New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1854-10-23
COAL.

An official exhibit just published By the Dau-
phin and Susquehanna Coal Company furnishes
a striking confirmation of the statements we have
recently laid before our readers in regard to the
expenditure that has been incurred with view to
furnish the market with it's present supply of
fuel. II is announced therein that the Company
in question, after having expended almost 81 OOO,-
0C0 in opening mines, constructing roads, building
houses aud erecting engines, has become utterly
bankrupt and that the whole property of the Com.
pany must now 20 to the first class of mortgage
bosdholders, to the entire exclusion Of the sec
ond class of bonds, and of course of all other
creditors and to the humiliation Of all value in
the stock.
This case ia worse than any other that has fall
len under our notice but il is strictly la harmony
with the results observed in numerous others.
OF the persons v ho furnished the means for the
construction of the Reading Railroad, the Schuyl-
kill, and Lehigh Canals, and other similar works,
many have lost nearly all their capital, while
others sitter having for years been deprived of
income, could not now sell out without loss Of
one half of their original investment Tie
interest upon the Pennsylvania Canals leading to
the coal region has, We believe, to large extent,
been paid out OF taxes levied upon the people Of
other parts of the State, and thus it has been
that we have been supplied with heat and power
at less than half their former cost, while most
of those by " HON II has been supplied have been
ruined
correspondent writes US that we have great
ly uLdeI estimated the amount Of capital that has
been applied to the accomplishment Of this great
object. He says that be has examined the matter
carefully and tia. lie is prepared to show, that
withou. reference TO any value hatsoever in the
land, the amount that has been expended would
not be covered by one hundred and fifty million
Of dollars 1t is an astounding SUN but we have
every reason to believe that he is right. To pay
mere legal interest upon that sum would require
ten million of dollars, or two dollars upon each
tun of coal that this year comes to market
Not, however, that any such contribution
would be required had the trade been permitted
to develop itself in due proportion to the expen-
ditures that have been made. The difficulty, as
our correspondent says, is that the market
has been 20 repeatedly cut down By the ruin of
the coal producers customers the makers of
cloth and of iron as in the period from 1887 to
was being sacrificed to British free trade that
the trade has not grown to the extent required
for supplying the consumer cheaply while prop
ery rewsrding the producer; and here, as we
think lies the real difficulty Of the case. Now
that the great avenues Of communication with the
coa region have been completed at such enor.
nous eost it would seem quite clear that COM
paratiyely slight expenditure would suffice for 30
increasing the facilities as to pass ten millions
as readily as FIVE are now passed; and, if we are
correctly informed, FIVE millions Of dollars ap-
piled to improvements in the coal region would
soon double the supply from the mines. II is
here, as everywhere, that the first operations are
the most expensive and least productive What,
however, is the inducement held out TO men to
iIyest their means in such improvements Our
railroad owners being ruined and 80 is likely
to be with all who have contributed their means
to the production of anything that cannot
be exported. Our future is, and Is univer-
sally felt to be, entirely uncertain. We are over
head and ears in debt, and every week witnesses
the export Of million Of dollars in gold followed
BY the explosion Of banks, the ruin of merchants,
the discharge of iaborers. the decline Of trade,
and the destruction Of value in ships, houses aud
lands. And We are thus surrounded by all the
evidences Of an approaching crisis; but instead
Of preparing for it by the adoption of measures
tending to arrest the export of gold, we have just
bound ourselves up for ten years to purchase all
the wheat and all the coal that the British colo
nists may choose to send US, and to add this de-
mand for gold to those already existing in conse-
quence of our determination to buy our cloth and
our iron abroad. instead Of making them at home.
Every thing is done to prevent cloth, iron or coal
from being cheaply produced at home. The
whole country 10 sacrificed to the Belmonts and
CHER money jobbers, who are enriched st the
csst of the men who make roads, build furnaces
aud open mines. Aud al tais 10 done IN he 1aue