other, and more than ten steam-boats ply between the two every day, carrying from 500 to 1000 passengers each. Besides, the whole river, from one city to the other, is constantly whitened with sail-boats. And if there be any one route of the same distance, in the world, that excells all others for an easy, secure, certain, cheap, and speedy passage, it is to be found on the majestic river between New-York and Albany. To execute this road in a suitable taste for that region, if compared with the cost of other roads constructed by the United States, will amount to $3,000,000. As a specimen of government economy, the engineer had made eight separate surveys, to ascertain the proper route for a road, whereon to transport the mail from Baltimore to Philadelphia; the constructing of which, as regarded the transportation of the mail, would produce to the United States a considerable loss. This was demonstrable from existing facts, and a comparison with other roads. From Philadelphia to New-York was 96 miles, on a good turnpike road. The mail is transported daily between the two for 13,400 dollars. From Baltimore to Philadelphia is also 96 miles, on a road constructed and kept up by the people, who understand their true interest better than Congress, with all its train of engineers, and the mail is also transported daily between these two cities, and an additional mail transported daily from Baltimore to Washington, during the session of Congress, all for 18,735 dollars. So that the mail is transported from Baltimore to Philadelphia, on a country road, for a less sum than from Philadelphia to New-York, on a turnpike road. If we take into consideration the character of this road, its bridges, and especially the one over the Susquehannah, more than a mile wide, its width, its ornaments, and its fripperies, we cannot estimate the cost at less than 1,500,000 dollars, the interest of which, at six per cent, will amount to 90,000 dollars per annum. Then taking these plain facts together, they will give you this result: By adding 13,735 dollars, the sum now paid by the government for the transportation of the mail, to 90,000 dollars, the interest on the money expended, it will give you $103,735, the real sum the transportation of the mail will cost you for ever after. Mr. Smith remarked that, when the bill to make an appropriation for the repairs of the Cumberland road was before the Senate, he stated the average cost of that road had exceeded 13,000 dollars. It was contradicted by one gentleman, who attempted to prove, from documents, that it did not exceed $6,000 per mile. In defence of what he had then stated, as well as to lay before the Senate an official statement of the cost of the road-making system, in which the United States had so largely embarked, he had collected certain documents of 1827.

In a Report from the Treasury Department, 6th January, 1827, relative to the cost of that road, it appeared it had cost, up to that period, from Cumberland to Wheeling, a distance of only 130 miles, $1,710,298 93, which gives an average of 13,156 dollars per mile, on the whole distance. The sum paid to commissioners and a superintendent for that 130 miles, is 78,430 dollars 47 cents, which

will average 604 dollars 31 cents per mile, for superintendence only-a sum sufficient, itself, to make a good road.

Caspar W. Weaver, the superintendent, in an official report of the 25th of May, 1827, to the chief engineer, gives his estimate of 328,983 dollars 68 cents, then indispensably necessary for the repairs of that 130 miles, which will average 2,522 dollars 95 cents per mile, for repairs only!

Mr. Weaver, in another official report, 16th November, 1827, to the chief engineer, says-It was of great moment that a system or plan for the regular repairs of that great monument of the wisdom and munificence of the general government, should be established by Congress. And then goes on to say-the road had become too bad to be mended, and must, in a great degree, be made anew. And then further adds-without constant repairs it could never be travelled!

So incredible are the facts relative to the cost of this road, that it had become necessary to prove to the Senate, by their own official documents, the truth of their own acts. And, indeed, so extravagant are the facts, that, without such a proof, it would appear like an idle dream, that a road had cost the government 13,156 dollars per mile, to construct it, and 2,522 dollars per mile, to repair it, in one year, and before that year had expired, had become impassable until it should be made anew. And to ensure its future usefulness, the government must set apart a separate fund, to be drawn upon for ever, at the will and pleasure of a superintendent, whose interest it was, to be perpetually making and mending. Yet true as this is, and with all its enormities, it is only a foretaste of what is to come, if we are to pursue this system; and more especially, when the government shall have fully embarked in constructing canals, of which there were as many as thirty in the plans and surveys, now exhibited to the Senate, some of them 500 miles in length. Among them. are the James river and Kenhawa canal, and the Chesapeake and Ohio canal, concerning which, Mr. Smith said, he would offer a few facts from the reports of the engineers.

These two canals, very similar in character, taken together, give a distance of about 500 miles in length, and are entirely in the mountains, where nothing was to be seen, from the beginning to the end, but craggy rocks, deep sunken vallies, cataracts, and awful precipices, which were to be encountered at every step. These canals were to be made up of aqueducts, of dams, of culverts, of embankments, of bridges, of locks, and of tunnels. A sample of which is given by the engineer, in the eastern section of the Chesapeake and Ohio canal, a distance of only 186 miles, on the most favourable and least mountainous ground. There are 218 culverts, 9 aqueducts, 160) bridges, and 635 locks; and yet the engineer estimates the cost of this section, to average only 23,935 dollars per mile, whereas, on the middle section, of 70 miles in length, he estimates the average cost at 143,258 dollars per mile. On this section, he estimates the cost of a single tunnel, only 5 miles in length, at 3,500,000 dollars, which will average 700,000 dollars per mile. From these estimates, it would be a fair conclusion, that less than 50,000,000 dollars, will not be adequate to complete this 500 miles of canal, as the James

river and Kenhawa canal, would, according to the survey of the engineer, require tunnels 10 miles in length, and dams 70 feet high.

