The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1859-06-11
r-.~re.s In the Ola world and the

New.
The London Nems Of the World, in an
article on national progress, refers to some
of the wonderful events 10 the grand mareh
of the age in which we live. ITO THINK
that our men and women" says the Aescs,
"when they were boys and girls, saw the
lynasties of a thousand years knocked over
like ninepins--the greatest monarchs in Eu-
rope made shorter by the head, or fugitives
An adventurer of yesterday, making him-
self the great Emperor of the world; that
the power loom and the spinning jenny were
not yet that the servant with laborsome
petition wrung the slow leave Of flint
and steel to strike a light in the undertook
to kindle the morning FIRE that the dim
streets glimmered in the DOUBTFUL "dark-
ness visible" of train-oil lamps; that the
theatres were illuminated with wax candles;
that the lancet was never ont of the sur
geon's hand, and calomel and starvation
were the physicians specifics. 1t then took
six months go to India, six weeks to Anne
RIGA, sixty hours to Edinburgh, at the swift
est. There was no steamboat on the sea, no
engine in the factory, no stocking-loom, no
ace-weavins, no stereotype or steam press,
no railways, no telegrapbs, no cheap BOOKS,
no penny postage There was no Mel
bourne, or Sydney, or Adelaide, or Auck-
land, Hobart Town, or Cape Town. upper
Canada was the place Of the bison and
red men; there was scarcely white man
in the Western States, and not four mil
lions of Americans anywhere. Now! 1t
takes away ones breath merely to think
of what we have come to. The discovery OF
America-,he mariners compass, the art OF
printing, the Baconian philosophy, the rev.
lations Of Newton-all these were vast Meo-
rctieal conquests of the human mind men,
seeds, however, for slow future germinatiore
painful CESSATION, and elaborate develop
ment. But our modern acquisitions-those
which the last half century has revealed
were all of immediate practical use, reduced
to instant requisition. The luclfer match,
the spinning jenny, the power-loom, the
steam-epgine, the steamboat, the telegraph,
and railway train, the hydraulic RAM steam
hammer, the law of storms, the science and
instruments of navigation that have gwen
even to the old means of the mariner treble
the efficiency, by raising the speed OF sail
ing ships to that extent; the daguerreotype,
stereoscope, and we know not how many OF
the trumphs of this nineteenth century,
have all become instantly available, on the
widest scale, in the most practicable shape,
and up 10 the very highest point OF efflclen-
cy and usefulness at once. You can go to
India in mouth America in week, Edin-
burgh in eleven hours get well bound
new bible for 1Od; converse with people two
thousand miles off in a minute get lace at
a penny yard, and handsome gown for
s.. You can kill with rifle at half q
mile, and with ordnance at four; take your
likeness py the sun in one second; ; sail
against wind and tide, and make the mid
night city like midday, by means of air
through pipes. Nay, we import as much
gold from our own colonies to this one
country in a single year, as vas received byall
Europe in the preceding quarter of CEN
tury."
4 Philadelphia journal adds to this grand
summary, a few highly interesting facts, il
Illustrative of American prorgess. Our pop
ulation has increased from three millions to
twenty-five millions the States from thir-
teen to thirty-three; our commerce in lT9l
was:valued at $50 900 imports, and
$1,000, 900 exports. Last year 1883, it,
amounted TO the enormous sum of $685.
6l2, $50 in imports. and 1924 644, 42l in ex-
ports, (specie included. Our exports of cot
ton alone-a product entirely new since the
revolution, reached the unprecedented value
of Sl3l, 1886, Sol; and of tobacco, SIT ,009,-
767. Journeys that formerly occupied a
week, are now accomplished in twelve or
fourteen hours. Our linear extent of rail-
roads is 27,75 miles; we have As, 900 miles
of telegraph wires, and 1882 miles of navi
gable canals. California averages pro-
duct of fifty millions gold per annum. In
1858, the United States MINIS coined $751;
357, OsS in gold. silver aud copper. Our
manufactures employ two millions of per-
SONS, at an annual cost of 1898, 900, 900 for
labor