little respect; but it is, however, reasonable, we think, to estimate the rate at not more than $35,00 per ton; provided no dividends are required to be earned on the capital invested in the construction of the work.

But while we are of opinion that the author has estimated the rate of tolls too high on the railway, we are so unfortunate as to think that his estimates by the canal and ocean route are too low. We tract the following paragraphs to show his estimates of charges on this route.

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Seeing how much the dangers of the sea would be lessened by opening this canal, and consequently how much the rate of insurance would be lowered-how much the average rate of sailing under canvass would be increased with the trade winds free, and how much the voyage would be shortened-how small the crew and how trifling the expenses of navigation would be-it is not unreasonable to anticipate that this ship canal would enable us to deliver our cotton, our lead, perhaps our iron, but certainly our rice, wheat, corn, flour, beef and pork, hemp, and tobacco in the markets of China, India, New Holland, and Japan, at a less rate of freight than we can deliver them in Europe. The lead could go for nothing, as it now does to Europe, for it would serve as ballast.

"The rule which governs the rate of freight in sea voyages under canvas, is the average length of time which it will take a ship to load, perform the voyage, and discharge cargo. If a ship have a cargo on board, it costs no more to sail than to lie at anchor. Her expenses are the same in either case. We see by viewing the matter in this light why the freight is proportionally so much heavier for short voyages by sea than for long. Because in short voyages such a considerable portion of the time is taken up in waiting for freight. A ship that has to make a voyage of 20,000 miles for instance will charge in proportion to the distance much less freight than a ship will which has a voyage of only 2,000 miles. This last may be but 10 days in making the voyage, but it may take her 10 days to load and a week to unload, and a further delay of some days before she can get another cargo. All these are considerations which, in establishing her rates of freight, have to be taken into account by her; whereas, the ship on the long voyage is certain of employment for a longer time, but a small proportion of her time is taken up in loading and unloading and in hunting for a fresh cargo. Therefore, the rates of freight are proportionally less per long than per short voyages.

"A ship going around Cape Horn, with her expensive equipments, heavy crew, dangerous navigation, and large insurance, charges for freight at an average of 12 1-2 cents per ton per day. That is, a ship carrying 1,000 tons of merchandise around Cape Horn to Lima will be 120 days making the voyage, and will charge $15 per ton, which as before stated gives 12 1-2 cents per ton per day.

"Now, then, a ship sailing through this ship canal would make the voyage to China in sixty days, and, for the reasons stated, at much less-say one half- than the cost of the Cape Horn voyage.

"The voyage, being but half the length of the other, should, if the expenses of sailing were the same, be only one-half the Cape Horn freights.

"But the expenses by the canal being so much less, and the wear and tear of ships being scarcely appreciable, let us suppose it will be just one half-this would give from New Orleans and our Atlantic ports $7 50 per ton to China and India, and less to New Holland and all the islands of the Pacific, and, by the same rule, $5 only to Peru and South America. At this rate, the cost of transportation to India and the Pacific markets, from the Gulf and Atlantic ports of the United States, would be for

It is thus perceived how this canal would bring Asia and the multitude of markets in the Pacific ocean to be down stream from us. Who can calculate how immense the advantages are of having the favor of both winds and currents in carrying for us to market those cheap and bulky articles which constitute our staples, and which cannot afford to pay so heavily for conveyance as the more light and valuable articles can ?"

Surely no individual ought to be better acquainted with this branch of the subject than Lieut. Maury; but we do not comprehend how produce can be transported at as low rates from our sea ports to China, as to Europe. Indeed some of the articles in his list are put down at a much lower rate. He supposes that Cotton can be shipped at from one dollar to one dollar and fifty cents per bale. By reference to tables showing the rates of freight from New Orleans to Liverpool, Havre and New York, on the 1st day of each month for two years, ending in 1848, we find that the prices for cotton to Liverpool during that period, ranged from three-eighths to one penny per pound; which is equal to from about three to eight dollars per bale. The lowest price to Havre during that period was 7-8d. per pound; and it is quoted but twice below 1d.; and in one instance as high as 2d. per pound. The price to New York, during the same period, ranged from one quarter to one and one-eighth cent per pound; and the average per bale, (supposing it to weigh 450 lbs.) during the period, was $2 56— about double Lieut. Maury's estimates to China. The freight on Tobacco from New Orleans to Liverpool, ranged, during the same period, from 30s. to 57s.; averaging about 41s.-equal to nearly $10 00 per hhd. Lieut. Maury estimates the cost to China at from $5 00 to $7 50 per hhd.

