12 



and the value of the crops of that year are estimated to be worth $736,- 

 586,326 — all this exclusive of the vast amounts of cotton, rice, sugar and 

 tobacco which were raised in the Southern states, and which entered into 

 the calculation of 1840. And if we examine the cotton crop of the same 

 periods we shall find that it had increased from 790,419,275 in 1849, to 

 2,000,000,000 or thereabouts in 1800, just previous to the breaking out of 

 the war. Guided by these figures, what have we a right to estimate for 

 twenty years to come ? In the twenty-one States upon whose crops the 

 computation of the crops of 1862 has been made, we may estimate the 

 grain crops of 1880 to be worth $1,500,000,000, exclusive of the hay 

 crop and the root, fruit, and garden crops constantly increasing. Of the 

 cotton crop we will make no calulation — but we may say that if the loose 

 and careless husbandry of slave labor produced 2,000,000,000 in 18G0, it 

 will be hard to compute the amount which free labor may produce on 

 those same lands twenty years hence. 



In addition to this actual increase in the products of our soil as shown 

 by figures, we must take into consideration the immense changes which 

 have taken place in our country within the last twenty years. I have al- 

 ready spoken of the improvements which have been made in our machinery, 

 all within that period. But, more than all, the means of transportation 

 have been vastly improved. Twenty-two years ago, the great channels of 

 trade in agricultural products were coastwise, or along our navigable 

 streams. Of the vessels that were then daily taking their cargoes in the 

 harbors of Charleston, New Orleans, Mobile and Savannah, it is safe to 

 say that the principal portion of these freights was derived from the cot- 

 ton, sugar, rice and tobacco, as well as other agricultural staples of the 

 surrounding territory. The same was the case with the commerce of the 

 Mississippi ; and we find the numerous steamships and flatboats which 

 plied upon that river in those days, were laden with the agricultural pro- 

 ducts of the States that -border its banks, or that are sent down through 

 the interior by the Ohio. The commerce of the lakes was maintained, 

 moreover, in a great measure by the transportation of the agricultural pro- 

 duce of the great States of Ohio, Illinois and Michigan, lying on their bor- 

 ders, to the eastern markets. From the interior the transportation to these 

 great channels of water communication was slow, tedious and expensive. 

 The grain crops of central Illinois and many parts of Ohio and Michigan 

 were of necessity converted into beef and pork, and driven as it were to 

 market, in order to avoid the cost of transportation by carriage, which 

 almost destroyed their original value. 



