INLAND BOAT SERVICE. 7 



cargoes for the steamboats. Among other farm products received 

 by water at Baltimore are tobacco from Patuxent River landings, 

 live stock from the upper Rappahannock, and poultry and eggs from 

 practically all the river routes. 



Through service between Baltimore and Norfolk, Baltimore and 

 Philadelphia, Norfolk and Washington, and between Norfolk and 

 Richmond is maintained throughout the year by regular lines of 

 boats. Over each of these routes the trip is made in a single night 

 and the schedules are maintained as regularly as on railroads. 



An important feature of Chesapeake Bay trade, as of some other 

 waterways, is the large number of small craft, such as sail vessels, 

 power boats, and small gasoline launches, which serve as common 

 carriers on these waters. Early in July Baltimore Harbor swarms 

 with such vessels bringing in the first of the wheat crop from the lower 

 bay. They also carry a considerable amount of canned goods, water- 

 melons, sweet potatoes, and other agricultural products. Their 

 traffic in oysters, fish, lumber, railroad ties, and firewood is important 

 also. 



South of Virginia the Atlantic plain becomes wider and the navi- 

 gable rivers extend farther inland, thus affording a wider reach from 

 the coast for steamboat traffic than is afforded farther north. Steam- 

 boat traffic here begins to differ somewhat from the traffic on tidal 

 waters and shows some points of resemblance to that of the Mississippi 

 Valley. The long route from Baltimore to Fredericksburg, 285 miles, 

 is not directly inland, but extends more than halfway parallel to the 

 coast, the Rappahannock River itself measuring but 106 miles from 

 its mouth to Fredericksburg; but from Savannah to Augusta the 

 202-mile route extends inland, as does the 370-mile route from 

 Brunswick up the Altamaha and Ocmulgee Rivers to Macon. 



Two isolated routes in the Atlantic coast region are worthy of 

 mention. Lakes Champlain and George afford a highway for local 

 traffic along part of the borders of Vermont and New York; and at 

 the southern part of the Atlantic slope the Kissimmee River, with 

 Lakes Kissimmee and Tohopekaliga, afford a steamboat route between 

 the town Kissimmee and Fort Bassenger. 



Numerous other routes are followed by steamboats on the inland 

 waterways of the Atlantic coast and are mostly characterized by 

 regularity of service and by lack of hindrances to navigation, except 

 on the northern waterways in winter. 



MISSISSIPPI VALLEY, INCLUDING GULF COAST. 



The principal steamboat routes of the Mississippi Valley and Gulf 

 coast may be grouped according to some central river port, as Cin- 

 cinnati, St. Louis, Memphis, Vicksburg, New Orleans, or Mobile. 

 From Cincinnati regular lines of boats extend up the Ohio River as 



