The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-07-23
The ADVERTISERS
 M HOME STUDY CIRCLE


 I by travelling eighteen hours day, | The exeerable roads arfdathe lack of i bridges caused frequent delays and | mishaps. if nothing worse. The cross | ing from Brooklyn to New York was a | dangerous trip in winter and continued | to be until the application of steam to | the ferryboats. When these were the | conditions where trade was most active and travelling most usual we can | imagine the innumerable dangers and | accidents on the less common routes. It
 is no wonder that gentlemen setting
 out on a journey of 300 miles should ' give a farewell banquet and solemnly
 say good-by to their friends.
 | If we turn our attention for a mo-
 ment from the seaboard to the country beyond the mountains we find here and | there an outpost of civilization. Daniel | Boone was daring the dangers from wild beasts and wilder men in Ken lucky. Western Tennessee was being
 settled. But the country to the north. Ohio. Indiana and Illinois, was still the | home of the buffalo. St. Louis was be- | coming a center for the fur trde. The | Great Lakes were practically unknown. The Mississippi River was hopelessly remote from civiliza ton and it seemed barely possible that this river could | he of any importance for many dec- ades.
 1 If to these discouraging conditions | the state of the country after the war | be added the outlook for expansion was | gloomy and 1t Is no wonder that the western territory was valued so light | ly. The country was heavily in debt, | there was no efficient central power. l of int or | feelings. The states were jealous of each other and each tried to profit at the expense of the others. States which | had "no convenient ports for foreign | commerce were subject to be taxed by | their neighbors through whose ports l their commerce was carried on. New | Jersey, placed between Philadelphia | and New York, was likened to a cask | tapped at both ends; and North Caro-
 lima. between Virginia and South Caro- | lima, to a patient bleeding at both
 arms" These are the words which
 James Madison used in timely and | influential pamphlet.
 | In the different States there were | local causes of trouble, which threat ened to paralyze any forward move ment. Tn 17S4 North Carolina was | struggling with its rebellious colonies,
 which had formed the State of Frank land Virginia was rendered uneasy
 by the same movement. A little later | Pennsylvania was having trouble with | Connecticut about the settlers at Wy oming. Pa. Massachusetts was called
 upon to put down Shay's rebellion and | was having trouble with the settlers in | Maine. In all the States there were dangerous economic conditions. result | ing from the long war which threat ened troubles similar to Shay's rebel | lion.
 But fortunately all of these points of | danger were safely weathered. The | best men in the country recognized the evils and gave their labors unstintingly | for the public welfare. The compara- tive anarchy which had prevailed in many respects caused the States to come together and to be willing to sub ordinate some of their local interests. An efficient central government was | formed. All of the States came into the Union and Washington, aided by his cabinet and the Congress, went reso-
 lutely to work at the most pressing problems. The public debt was arrang- | ed for, peace was secured, commerce was fostered. The rage for emigration had set in. The Ohio company had flooded the set- dement's with circulars booming their
 grant of land. The extrayagant claims made for the new territory have been Justified by time and were sufficient then to attract many settlers. Some thousands went out from the east In 17S8, the land was rapidly taken up and prosperous settlements arose. As the land routes to the Atlantic coast were so difficult the only natural out let was by the Mississippi. For a time there was serious danger that the settlers west of the Alleghanies would conclude that their interests lay with the power that held the mouth of the Mississippi, and would separate them selves from the United States in order
 to ally themselves with Spain. This
 was one of the potent causes which brought the Mississippi River into prominence and which later led to the Louisiana purchase.
 In other respects, too, the country ad- vanced with rapidity which has had no parallel in history. In the closing years of the last century all sections shared in the general prosperity. Cot ton was becoming an important factor
 in the South, mills were going up in New England, new inventions brought added wealth. The sails of the United States vessels were to be found on all the highways of trade. In a word,
 the energy of the people was bound
 less. A few keen-sighted observers realized that the country would soon expand beyond it's boundaries, which had seemed so vast in 17S3. But no one dreamed of a country stretching from ocean to ocean and finding these con fines so limited that it would extend its grasp to far-distant islands in the Pacific.
 Copyright, 1S0O.)