The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-11-10

the altered conditions of industry and trade
in the South, as evidences of the inevitable
and irretrievable decline Of New Orleans as
commercial metropolis. This We conceive to
be a Jump in the dark to conclusion as
questionable as it is undesirable. 1t is going
out of the way to look for difficulty, peril and
encouragement, as though there were not
plenty of these Immediately at hand to occu-
DIV the thoughts and energies of all classes of
our people The conclusion, unnecessary as
it is, would undoubtedly prove disastrous if
generally assented to. 1t is the nature OF q
gloomy, though fanciful, contemplation like
this to "make the meat it feeds on" in
more real sense than jealousy, by promoting
the apprehended misfortune. Those who
thus borrow trouble of the future are the
most hopeless of bankrupts.
The occasional transportation of cotton by
rail to New York from some points whose
trade, as We frequently hear it said, "natu-
rally belongs" to New Orleans, is, indeed, a
very significant fact. But, really, on the face
of it we can see nothing to justify the notion
that it is unnatural. On the contrary, if such
proceedings are approved by their CONNER
cial results, we can conceive nothing more
natural than that they should be persisted in.
And, on the other hand should they turn out
improbable, and should the shipment of
cotton to New Orleans, by river or rail, from
any point whence it has been diverted of late
to New York, offer superior advantages,
nothing will be more natural than for the
cotton product at that point to find its way to
this city and it will certainly do SO by law
as unalterable as that which causes water to
descend or vapor to rise.
1t is entirely futile, therefore, to lay claim
to any material of commerce as naturally
belonging to this city, or to draw distinctions
between natural and artificial channels and
movements of trade. In one sense, commerce
itself, in all its processes and all its aspects,
is artificial and the more it is developed, the
more intelligently it is cultivated, the more
complex and elaborate must be its artifciality.
1t is impossible to designate a method for
transporting commodities by land or water, if
we descend all the way from the splendid
steamship to the Indian pirogue, or from the
railway train to the Arabian caravan, that is
so simple as not to be artificial. If, then, in
any direction, artificial appliances Of COM
merce threaten to divert to another destina-
ton products which might otherwise come to
this city, it is supremely absurd to protest
against the fact as something contrary to
nature. 1t simply devolves upon our COM
intelligent and enterprising body of men, to
offset, if they reasonably can the commercial
agencies that are working to their injury by
others which will work to their benefit; and
if this is not to be done, in regard to the par
ticular competition, to look around for the
compensatory resources which the actual
situation presents and address themselves
with hopeful assiduity to the work of turning
them to the highest account
There is no lack of such resources, depend
upon it. 1t is not impossible for New Orleans
to gain in other fields of trade more ground
than she is in danger of losing by the north
ward diversion of cotton. This diversion by
no means indicates an absolute loss of trade.
While it shows that the cotton factorage sys-
TEN of the city, once based on dangerous
initiation of credit, has contracted within
safer limits, it also suggests the opening up
of opportunities for more various investments
and for greater versatility of commercial
enterprise than were possible when cotton
overshadowed and, measurably or wholly,
crushed every interest which was not directly
tributary to it. A careful survey of the city
will discover that its business is difused over
larger surface than ever before, and that if
the volume of its Commercial activities is less
subsistence to greater number than
in the days when such activities
were mostly absorbed in the range of transac-
tons incident to the cotton market. Nor
was the population of the city ever so large as
now, bordering close upon three hundred
thousand. Many of these, as in all cities, are
idlers and non-producers. But in the long
run, all of them, except those who claim the
privileges of rogues, Migrants, and carpet
baggers, must make an honest living by some
sort of work unless they represent the pres
ence of ready cash adequate to their support.
Thus, this increase of population would ne
cessarily tell at length, if it were not already
ttlllIy, III Tue luclctisc VI pfOuuCtlNc ldDOftrS
in the city. And such, after all, is the only
solid basis of city's prosperity.
1t would be well, also, for those who point
| lugubriously to the attraction northward of a
few hundred bales of Southern cotton, to con-
slider the attraction hitherward of an incom-
putable quantity of Western grain. Nothing
but universal war in Europe could raise the
price of this grain so high as to justify its gen.
eral shipment at railroad rates, and the ice
blockade along the lake and canal route of the
North leaves no available channel but the Mis-
sssippiriver. In few years, it is no wild cal
culation to suppose, New Orleans will be
the depot of not less than two hundred mil
| lion bushels of grain
For the rest, it is not to be doubted that
this city is in one of the stages-an inconve-
nient and in some degree dangerous stage-of
commercial transition. But there is no valid
ground for concluding that the future before
it is to be an era of commercial decline, or
| that IL is now touching the mann mira of