The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1868-09-03
The Course and Destination Of Commerce.
Tho Future OF tho United States.


Tho Future OF tho United States.
All the developments and signs OF the times
show that the United States are destined to be
the great centre of the commerce of the world
and q greater commercial Power than ever
existed before. In contemplating this subject
of the growth and course Of commerce 1t is
curious to notice its uniform direction from
east to west. The earliest records we have Of
commerce-and these are often exaggerated
and not very reliable-are from Asia. The
great cities of Babylon, Nineveh and Palmyra,
in Central Asia, as well as Thebes and other
cities Of Egypt, for example, had an interior
commerce carried on chiefly by caravansaries
or on the backs Of camels. 1t does not appear
from history that even the great rivers of Asia
and Afica-the Euphrates, the Tigris and the
Nile-were used for this purpose, or, at most,
to any extent. The early nations living on or
bordering them did not understand even river
navigation. We have no knowledge that the
interior seas, as those of the Euxine, the Cas-
plan or the Sea of Aral, were navigated for
commerce in the earliest historical times,
though 1t is not improbable that the inhabi-
tants on these, as well as on the great rivers,
might have used canoes, or something like
them, to limited extent, as the natives of the
South Sea islands do at this day. As to the
early cities of the interior of that part of Asia
known as Palestine or Asia Minor, such as
Sodom and Gomorrah, the cities of the plains,
and Jerusalem, they had but limited trade,
and that only carried by beasts of burden.
Asia were unknown, and, therefore, nothing
can be said of the commerce there.
The earliest accounts of commerce by navi-
cation or of the use of vessels for war in
sacred and pagan history are those mention
ing the ships of Tarshish, which brought trea-
sures and materials to Solomon at the time Of
building the Temple, and those of Homer
about the fleets of Greece, which besieged
Troy. Then we come to Tyre and Sidon, on
the Asiatic coast of the Mediterranean. These
sense of that term. Their trading vessels
went to the different ports of Greece, to Italy
and to other ports of the Mediterranean.
Carthage then rose as great commercial
emporium on the coast of Africa, and after
wards Alexandria in Egypt. Commerce at
that time was centred and spread along the
eastern shores of the Mediterranean. The
Carthaginians or Phenicians carried their
commerce through the Straits of Gibraltar,
formed colonies on the coast of Spain and
penetrated as far as Britain, where they
opened the tin mines of Cornwall. This was
the commencement of a more extensive and out
side commerce-an ocean commerce-far to the
westward and northward. 1t may be said,
indeed, that when the Carthaginians passed
the columns of Hercules they laid the founda-
ton of modern commerce. With the ascen-
dancy and dominion of the Roman empire the
commercial supremacy of the coasts of Africa
and Asia declined and was transferred to the
western shores of the Mediterranean. But
during that long period Of the decline of the
Roman empire commerce was nearly extin-
of conquest occupied the attention Of the
Romans almost exclusively.
But more important commercial era COM
menced with the rise of Venice. in the twelfth
century, and the other great marts Of COM
merce in Italy. Venice for centuries was the
first maritime and commercial Power of the
world and she monopolized the trade with
India by the way Of Egypt. But the Vene-
tians lost this when the route by the Cape of
Good Hope was discovered. Farther west
still the seat of commercial empire tended,
when Spain Portugal and Holland eclipsed the
maritime cities and republics of Italy. The
ships of those nations traversed every sea
and their colonies were established in both the
eastern and western hemspheres. They fill
glorious page in the commercial history of the
world. But soon more western and greater
people still arose and overshadowed them and
all previous commercial nations. The British
then became the first maritime Power. That
grand old flibuster, Admiral Blake, in the
time of Queen Elizabeth, did great deal to-
wards giving England the maritime and COM
mercial supremacy which the British have held
ever since. But westward the star of COM
merce continues to wend its way. This mighty
republic, the colonial offspring of Great Britain,
is destined to eclipse the glory of its parent and
oil former commercial nations. The United
States occupy the most central position on the
globe. With Europe on one hand and Asia on
the other we shall be the centre and medium
Of commerce for both. BY the improvements
in steam navigation the Atlantic and Pacific
oceans have become only like lakes. The Pa
ciac railroads, stretching across the Continent
from one ocean to the other and connecting
with the steamships on both, will concentrate the
trade Of the world here, and New York and
San Francisco must become the greatest cities
on the globe. The magnetic telegraph, which
has put us in instant communication with Eu-
rope, and which in few years will do the