The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-03-13


 Tonnage net gauge, steam
 vessels entering .......... .5SS, S5S 47,157 Tonnage reg. steamersclear-
 Ing ...-.. ....................SS .SS2, 5O4 64l, ,bl4 Tonnage net gauge clearing. .596, 965 460,1l4 First class passengers arriy-
 Ing and leaving ..-....... 5,49S 4.213 Second class passen gers ar
 irving and leaving ... 10,25S s,104 Third class passengers ar-
 irving and 1eavinf ...... 75,540 61,5T7 Head of cattle entering ... 2.s46 -
 These figures reveal the rapidity with which Antwerp Is advancing in favor with the shipping people. Its trade with the various South American countries and with the East Indies is large. and it's connections with the United States are steadily improving. With New York 1t has long been firmly bound and, al- though Boston has no passenger service to this port, the new connection which the International Mercantile Marine com pany established about year ago, has already contributed to swell the total of the commerce. The cattle, for in- stance, which appeared as an import for the first time in 1903. all came by way of Boston.
 What gives the city of Antwerp it's par ticular advantage over European compet- itors-and the competition for trans-At- 1antic traffic has become very keen-is the combination of quaps and basins with their network of connecting railways, which make up decidedly the most admir- able system of terminal facilities on the continent of Europe. Great basins and docks extending far inland. together with dry docks have been created and fur ther very important developments are in prospect The Scheldt itself in the neigh borhood of the city. is from 900 to 2o00 feet wide, and has a mean depth of about thirty feet at low water.
 During the Renaissance.
 In the days of the Renaissance all the shipping was gathered about the lower part of the city, near where the cele- brated Maison Hanseatique, built in 1884 by the celebrated Hanseatique League, still stands and does commercial service. To the imaginative foresight of Napo- leon, however these quays along the river front did not suffice. He conceived and started the vast aggregation of maritime basins at the north end of the city. The two oldest of them all, which the French emperor himself constructed, are the Petit Bassih and the Grand Bassin. In these. 8ntered from the river by a mar row channel, a number of good-sized ves- sels can at any time be moored for dis  in use, but they early proved inadequate to the needs of the port SO that at a somewhat later period another system of intereonnected basins was started. The entrance to these is through a deep canal. running from the Scheldt Into the big Bassin du Kattendyk, which serves as sort of central clearing house for the other and more distant basins such as the Bassin Mexico, the Bassin aux Bois, the Bassin de la Carpine and the Bassln de Gateage Nord There are likewise several dry docks or caleS seches.
 This collection of docks, great as it is, is not regarded by the enterprising Ant werpians as a finality On the contrary they hold 1t as only a question of few days when the grand coupure" or great cut will be built, intersecting big loop of the Scheldt just above the city. When this thing happens the importance of the port will be greatly enhanced.
 Prosperity Dates From 1794.
 The revived prosperity of Antwerp dates only from 1794, for from 164S, when the treaty of Munster closed the Schedt to all seagong vessels, up to the time when the French tore down the forts erected by the jealous Dutch at the mouth of the river, all the life and industry of the city stag nated Even since the opening of the river there have been times of depression especially about 1882 when the Antwerp ians unwilingly joined in the revolution started by the Dutch, and suffered severe ly at the hands of the French, Since 1863, however the city has had only good times. and, like many other old and ap- parently ervativeacommunities it has merited it's prosperity by exhibiting re- markabe progressiveness not only in gathering together the means of great commence, but by making the city in ev- cry way alluring to the world that travels. Antwerp, as the delighted American finds, is a town in which the old has been pre- served and the new so constructed as not to detract from the character of the an- tique. The modern city shows handsome residences on straight avenues magnif- cent geological gardens, parks, boule- wards and Qualifications extending all about the city. Probably no other Euro pean community not even in Germany, the land of civic betterment, has made more progress in the arts of decoration than Antwerp. If there were nothing in the place antedating 1860 1t would still be