3 3 
Wisconsin state agricultural society. 
selves, nor should we expect our neighbors to subject their crops to 
a like circumnavigation. As I have already clearly shown, we can¬ 
not move our crops over the trunk lines of railway, for two reasons : 
They could not, all combined, move them, if we desired it, and if 
we did, and they had the means to do the job in time, we could 
not afford to pay even what it would actually cost the roads. 
Under these views of the case, one of two things must transpire: 
We must either stop raising surplus products , or we must have ample 
facilities to move our surplus , at living rates! As the Fox and Wis¬ 
consin channel partakes of the nature of both canal and river, 
with steam towage, we may safely put the freight cost (after com¬ 
pletion and for through freight) at two mills per ton per mile. 
This would yield a gross freightage from the Mississippi to Green 
Bay, 178 miles, with a full cargo and a tonnage of 800, of 
$106.80, for about 86 hours’ time. The present railway charges, 
from Madison to Milwaukee, 80 miles, for the same number of 
bushels, is $588.00. I presume it is not much more from the 
river. This shows a difference on 4,200 bushels, from the river 
to the lake, of $481.20—or 18 86-100 cents per bushel in favor 
of the water course. 
This rate of difference, if sustained on all freights carried by 
our roads last year, and officially reported to the secretary ot state 
would make a sum total of $22,500,000, but since this is greater 
than the whole sum reported by the roads, it would seem that the 
farmer’s produce is taxed higher by the roads than most other 
freights. 
I do not suppose (much less desire) that the improvement of our 
water channel would materially lessen the business of the roads, 
since, as I am prepared to show, they would still be crowded with 
business. To be assured of this, let the political economist and 
statistician take up the U. S. Census Reports and statistical tables 
from the most authentic sources, pertaining to the thirteen states 
and territories lying in the latitudinal pathway to New York, be¬ 
tween the Pacific and Ohio, and they will see that all the railwa} 7 s 
we are likelv to construct for the next five decades, in addition to 
our present lines, together with all our present water facilities, 
would not suffice to move the mountainous volumes of freights 
hat annually await transportation. The cereals raised in the 
