COMMERCE. 327 
Our chief commercial city is forty days’ sail from China, and 
fifteen from Honolulu. It has been proposed to establish a 
line of steamers between San Francisco and Shanghae, but I 
doubt the necessity of such a line. Whenever the trade will 
justify it, there will be a line of swift-sailing packets, which 
can make almost as good time as steamers. There is no sea 
where sailing-vessels can make such regular and swift passages 
throughout the year as on the North Pacific, particularly if 
they sail across it from east to west or from west to east. The 
trade-winds, which blow over it toward the south, are constant, 
and equally favorable for vessels bound in either direction. 
Side-wheel steamers would be entirely unsuited for the route, 
because the wind is always from the north, and one wheel 
would be out of water nearly all the time; but propellers, to 
be used when the wind is low, might be of service; though 
there is reason to doubt whether they would be of sufficient 
service to justify the additional expense. Six or seven years 
ago, a steam-propeller was employed between San Francisco 
and Honolulu, but it was soon driven off by the sailing-vessels, 
which made the trip ordinarily in about the same time, and on 
several occasions beat the steamer. 
We caunot foresee clearly the manner and rapidity of the 
development of the foreign commerce of China and Japan, but 
that it will reach a high development is certain. Three hun- 
dred and fifty millions of industrious people are not to be shut 
out from intercourse with Christendom. They have wants 
which must be supplied, and which white men alone can sup- 
ply; and as California is the nearest state containing a large 
white population, and having a large commerce, we must have 
much to do with the business of supplying them. 
§ 234. Tributary Population.—The present population of 
Nevada territory is about six thousand men, and the yield of 
silver and gold is estimated to amount to about one million 
dollars per year. It is now the general and confident opinion 
of Californians that the population and silver production of that 
territory will rapidly increase, and of course the increase must 
