of the great revolution in ocean-navigation, as well as that on internal waters.

In fifty years from the first trip of "The Clermont" on the Hudson, the number and influence of steamboats and steamships had exceeded computation. The world is alive. with the quickened activity which has resulted to mind and commerce. Time, beyond computation, is saved in the transaction of business. The style of convenience in moving over the waters, and the nearer approach of nations, contribute to general improvement in civilization and the realized brotherhood of man. In all this we cannot fail to see the distinct manifestation of God. His were the waters and caloric; his the timber, the metals, and the fuel; his the mind and the muscle. He made them all, and controlled the time and the place of their mysterious combinations; thus revealing clearly his purpose, in the colonization and government of this country, to advance the race boldly beyond all former standards and methods of civilization.

RAILROADS.

To England fairly belongs the first honor of this great invention and the use of steam-locomotives. The beginnings, of course, were very small and rude; but they demonstrated the fact that steam-power could be rendered available for impelling carriages and removing freight on land. The development of this power has been very rapid both in Europe and America. It began in this country in 1829; and the decade immediately under review marks a splendid advance in this great method of civilization and progress. Previous to 1850, our railroads "sustained only an unimportant relation to the internal commerce of the country. Nearly all the lines then in operation were local or isolated works, and neither in extent nor design had begun to be formed into that vast and connected system, which, like a web, now covers every portion of our wide domain, enabling

each work to contribute to the traffic and value of all, and supplying means of locomotion and a market, almost at his own door, for nearly every citizen of the United States."

Only one line of road, the various links of the New-York Central, connected the tide-waters of the East with the great internal basins of the country; and this was encumbered with such tolls in the interest of the Erie Canal, as to amount to an embargo on freight.

The next line, extending from Boston to Ogdensburg, was completed within the year 1850. The New-York and Erie was next; and this was opened April 22, 1851. The next was the Pennsylvania, which completed its "mountain division in 1854." The Baltimore and Ohio, fifth in time, was opened in 1853. "The Tennessee River, a tributary of thẻ Mississippi, was reached in 1850 by the Western and Atlantic Railroad of Georgia; and the Mississippi itself, by the Memphis and Charleston Railroad, in 1859. In the extreme North, the Atlantic and St. Lawrence, now known as the Grank Trunk, was completed early in 1853. In 1858, the Virginia system was extended to a connection with the Memphis and Charleston and with the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroads."

"The eight great works named, connecting the interior with the seaboard, are the trunks or base lines upon which is erected the vast system that now overspreads the whole country. They seem as outlets to the interior for its products, which would have little or no commercial value without improved highways, the cost of transportation over which does not equal one-tenth of that of our ordinary roads."

The following will exhibit the number of miles of railroads constructed in ten years, from 1850 to 1860:

Let the reader observe that we began this ten years with 8,588.79 miles of railroad in operation in the whole United States, costing $296,260,128; during the progress of the decade, we increased 21,186.63 miles, at a cost of $838,192,781; making 29,775.42 miles of road, costing $1,134,452,909. This progress is so great, that we cannot extend our conceptions or reason so as fully to grasp and comprehend it. In the decades to come, additions will be still more incomprehensible.

These roads, it was estimated by Mr. Kennedy, "transported in the aggregate at least eight hundred and fifty tons of merchandise per annum to the mile of road in operation. Such a rate would give twenty-six million tons as the total

annual tonnage of railroads for the whole country. If we estimate the value of this tonnage at a hundred and fifty dollars per ton, the aggregate value of the whole would be three billion nine hundred million dollars. Vast as this commerce is, more than three-quarters of it has been created since 1850.

Up to the close of 1866, we had extended our lines so as to reach 36,890 miles; making about thirty-eight per cent of all the railroads in the world. In all Europe there are 50,117 miles, in North and South America 40,866 miles, in Asia 3,660 miles, in Great Britain and Ireland 13,286 miles, in France 3,082, and in Prussia 5,704, miles of railroad. In the United States there are eighty-one square miles to each mile of railroad, and a mile of railroad to each thousand inhabitants. In Great Britain and Ireland, the proportion is nine miles of area to one of railroad, and one mile of road to each 2,189 of population; and in France the ratio is twenty-four square miles, and 4,172 of population, to one mile of railroad.

One of the two grandest enterprises of the age is the Transcontinental Railroad connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and bringing America and Asia into neighborhood relations. The Union Pacific Railroad is now rapidly moving westward. It reached the Rocky Mountains in September, 1867, a distance of five hundred and seventeen miles from Omaha, Nebraska, where it connects with the great Eastern systems of roads centring at St. Louis, Chicago, Boston, and New York. The California Central is building from the Pacific Ocean, eastward, to meet the Union Pacific; and they have already tunnelled the Sierra Nevadas, and hasten to meet their Eastern co-laborers at the earliest possible mo

ment.

By this road, New York is within a week of San Francisco; and, by steam, Asia is within twenty-eight days of our great port on the Pacific. With these connections, the vast trade of Europe with Eastern Asia must cross this continent,

and San Francisco and New York be raised to a position of commercial enterprise heretofore unequalled.

This vast work was boldly commenced by the United States in the midst of our gigantic civil war. Individual capital is munificently aided by the government with a grant of twelve thousand eight hundred acres of land to every mile of road; to which are added United-States bonds, for the least expensive portion, sixteen thousand dollars per mile; the next class, thirty-two thousand dollars; and, for the mountain section, forty-eight thousand dollars per mile. This immense undertaking is now (fall of 1867) more than half completed. The cars will doubtless pass from ocean to ocean early in the year 1870.

In the mean time, American genius has rapidly improved the comfort of railroad travelling. We may now at our pleasure enjoy our saloons and refreshments in the splendid cars fitting up for this and other roads; and, when weary, at night we can retire to our state-rooms, and enjoy our repose, and wake in the morning to find that we have moved as rapidly and safely in the hours of sleep as in the day.

THE SAFETY STEAM-GENERATOR.

We have not reached the highest perfection in the use of steam. Invention and discovery ought to reduce the bulk and expense of steam-apparatus, and secure us against the possibility of explosions. In this connection, it gives us great pleasure to introduce to our readers a recent invention by our fellow-countryman, THOMAS MITCHELL of Albany, N.Y., which promises to accomplish these invaluable results. It has been examined and fully indorsed by scientific men and practical engineers. John Johnson, LL.D., Professor of Natural Science in the Wesleyan University at Middletown, Conn., in a letter to the inventor, says, "Having been favored with an opportunity to witness the working of your recently-invented safety steam-generator, I take pleasure in