The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1859-04-26
In an age like the present-which has been char

In age like the present-which has been char
acterized as one of intense commercial activity
vigilance and crcumspection, sagacity and fore
thought are essential conditions to success in
business. Especially is this true in a country like
ours, where the progress of population has not
only baffled all ordinary calculations, but where
also from combination of causes-which cannot
now be said to prevail to any very great extent
the current of trade has been diverted from its
natural channels. The great navigable rivers and
their tributary canals, which, at one time, formed
the most practicable highways from the remote in
terror to market, have lost much of their earlier
Importance, now that turnpike roads have been SUI
perseded by railways, and the Conestoga wagon
by the locomotive. The introduction of the rail,
combined with the use of steam, has revolution.
lied the carrying trade, and by bringing distant
points into comparatively close proximity, has
given, or is destined to give, to each prominent
commercial centre the full benefit of all the advan.
tages to which it can justly lay claim. But
neither favorable geographical position, nor the
most perfect facilities for transporting goods pro-
duce, will suffice of themselves to build up the
trade of city. These are but means to an end
Mercantile energy and forecast must do the rest
1t is not enough that the workman is put in pos
session of tools machinery of the most approved
construction, he must know bow to use them. He
must do more. Every man who is engaged in
trade must learn where his commodities are most
in demand; must seek out customers for them, and
must be prepared to anticipate competition. What
ever the articles are that are designed for SALE or
however various or intrinscally excellent they
may be, their qualities and uses must be made
publicly known before they can find purchasers.
Nor should the efforts to disseminate this knowl-
edge be restricted to a particular locality. A
thorough man of business, whether he be merchant
or manufacturer, will seek his market wherever it
is to be found, and will make use of all honorable
means of extending the range and the number of
his customers. He will keep himself well
informed with regard to the prices at which
goods similar to those in which he deals may
be bought or sold in other markets; he will
measure carefully his own ability TO enter
the field of competition, and will seize
every favorable opportunity for establishing COM
mercial relations with those distant sections of
country which the opening up of new avenues of
travel and traffic may have rendered easy of access
the merchants of this city have failed to keep them
selves posted concerning the vast changes which
the extension of the Railway system throughout
the interior is working in the old and, in many in
stances, artificial channels of trade, and that while
those of New York and Philadelphia have been
vigorously prosecuting their business operations
in the West and North West-by personal can
wasting, by liberal advertising, and by those
various modes of procedure which sagacity and
enterprise suggest-our citizens have been content,
for the most part with such chance custom as
might happen to fall in their way. Yet
one who has watched the material pro-
gress of Baltimore during the last quarter
of century can doubt that - rapid as it
has been-her future increase in wealth and
population might be considerably accelerated if
proper means were taken to keep the merchants of
the interior thoroughly acquainted with regard to
her advantages as market. 1t is not enough
that we should give publicity to the facts that our
city numbers now two hundred and sixty Thousand
Inhabitants that even prior to the completion of the
Railway connection with the Ohio and Mississ;nn.
valleys, were doubling population every
thirteen and half years; that between 1910 and
1850, our manufactures increased in annual value
from thirteen millions of dollars to thirty-three
millions and that since the last census various
new branches of mechanical industry have been
successfully introduced. All these general state
ments, though true in themselves, are too vague
to be of essential service to persons at distance
What they require are details. They want to
know not only what the articles are that we have
for sale, their price and quality and the cost of
transportation to given point; but what we are
prepared to purchase in return, and what induce
ments we can hold out to them to deal with us in
preference to dealing with other cities. They
want In brief bill of particulars, and it is to the
interest Of our business men, that every species of