Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, Va. [W. Va.]) 1852-1859, 1853-08-17
Baltimore and Now Orleans

We had occasion, yesterday, to allude TO the
commanding position occupied by the city OF Bal
timore with respect to the trade of the South and
Southwest if she but appreciate her true position,
and make but the proper efforts to grasp the faci
tiles almost within her reach.
The evident tendency of things is to make Bal
timore the great commercial depot of very large
portion Of the Southern trade The great currents
or commerce, like the channels of great rivers are
ever nuctuating, and to enc who looks with a
philosophic eye upon the promises of the future
they are ever wrapped up in the present and the
mast. these changes may with no small degree of
certainty, in most cases, be predicted. New Or
leans, at present the chief mart of Southern COM
merce, is so, mainly from temporary necessity.
She IS neither geographically nor conveniently To-
caled for the wide and commanding influence
which the interests of the Southern Cotton trade
reouire. She is too far from the chief cotton mar
keis abroad; too far from the Gulf of Mexico, too
far from the great marts CT general commerce, and
loo fiat for the confidence of capitalists. She is
even now subject TO the most alarming and disas-
ttous overfiows from the great father of waters,
and it is most clearly shown by the mastery report
of Mr. Elicit, that the present system of leveeing
The upper waters of the Mississippi and her tribu-
taries must greatly increase the danger and fire..
ouency of such calamities. Even as things now
me. it is wen known that few of the great busi-
ness houses of New Orleans hold much permanent
interest in the city. They there merely from the
necessity of the business which has hitherto been
confined by natural barriers to that city. The
sickness of the summer season dives them away
the greater portion of the year, and the precarous
value of real estate, at all times, makes themun-
willing to vest theit capialt permanently in such
fotms as would give stability to the fortunes of the
city!
But more and weightier than allthis is thegreat
principle that nothing short of the necessity of cir
cums,ances, such as have heretofore favored New
Orleans, can ever sustain city in her commerce,
which has not at the same time something like an
equal amount of imports with her exports. Ships
WILL with other things being equal, seek their la
ding at the same OF the nearest ports to those they
have entered with their homeward bound freight
and unless a city can command an importing, as
well as an exporting trade, her facilities for trans
shipments must be limited. This is great en-
barraSsment to trade, clog upon the rapidity
of interchange, which is essential to successful
commerce. 1t is well known that this difficulty
applies peculiarly to New Orleans. For weeksand
months the cotton commerce is emblazoned by the
scarcity of tonnage the importing trade ofthe
city is so small as to promise remedy or
relief The future must be, relatively, wOrse than
the present, for much of the supplies heretofore
furnished to the Mississippi Valley by that city,
are now pouring in upon it from the North over
the new railroads which are bringing the Southern
and Western States into such easy and cheap COM
mereiaI relations with the great Atlantic cities.
These cities would gladly take her cotton. They
have the capital to bring ii, the shipping to send
it abroad, and wider range Of competition to reg
uate and sustain the price Of this great Southern
staple Heretofore, the difhculty has been the
want of a cheap transportation between tho South
and the great Atlantic cities. This difficulty is.
however, now removed-the Baltimore and Ohio
railroad has surrounded the mighty mountain
chain which heretofore rose, like an ocean barrier,
10 roll back the commerce of the South into its
ngesent fnconvenient channels, and the connec.
ton, which this gleat line of Railroad has made
and is contemplating still further to make. with
the Union Line of steamers on the Ohio liver, as
low down as Louisville, and thence through the
regular Mississippi packets, with New Orleans
herself; will still further obyiate this inconye-
nience, so that we may confidently predict that in
short time vast changes will take place in thc1
currents OF this trade, and the Baltimore and Ohio
Railroad, and It's Southern connections, become
the main channel by which they viii disenbogue
themselves in the great bosom of universal COM
lnercs. Let this course Of trade be once fairly
o1sasa. aud The doom of New Orleans IS fxed,
IS com nee viii be gone, her capital transieted3
10 81 hef her leyees neglected, and the spot
,bcs s. with The activities Of trade. deserted