Nor has he been more fortunate, in our opinion, in his arguments in favor of the Gila route for the railway. We make copious extracts from this part of the document, lest we should do injustice to the author. He says:

"There is another point of view in which this work becomes an object of great National concern-California has turned to gold at our touch, and should it continue to supply that precious metal according to the ratio that it has already done, the proportion of gold to silver in

the world will be changed, and, consequently, an alteration in the respective value of the two metals may be expected.

"Gold is sixteen times more valuable than silver, because silver is sixteen times more abundant than gold-in other words the earth has hitherto yielded to the labor of the mines sixteen ounces of silver to one of gold. Should the amount of gold from the California mines change these proportions, so as to give for example, an ounce of gold to ten of silver, gold then will be only ten times more valuable than silver-as we lessen the value of gold, we shall, in the same proportion, lessen the value of California mines and sustain a double loss-a loss with the rest of the world in the depreciation of our gold coin, and which loss will be proportionate to the amount of our gold circulation, and a loss in depreciation in the value of the gold mines in California. To prevent such a calamity, it becomes an object of great National concern to stimulate the working of silver mines and to preserve the relative proportions which now exist as to the quantities of gold and silver. It is obvious that if the mines of California shall continue to furnish yearly fifteen or twenty millions to the gold calculations of the world, without a corresponding increase in the supplies of silver, the gold coinage of the world will become plethoric, and the whole amount of the gold depreciation or the largest portion of it will be sustained by us. The Pacific Railroad will serve in a manner to prevent such a loss.

"The silver mines of Mexico are inexhaustible and exceedingly rich, but they have ceased to be worked with activity, partly from the scarcity and consequently high price of quicksilver, and partly from the want of proper engines for pumping and working the mines.

"These had to be transported from Vera Cruz or other Mexican ports, across the mountains on the backs of mules, and, therefore, at an enormous expense. It needs no argument to show that very powerful engines cannot be moved on the backs of asses, and that many mines, which now cannot be worked, on account of the difficulties of drainage, the want of proper machinery, and the expense alluded to, would, if the expense of transporting the quicksilver and machinery to the mines, and the silver to the sea were lessened, be worked with great profit.

"It so happens that simultaneous with the discovery of gold in California, quicksilver mines of great value were also discovered there. Here, then, is a new source of supply of this metal for amalgam to the silver mines.

"Now the Pacific Railroad-should it take the Southern route, and this, supposing the Southern route to be as practicable as the more Northern one, should be a more powerful reason in its favor-will pass near the great mining and mineral districts of Northern Mexico. Private enterprise will shoot out branches in that direction, from the main stem, and quicksilver in abundance and machinery of ample power and capacity can then be delivered in the vicinity of the mines, cheaply and without difficulty, over this railway, and thus new life and vigor will be given to the working of the silver mines there, while we are at the same time providing for the common defence.

"Nor would the beneficial effects of this road upon these mines end here! It would turn their produce from the ports of Mexico, and

bring to this country, in exchange for the manufactures of New England, and other "Yankee nations."

"A southern route would bring the road near the northern provinces of Mexico, which are the richest and most desirable portions of that country, and all the people there, who could be supplied with articles of foreign merchandise more cheaply through our own country and over this road than they can through the ports of Vera Cruz and Tampico, and over the mountains on the backs of mules, would naturally depend on the railroad for their supplies. The extent of country to be thus supplied will be bounded by the line at which the freight and tolls on a bale of merchandise dragged by the iron-horse of the North, can meet with equal charges a similar bale brought on the backs of mules from the seaports of Southern Mexico. Below this line, the people of Mexico would continue to receive their supplies on the backs of mules, as heretofore; above it, their commerce would take the new and cheaper channel that this railroad would open.

