222     ICE  ;  ITS  COLLECTION,  STORAGE  AND  DISTRIBUTION. 
To  deliver  a  cargo  of  ice  to  India  involves  a  voyage  of  sixteen 
thousand  miles,  occupying  four  or  five  months,  during  which  the 
equator  is  crossed  twice  ;  and  if  one  half  the  cargo  is  delivered 
it  is  regarded  as  a  success.  The  loss,  is,  however,  sometimes 
much  greater,  even  amounting  to  75  per  cent.  On  shorter  voy- 
ages, such  as  the  West  Indies,  and  the  southern  part  of  the 
United  States,  the  loss  will  not  often  exceed  33  per  cent,  of  the 
amount  shipped. 
It  would  seem  that  ice,  costing  nothing  for  the  raw  material, 
might  be  furnished  at  lower  rates  than  is  demanded  for  it ;  but 
when  the  amount  of  capital  and  labor  employed,  in  houses,  men, 
teams,  horses,  tools  and  machinery,  are  taken  into  the  account, 
together  with  the  greatly  advanced  cost  of  every  item  which 
enters  into  the  business,  it  will  be  at  once  seen  that  only  the 
utmost  care  and  the  most  perfect  appliances  can  render  opera- 
tions remunerative  enough  to  induce  capitalists  to  invest  their 
funds,  and  allow  them  to  continue  thus  appropriated. 
The  few  remarks  thus  offered  on  the  subject  imperfectly  sha- 
dow forth  one  side  of  this  immense  department  of  la,bor  and  trade. 
Northern  New  England,  and  Maine  especially,  has  a  grand  fu- 
ture open  before  her  in  this  line  of  commerce.  The  demand  will 
never  diminish,  and  we  may  look  for  a  gradual  and  steady  in- 
crease, which  will  make  large  drafts  npon  our  rivers  and  lakes. 
Though  for  a  large  part  of  the  year  New  England  is  in  the 
"cold,"  she  has  summer  enough  for  flowers,  fruits  and  food, 
and  the  products  of  her  Arctic  season  extend  their  refresh- 
ing influences  to  climes  which  if  in  some  respects  they  may  be 
called  more  favored,  in  others  leave  the  question  open,  as  to  their 
being  so  much  more  to  be  preferred.  Let  us  borrow  the  words 
of  the  Physician-Poet  of  the  Old  Bay  State. 
"  New  England  !  proudly  may  thy  children  claim 
Their  honored  birthright  by  its  humblest  name  ! 
Cold  are  thy  skies,  but  ever  fresh  and  clear, 
No  rank  malaria  stains  thine  atmosphere  ; 
No  fungous  weeds  invade  thy  scanty  soil, 
Scarred  by  the  ploughshare  of  unslumbering  toil. 
Long  may  the  doctrines  by  thy  sages  taught, 
Raised  from  the  quarries  where  their  sires  have  wrought, 
Be  like  the  granite  of  thy  rock-ribbed  land — 
