298 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



Wood Creek, the Old Canal, 1795. 



These countries are achieving commercial supremacy along lines 

 that parallel the development of their canal systems. One of the most 

 interesting features of international political economy is the great 

 value one nation will place upon a thing that another people will 

 throw away. What makes the canals of France of such value to the 

 people is their contentment in saving money. The Frenchman has a 

 keen sense of the value of a dollar saved. So long as he can get the 

 product of his acres and the output of his factories at their final 

 destination at the lowest freight cost, without time as an important 

 factor, he is content with canal transportation. He realized that a 

 dollar so saved is to be totaled among his profits and not credited to 

 his savings. 



The American, working on the credit system, is obliged to earn 

 the quick dollar, and yet feels the attrition of the nether millstone that 

 gives to the corporate trusts the money that belongs to the small 

 producer. He thus abandons canals that in France would pay the 

 individual as well as the state. The American has but one standard, 

 Do the canals pay? He demands immediate returns, not prospective. 

 Canals have their good and bad years. With such a criticism no canal, 

 as a tax earner, is always successful. This, in brief, was the history 

 of the abandonment of the central New York canals. It is interesting 

 to trace this cause in the profligate dereliction of the lateral canals. 