"This dividing line between the locomotive and the mule cannot be distinctly drawn until the railroad shall have been in operation. But it may be safely assumed that the portion of Mexico that will then become tributary to the Pacific road and to the work-shops of New England, will not include less than three millions of people.

"A National monopoly in commerce with three millions of people who manufacture nothing, want everything, and who have nothing to give in return but uncoined silver and the precious metals! Was ever a

commercial people offered such a temptation! There are no people in the world who buy of foreign merchandise more freely than the Spanish Americans. There are twenty millions of people in the United States. We import annually about one hundred millions of foreign merchandise. This gives an average yearly consumption of $5 worth, per capital, of foreign goods, notwithstanding we manufacture ourselves so largely and so extensively.

"The average annual consumption of foreign merchandise, per capital, in Cuba, is some forty or fifty dollars. But suppose that the Northern Mexicans, with the cheaper supplies and the increased facilities to buy which this road will afford them, shall, notwithstanding that they manufacture nothing, only buy on the average as much as the people of the United States, who manufacture almost everything, that will give an internal commerce at once of fifteen millions of dollars the year, which we will both fetch and carry, and which will be paid for mostly in bullion. These are but a portion of the advantages offered by this route for the road.

"There are the Mormons of Deseret and the people of New Mexico, who have now and for years will continue to have as much as they can do in contending with the wild beast and the savage of the forest, and in subduing the earth with the hoe and the plow.

"As with our Northwestern and Southern States, several generations will probably pass away before they will have the earth sufficiently subdued to turn their attention to manufacturing.

They will, therefore, afford to the manufacturers of the East an immense business over this railroad. The old Santa Fe trade that was carried on by mules, will be nothing in comparison to it.

"The people of the Eastern States especially, have a stake deeply and richly set in this road, and, therefore, for sectional and moral as well as great national considerations, they are invoked to come forward in support of this great high tower of national defense, of power, and of greatness, and to unite with the people of the Memphis Convention in declaring themselves in favor of the route, and in pledging themselves to go for it, by that route, which, being practicable, shall best subserve the great purposes of national defense.

"The Memphis Convention, with a patriotism and a broad feeling of true nationality, which is beyond praise, laid aside all local prejudices and sectional jealousy, and declared itself in favor of the road to begin at the best point and to take the most suitable route, whereever that route and that point shall be found to be. It asked for the necessary surveys and examinations of the different routes, and expressed the opinion that the route commencing at the San Diego, thence up the valley of the Gila to the borders of Texas, between the parallels of 32 deg. and 33 deg. of north latitude, and thence to some point on the Mississippi between the mouths of the Ohio and the Arkansas, was worthy particular examination.

"The Convention acknowledged what we all feel that information is wanting to enable us to decide as to the best route.

"The routes which seemed most to occupy the attention of the Convention, was the route just indicated, and the routes from Memphis, from St. Louis, and from some part intermediate between these two, as from the mouth of the Ohio to San Francisco or Monterey. The delegates from the northern valley States were in favor of a still more northern route.

"Now, in order properly to understand the claims of these several routes, let us suppose that, as far as topographical features and facilities for constructing the road are concerned, all of these several routes shall be found to be equally practicable. Upon what principle is the choice of routes to be made? That route should be selected which, being topographically practicable, will best subserve the great purposes of National defense as far as it can be done consistently with this great and prime object.

"The route may be modified so as to better subserve the great interests of commerce in peace, and the eastern terminus may be located so as to be most acceptable to all the States and convenient to the people.

"In the first place, let us see, always supposing all the routes to be equally practicable, which will best subserve the great object of national defense.

"The eastern terminus of that route is obviously the navy-yard at Memphis, where the immense naval resources of the Mississippi valley in war are to be gathered, and from which sails and cordage, rigging, provisions, and every item in the catalogue of ship chandlery, with men, and munitions of war, are to be poured in upon the Pacific over this road and its western branches to San Diego, Monterey, and San Francisco. If Government do not build branches to these ports on the Pacific, our citizens will.

"The southern route is the best for National defense because it will not be obstructed by the snows of winter, and will, therefore, be