;er share was re- 

 ceived fr-om the transport of passengers. The 

 importance of this fact to our en(|uiry cannot be 

 overrated: for v.'c have the power to extend Ibis 

 very rail road through a country as rich as that 

 between Petersburg and the Roanoke, and of con- 



tate so as to allay local jealousies. A railway in 

 connexion -with those from Petersburg and Norfolk 

 will witliout doubt, not only repay itself, but will 

 afford a large surplus to be expended on other im- 

 provements. When these roads from Petersburg 

 and Norfolk, to the Roanoke, are extcn.ded to Fay- 

 etteville, from tlie success or failure of the experi- 

 ment, every man will be able to see and judge in 

 what degree tlie state is" capable ot" a system of 

 improved transport. If this first attempt be suc- 

 cessful, the general plan may be gradually exe- 

 cuted in the same cautious method, hy successive- 

 Iv completing such portions of the general plan or 

 of the particular works, asprom.ise to be most pro^ 



