220 



SCIENCE 



[Vol. XIX. No. 480 



or Atlantic. They sailed by day, putting into harbor at night, 

 and never losing sight of land unless driven by stress of weather. 

 At first they sailed only with the wind, but by slow degrees they 

 learned to tack ; then decks were builc over the stern and prow, 

 leaving the mid-ships exposed to the high seas. This class of 

 vessels, sometimes with banks of oars, continued until the middle 

 of the last century. In the early part of the fifteenth century 

 smaller but stronger vessels of better material were built for the 

 voyages of discovery undertaken by the Portuguese. At this time 

 also the mariner's compass was brought into general use, having 

 been introduced from Arabia; eighty years later it found its way 

 to England. Two of the vessels of Columbus were decked only at 

 the prow and stem, and the three were manned by one hundred 

 and twenty men. 



The Armada of Queen Elizabeth was formed of merchant vessels 

 fitted up as men of war, and not until the time of Charles the First 

 were there any regular ships of war in England or, probably, in 

 other countries. 



Commerce was usually carried on by companies, with rules 

 regulating the quantity of goods to^be exported, so that the mar- 

 ket should not be overstocked and unremunerative prices obtained. 

 Sometimes the merchant was owner of the vessel, who adventured 

 with his cargo and sailed in his own ship. The ships were con- 

 structed with little reference to speed, sailing forty or fifty miles 

 a day.! 



The steam engine came into use near the middle of the eighteenth 

 century in England, and two generations passed before it was used 

 on vessels. The first steamboat ran on the Hudson in 1807, in 

 England in 1812.' Then another generation passed before the 

 ocean was crossed by the '•' Sirius " and " Great Western " in 1833. 

 These ships sailed from seven to eight knots an hour. Ten years 

 later iron ships were built; then came the propeller, the invention 

 of Ericsson, followed by vessels built of steel, and lastly the •' City 

 of Paris" and "Majestic," carrying fifteen thousand tons of 

 freight and sailing five hundred knots a day, or twenty knots an 

 hour. 



Until the present century all commerce between remote points 

 was by water, excepting in the Roman Empire. After the down- 

 fall of Rome there was neither commerce nor travel and no use 

 for roads, the cost of transportation even for a short distance ex- 

 ceeding the value of the goods. 



The railroad was introduced about the same time into England 

 and America, and was rapidly extended into every country. The 

 steam-engine on land and water has revolutionized the methods 

 of transportation and created a new commerce. ■• The movement 

 of goods in a year on all the through routes of the world did not 

 then equal the movement on a single one of our trunk lines of rail- 

 road tor the same period." Formerly it cost ten dollars to move 

 a ton of freight one hundred miles; now it can be moved thirteen 

 hundred miles for the same sum. The gi'ain and corn from our 

 western lands, then not worth the transportation to the sea coast, 

 are now sold in London, and our prairies yield to the western far- 

 mer greater profit than the grain lands of England yield to the 

 farmer there. The land commerce created by steam probably ex- 

 ceeds today the commerce carried on the water. 



The cost of moving freight by railroads varies greatly in different 

 parts of the United States and in difl'erent countries. The highest 

 cost west of the Rocky Mountains is two and a quarter times more . 

 than in some of our middle States. The average freight receipts 

 per ton per mile in this country is $0,922, which is less than those 

 of any other country, although the Belgian and Russian rates are 

 not much higher. In England the rates are from fifty to seventy 

 per cent higher than in America, and in the other countries of 

 Europe higher than in England. 



In England and America the railroads are operated by private 

 companies in competition. 



In France railroads are operated by private companies regulated 

 by law, the country being divided among different lines of road. 

 Lines are constructed by private companies and run at rates fixed 

 by the government. 



' The breadth was about one-tourth the length, aad not until within forty 

 yeara were the proportions ot one-tenth or one-twelfth of the breadth ob- 

 tained. 



In Belgium and Germany the principal roads are owned and 

 operated by the government. 



Our system has yielded the best results to the people. 



The commerce which was in olden times transported only twenty 

 or twenty-five miles a day is now moved five hundred miles a day 

 by water and eight hundred miles by land. Correspondence, then 

 carried no faster than freight, is now borne by telegraph to the 

 farthest ends of the world. 



All these changes have taken place within a single generation ; 

 for our fathers could not travel any faster than Alexander or 

 Csesar. Steamships, railroads, and telegraphs within that time 

 have transformed all commercial transactions and the methods of 

 commercial business. Formerly eight months were required to 

 execute an order in India or China and obtain the return; now 

 one day is sufficient. These commercial changes caused a revo- 

 lution in the modes of business, and were the main factors which 

 produced the monetary disturbances of 1873, the effects of which 

 we yet feel, so long has it taken the world to adjust itself to its 

 new relations. 



The Future of Commerce. 



The commerce of the world originated in Asia; it was carried to 

 Africa and thence to Europe, and fi-om Europe to America. This 

 movement can go no further westward, for on the other side of 

 the Pacific is China, which has successfully resisted every attempt 

 of the European to encroach upon her domains, and India with its 

 teeming population of two hundred and fifty millions; so that 

 America, the last of the continents to be inhabited, now receives 

 the wealth of India and Asia pouring into it from the west, and 

 the manufactures and population of Europe from the east. Here 

 the East and West, different from each other in mental power and 

 civilization, will meet, each alone incomplete, each essent'al to 

 the fullest and most symmetrical development of the other. Here 

 will be the great banking and commercial houses of the world, 

 the centre of business, wealth, and population. 



The end is not yet. Inventions are increasing in a geometric 

 rather than an arithroetric progression. The limit of steam- 

 power has not been reached, for with a high temperature in the 

 steam- boiler the addition of a few pounds of coal increases the 

 steam-power so greatly that we are unable either to control or to 

 use it. 



Electricity has just begun to offer new opportunities to com- 

 merce. We are no longer compelled to carry our factories to the 

 water-power, for by the electric wire the power may be brought 

 to the house of the operative, and we may a/aiu see the private 

 workman supercede the factory operative. A few cars and small 

 vessels are moved by electricity — the forerunner of greater things. 

 We know little of this new agency, but its future growth must be 

 more rapid and more wonderful than that of steam. 



The secretary of the Smithsonian Institution (Mr. Langley) tells 

 us that " before the incoming of the twentieth century, aerial nav- 

 igation will be an established fact " 



"The deeper the insight we obtain into the mysterious work- 

 ings of nature's forces," says Siemens, "the more we are con- 

 vinced that we are still standing in the vestibule of science; that 

 an unexplored world slill lies before us; and, however much we 

 may discover, we know not whether mankind will ever arrive at 

 a full knowledge of nature." 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



#** Correspondents are requested to be as brief as possible. The loriter's name 

 is in all cases required as proof of good faith. 



On request in advance, one hundred copies of the number containing his 

 communication toill be furnished free to any correspondent. 



The editor willbe glad to publish any queries consonant laith the character 

 of the journal. 



The Loup Rivers of Nebraska. 



Perceiving by Professor Hicks's reply (March 4) to my com- 

 ment (Feb. 19) on his essay on the Evolution of the Loup Rivers 

 (Jan. 29) that I had in part misapprehended his meaning, I have 

 corresponded with him in order to understand more clearly the 

 share that he ascribes to headwater erosion and capture in the de- 

 velopment of the present stream courses. As is not infrequently 