In times of old, they levelled the hills and filled up the vallies; but we, who are a wiser people, root up the mountains, and march through their centre. Nature had been bountiful, almost to excess, in the abundance of her rivers and water communications between the Western and Eastern sections of this Union, on which an easy and expeditious intercourse can always be had. But, hereafter, instead of passing along these native channels, at the rate of 15 or 20 miles an hour, we are to be lifted and lowered through more than 2000 locks, to be dragged over 50 aqueducts, and creep at a snail's pace, through protracted tunnels, as dark and dismal as the mansions of the dead, under the base of tremendous mountains. Surely nothing could surpass the folly of such a project, but the ambition and intrigue of those who planned and cherished it. It reminds us of a modern philosopher of the west, who, not long since, asked you for an outfit to enable him to visit the North pole, and thence the centre of the earth, in search of a concave sphere, which he conceived existed there. Were he now to ask, it would not be a matter of surprise, if his outfit should be granted; provided he would shift his course, and instead of the tedious route by the North pole, would commence his voyage at one of these tunnels, and make his reconnoissance directly through.

Mr. President, there certainly exists a strange incompatibility in the policy we are pursuing, with regard to economy. On some occasions it is cherished with a zeal that would promise to correct every abuse that may have crept into every branch of the govern ment, and ensure, in future, a circumspect and prudent administration of your public funds. But on other occasions the public interest seems to be lost sight of. And this diversity of policy was never more obvious than at this moment. Congress is, on the one hand, running the full career of retrenchment; exploring the recesses of every Department; examining every functionary; and probing every administration to the very quick-that it may save the people's money, and put down a system of corruption; whilst, on the other hand, it was practising an extravagance and profusion without limits. And the public money is regarded more as common spoil, than as the property of the general government, and he who can first lay hands upon it, bears it off. And if this course is permitted to continue, it must bankrupt this government, and introduce a species of corruption that would taint it to its vitals. A system, to use the language of a distinguished statesman, to whose eminence I can never aspire, of buying the people with their own money.

Yes, Sir, of buying the people with their own money! Eight separate and distinct routes have been surveyed between Baltimore and Philadelphia, by the Engineers appointed to that service; some of them made, without regard to the public interest, under the influence of distinguished men, to suit their own convenience, if we are to give credit to the memorial of the citizens of the county and city of Philadelphia. And that whole community are now enlisted in the cause, who had taken no interest in the question

until these surveys were made; but were moving on, in the spirit of laudable enterpise, to construct a turnpike road for themselves.

The Brigade of Engineers who were ordered to survey the route for a great national road from the city of Washington to NewOrleans, discharged that duty with very little deviation, by travelling along the public highways, in carriages and steam-boats, like other gentlemen; stopping at towns and villages to enlist the feelings of the inhabitants on the side of Internal Improvement, by inducing every man to believe the National Road would pass his door. This quieted opposition, and even inquiry, as to the constitutional power of Congress over the subject. Plain, honest men, who, perhaps, had never looked at the constitution, were willing to sacrifice their scruples to their interest.

But, Mr. Smith observed, notwithstanding these abuses, and many other abuses to which this system was eminently calculated to lead, and to which it must always lead, and would lead, he was not prepared to attach the blame to the President or the other functionaries to whom it had been confided. He was not the advocate of the President or any other man; but he would censure no man but for good cause. You have conferred on the President of the United States, the dignified office of an Overseer of the Roads, and given him two or three Brigades of Engineers, to survey the routes and report upon them. When they set out upon a reconnoissance, can he follow in their train, to see that each man does his duty? You have, by the act of 1824, submitted entirely to his discretion to decide what roads were of national importance. And by what means is he to determine this abstruse question? Is the President to travel over the whole United States, in quest of roads, and inspect the grounds on which they are to pass, before he decides upon their nationality? Is this practicable? If it is not, by what means is he to arrive at his purpose, but by means of information from others? When he has done so, it is ascribed to him as partiality. And the members of Congress are quarrelling with the President, and among themselves, because some have got the start of others in this race for roads. The members complain they have not obtained their full share. Some say they are not in favour, and therefore have not succeeded in their efforts to obtain surveys of their favourite roads.

It was, Mr. Smith said, among his objections to the system, the great inequality and injustice of its practical operations in the different sections of the Union. And this fact was fully demonstrated. At the present session there were applications from the Western States, all of which had received already large donations in public lands, for, at least, 10,000,000 of acres for Internal Improvements, and other purposes of their own. And there were applications now before Congress, in some shape or other, for appropriations for Internal Improvements in the different States, except the States of South-Carolina and Georgia, for more than $300,000,000. And with all this preparation and appropriation, in the other States, to fill them with roads and canals, at the expense of the public treasury

not a chain had been stretched, nor a Jacob staff planted, within the States of South Carolina and Georgia, by authority of the general government, for that purpose; and because their Legislatures have not deemed it constitutional, nor proper that their members in Congress should join in the general struggle for the mere favours of the general government, and higgle and huckster for a road or canal, as they would in a market or fair for a bale of goods

or an ox.

Among the arguments why we should appropriate $2,326,000, to begin a Break-water at the mouth of the Delaware Bay, we were told of the customs collected in the port of Philadelphia, on foreign goods imported, which gave that city high claims to the protection of the government. Sir, it is not the revenue you collect on foreign merchandise that constitutes the real wealth of a nation. It is the amount of your exports you are enabled to send abroad, that constitutes your national wealth. If you have nothing to send abroad, you can expect nothing to bring home. And turn it as you will, all your revenue is ultimately paid from the agricultural pursuits of the labouring community, who are entitled to their full share of the dividends of the Treasury. In order to ascertain the relative proportions of the agricultural product of each State and Territory, and thereby test the proportion of protection each one was entitled to on that principle, he had extracted from the statistics of Watterston and Van Zandt, the following table; and had selected the year 1818, as a medium year, and one as little encumbered with foreign or domestic embarrassment as any other. In that year, the exports were, from

The ten Atlantic States, North, including Delaware, exported during that year, to the amount in value of

$25,246,339