254 The National Geographic Magazine 



ment service in Washington, and Mr 

 Harrison, of New Jersey, Mr Hulbert 

 gives us a symposium on the vast prob- 

 lem of good roads. He contributes the 

 first paper, which forms the title of the 

 volume, composed largely of extracts 

 from the words of other men summing 

 up the blessings of improved highways. 

 His co-laborers treat of government aid, 

 the advantages to farmers, the proper 

 material for constructing the bed, and 

 the methods followed in New Jersey. 

 The volume is thus a happy combination 

 of the ideal and the practical, all told 

 in readable style, with the aim of popu- 

 larizing the subject. Hence technical 

 details are pleasantly passed over, though 

 enough of the realistic side is presented 

 to assist a man of fair common sense to 

 undertake some improvement himself, 

 since the views of experts are rather 

 liberally borrowed. One of the most 

 striking utterances on this transporta- 

 tion question is that of President Win- 

 ston, of the North Carolina Agricultural 

 College. He declares that bad roads 

 are unfavorable to matrimony and in- 

 crease of population. In this day of 

 interest in the Racial Suicide theory 

 this position should arouse the greatest 

 attention. CM. 



The Great American Canals, vols, i, n. 

 By Archer B. Hulbert. Cleveland : 

 The Arthur H. Clark Co. 1904. 



I. The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal : 

 The Pennsylvania Canal. Pp. 231. 

 Illustrated. 



II. The Erie Canal. Pp. 234. Illus- 

 trated. 



These volumes, 13 and 14 of Historic 

 Highways, supplement the series of 

 memoirs on the public roads of the 

 United States by accounts of the great 

 waterways. The Chesapeake and Ohio 

 Canal was a continuance of the effort 

 of the Potomac Company fostered and 

 directed in its earlier years by George 

 Washington to provide adequate trans- 

 portation facilities to the trans-Alle- 

 ghany region. Through an appropria- 



tion by Congress the route for a canal 

 from Washington to Pittsburg was sur- 

 veyed, but construction was never com- 

 pleted further than Cumbe Island, Md. 

 This point was reached in 1850 after 

 twenty-six years' work and at a cost of 

 more than eleven millions. The rivalry 

 between the canal and the Baltimore 

 and Ohio Railway, as well as the mixture 

 of politics and business which practi- 

 cally doubled the cost, affords interest- 

 ing reading. 



More important was the Pennsylvania 

 Canal, which by a system of railways 

 and waterways 394 miles in length, 

 united Philadelphia and Pittsburg. It 

 consisted of a railway to Columbia, on 

 the Susquehanna, whence canal-boats 

 ran through to Pittsburg, crossing the 

 Alleghanies by a portage road from 

 Hollidaysburg to Johnstown, on the 

 Allegheny. This system, although 

 twice the length, cost one million dol- 

 lars less than the Chesapeake and Ohio 

 Canal. 



The two canals here described may 

 be said to represent the rivalries of the 

 ports of Baltimore and Philadelphia. 



The Erie Canal, while representing 

 the commercial interests of New York, 

 proved to be more permanent and far 

 broader in its utilities. It affected the 

 trade of the entire region of the Great 

 Lakes and of the upper Mississippi, and 

 this marked an important epoch in the 

 commercial history of the United States. 

 It is to be regretted that the space given 

 to local politics was not used for an 

 analysis of its economic influences. 



A. W. G. 



Historic Highways : Pioneer Roads, vol. 



1. By Archer B. Hulbert. Pp. 200. 



Illustrated. Cleveland : The Arthur 



H. Clark Co. 1904. 



This volume is rather heterogeneous 

 in its material, which covers the evolu- 

 tion of turnpikes from trails and brief 

 experiences in frontier travels. The 

 volume scarcely equals in interest others 

 of the series. A. W. G. 



