The San Francisco call., 1896-04-26
Captain w. L. Merry Takes an
Opportunity to Impress
a Point.
NEW LIFE FOR THIS PORT.
The Position of San Francisco Will
Admit of Her Commercial
EnfranchiSement.

The following communication is SELF
explanatory:
The last number of the Manufacturers Rec
ord of Baltimore contains the tollowlng'
LONG AND SHORT HAUL
AS an Illustration OF the cheapness & OF water ,sd
transportation as compared Win raiIr0Ao h@'eo A'
following is very significant; -. 1rorro.
of marble recently sent from Iennes- ~ nis
to San Francisco. Instead OF shipping IL ali
rail either by New Orleans or ST. Louis IL was seht
in opposite direction. The car went via Ine
Knoxville, Cumberland Gap and Louisville ana Dy
fast freight line through Hagerstown, Nd, TO
New York City. Here 1t VIII be transietIseu ~ q
ship and started on its voyage down the Atlantic,
around Cape Horn aud up the Pacific 10 San Fran
cisco Although this distance is fully lo'UOO nlles
It is cheaper to send it by water than overland
about 5000 miles.
To San Francisco merchants there is nothing
novel about this. Indeed, merchandise has
been hauled from points further west than
tennessee to be shipped from New YORK around
Cape Horn to the Pacific Coast. But the in
stance, regarded as an exceptional case In
Baltimore, emphasizes the fact that san Fran
cisco can never be fully prosperous until me
conditions OF transportation are changed, and
even now 1t is, as the above proves, her posi-
t1on as seaport that is her salvation. Kali
ways alone can never make San francisco
great commercial emporium, and assert this
with tull comprehension of their great utility
and Importance. When we have short and
cheap waterway to and from the Atlantic our
seaport will see new life, and in the activity
which will result the railways, especially
tnose reacnlng tlQeWater mere, Will snare Win
our City its new prosperity.
Comparatively unsuccessful will be our
efforts to settle this State and to pro-
cure the prosperity which we have right
to expect in San Francisco until the condt-
tions of transportation changed. What
benefits 1t to increase our producers when they
have even now insufficient markets2 What
advantage is there in increasing manufactures
when we have so limited clientage to sup
port them? Does not every intelligent man
know that we are suffering from arrested de-
velopment? We may increase the tacilities
for distribution, and thus improve our com
mercial condition to a moderate extent, but
more decisively than ever before am author
lied by existent facts, like the one above
quoted, to assert that only the Nicaragua
canal is a full solution of our present unsatis-
factory condition.
Every inland transportation interest will be
equally benefited by it, for il is impossible that
our people shall be prosperous without trans
portation interests sharing with them the pros
perity which will come to US through short
and cheap waterway to the great markets OF
the worldl 1t is the ''short hauP' that pays
railroads the best, and the 'long hauP on
such products as railroads cannot handle ad-
vantageously may be diverted to water carriage
with great advantage to them, provided the
short haul be increased. The Nicaragua canal
is the solutionl WILLIAM L. MERRY.