Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1873-02-21

impracticable. as think, for there would
be 100 miles of close river and canal navi
CATION, and depth of only eight feet of
water.
After deyoting some time to the advocacy
of the Georgian Bay Canal, he said:
1t seems to me that cheaper freights from
Chicago TO the ocean would add immensely
TO the prosperity of every railroad between
Lake Michigan and the Rocky Mountains.
What they need is cheap freights to the
seaboard.
But it may be said that our commerce
would build up great city in a foreign
country on the lower St. Lawrence, a rival
to New York. The race will be between
Montreal and Quebec For myself think
the states west of Lake Michigan have fully
cancelled every debt they ever owed to New
York. For generation she has quartered
a horde Of political paupers and bummers
on her lateral canals, many of whom do not
collect tolls enough on her useless bitches
over which they preside to pay 1.-THE OF
their salaries, not to mention their steal
ings, and yet she insists on taxing the com
merce of the West to support all her canals
and to pay her debts besides. As to New
York city, she has for generation legal
lied the grasping avarice of the most stu
pendOas land pirate that ever lived
mean, of course, Commodore Vanderbilt.
He has watered the stock of the New York
Central railway over and over again, and
yet on these rascally values, he insists on
taxing the life out of the West for the
benefit of his own pocket. To keep pace
with him, Jay Gould and Jim Fisk stole,
not only the receipts of the Erie, but issued
stocks and bonds for more than the road
was originally worth, and stole them as
well and of course new managers must tax
Western commerce to retrieve the fortunes
OF the road, pay Its stockholders dividends
on their stocks, and bring them up TO par.
| believe the time is not distant when the
northwest will have the New York and the
St. Lawrence routes bidding against each
other for her carrying trade. Writing on
this subject nearly twenty years ago. said
80 Ii i true that national pride and I'M
mense capital and the beaten track OF com
merce are on the side of New York but
God and nature are stronger than all these,
and let any intelligent man compare the
Erie ditch with the mighty st; Lawrence
with a canal to pass vessels OF 900 tons
harden from the Georgian Bay to Toronto,
and he cannot doubt for a moment on
which side the immutable laws of commerce
will decide the contest A single cent per
bu>hel on freights, two days quicker time,
and Increased capacity will do it but six
cents on freights will turn our shipments of
produce to the New England States, and TO
Europe. all down the ST. Lawrence.
But. says one, how could we do without
the Niagara ship canal in time ofwar. Let
us have no war | am willing to put Amer
lea and Canada and England under the
strongest possible bonds to live in perpet
ual friendship and amity by the
certainty. in case of war, that her vast
products shall rot in her fields; Canada,
that her commerce shall be ruined, and
England with starvation. May the genius
of our Christian civilization, with the Royal
Cross of i. George in one hand and the
stars and stripes in the other, proclaim to
all the nations, let there be, now and ever
more. peace On earth and good will among
men