APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX A. 



Washington, D. C, Oct. ii, 1883. 

 Hon. He.vryA. Reeves, Greenport, L. I., N. Y. : My Dear Sir. — 

 Your letter of the 8th inst, requesting statistical information in regard to 

 the commerce, navigation and fisheries of Long Island, is received. I must 

 sympathize with you, and am very sorry that I cannot felicitate you upon 

 the task assigned to you, viz: that of preparing a paper upon the Com- 

 merce, Navigation and Fisheries of Suffolk County, to be read on the oc- 

 casion of the County's bi-centennial celebration. Long Island probably con- 

 sumes fully her share, if not more than her share, in proportion to popula- 

 tion, of foreign goods imported; but they are all imported 

 at New York, and appear as the imports at that city 

 with imports for consumption in all parts of the United States; for 

 with respect to foreign commerce. New York represents the whole 

 country. It would be utterly impossible to find out the value of foreign 

 goods consumed in Suffolk County, unless you were to inquire of every 

 village merchant as to the amount of foreign goods which he had bought 

 and sold during the year, and, besides that, propound the same question 

 to every lady in the county who has gone down to New York in the morn- 

 ing and done her shopping during the day. That, you see, would involve 

 something in the nature of a census work quite unique as a governmental 

 operation. Besides, .it would be entirely too inquisitorial, I fear, for the 

 average Long Islander. 



In the second place, there is probably a very small part of the products 

 of Suffolk County exported to foreign Countries, but she performs indirect- 

 ly a very important service in feeding the population of New York City which 

 is so extensively engaged in this great foreign commerce of the country, as 

 well as in its much more important domestic commerce and industries. 

 You and I know that Long Island is the garden spot of this Country, if not 

 of the world, and we also know very well that Suffolk County is the most 

 beautiful and best part of Long Island.. We also know the important ser- 

 vice which Long Island renders in sustaining the vital forces of New York 

 City, the commercial centre of this country, from the time of the first ap- 

 pearance of water cresses and early spring greens, until the last harvest home 

 of the Autumn crops. 



Next, I will touch upon navigation. It so happens that under our 

 Jaws both the northern shore and the southern shore of Long Island are 



