The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-09-21
NATIONAL PROJECTS.
New aTouth for the Mississippi River-NorfoIL
TO be Made an Important Port.

From Washington correspondence to the N.
Y. Herald, we take the following
The naturally navigable waters of the Mis-
sissippi valley aggregate nearly 100 miles
Water has its currents and so has trade. But
those of the latter do not run with the formers
for in the main the great outletof trade is north
east by the lakes, Erie Canal and Hudson, in
stead of south, by the Gulf of Mexico. 1t is now
proposed to open way across the Virginia
mountains broad and deep enough to drain the
Mississippi valley ilue eastward into the Chesa-
peake, not OF water of course, but of pro-
duce. The old James River and Kanawha
Canal - already finished half the distance -
was to connect the waters of the james
with those of the Kanawha, a tributary of the
Ohio; but the proposed canal is to be of ca
pacity equal ut least TO the great Erie Canal of
New York. Such q canal, by supplying 400
miles of the route, would open the way for trans
portation without trausshpment between the
ocean and 1900 miles of already navigable
inland waters. The project is to be brought
before Congress this winter, and it is expected
that it will be pettioned for by citizens of every
part of the Union Great considerations of
national defense are said by military men to
justify 1t, but the grand commercial hypothesis
is the manner in which it would affect the grain
interest of the West and the bread interest of the
East. 1t appears by official reports of United
States engineers charged with surveys, ETC.. of
proposed national canals in the Northwest that
the dangers of lake navigation, the numerous
transshipments, the necessity of much railroad
carriage and the closing of navigation five
twelfths of the year, besides the heavy tolls on
the Erie Canal, all make the cost of carrying
Western grain to the seaboard by existing routes
enormous. For example:-It is reported that
from Dubuque, Iowa, TO New York the freight
and charges amount to sixty-cight cents
bushel The effect of this is that before the pro-
ducer gets to market he has spent the bulk of
his grain in paying the way On the other
hand, the Eastern purchaser, of New England
and New York, has to pay whatever price the
demand imposes upon an article already
enhanced by such heavy way charges. Now, it
is claimed, upon very careful analogies and all
other data, that the siXty-eight cents might be
reduced half or even three-quarters, fthis great
Atlantic canal were opened, so that Western
grain could reach New York, Boston, etc.,
through the port of Norfolk. The far West, IN
Chicago as they would then pay to get it to the
seaboard. The reduction of carrying cost would
naturally divide itself equally between the con-
sumner and producer, so that while the New
Yorker would get his bread cheaper the Buckeye
would sell his wheat higher. Indian corn, now
unknown as bread out of this country, though
freely eaten by our foreign population, could
then be sent abroad cheaply enough to make it a
preferred breadstuff for the poor OF Christen-
dom, with the effect of virtually bringing into
new existence an American export that might
rival cotton itself in time source of national
wealth.
Another great work proposed is the Coosa
cotton route, from Mobile up the Alabama river,
thence up the Coosa river till within thirty miles
of the south bend of the Tennessee river; across
this thirty miles ship canal; thence up the
Tennessee and its longest branch, the Holston.
to the borders of Virginia, near Saltville; from
Saltville to Lynchburg (already traversed by a
railroad) q double-track road, fit for heavy
freights, and at Lynchburg striking the Atlantic
water route above mentioned to New York.
The railroad route is 176 miles long; all the
rest water. The route would save nearly 2000
miles of the present route which cotton takes
from the cotton centres in New York and the
other cities North and also the dangers of the
Florida Keys, for which insurance alone is two
and a half per cent on ship and cargo.
The advocates of these works claim that they
are more truly national than the Pacific rail-
ways, of which they are the necessary compile
ment. If, as half the thoughtful commercial
men of Europe fear, the trade of the world is to
abandon the routes of Vasco de Cana and Ma
gellan and cross the bosom of the great repub-
lie, the proposed water route from the genial
mouth of the Chesapeake to Omaha, at least, OIL
northwardly to the very base of the Rocky
Mountains, would give the country an advan.
tage in absorbing the Indian trade Of all nations
immensely greater than railway transportation
the whole distance between the oceans.