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690 Industrial changes. Communications. [i807- from the domestic system of industry to the factory system, and the consequent investment of capital on a larger scale. It is not necessary to describe the growth in detail. The single example of the cotton industry, in which the number of spindles in factories increased from 8,000 to 130,000 between 1807 and 1815, will suffice to show that a new period in American industry had begun. The cessation of the war in 1814 brought the new manufactures into direct competition with the older industries of Great Britain ; and the natural result was that some degree of protection was considered necessary to their maintenance. A tariff with some protective features had been adopted in the first year of the Constitution; but, since there had been few manufactures to protect in the early period, the real beginning of the protective policy of the United States may be said to date from the tariff of 1816. This Act provided for a moderate measure of Protection, which was subsequently increased by the Acts of 1824 and 1828. This rise of manufactures was accompanied by a growing activity on the part of eastern merchants in the western territory, and would have provided an increasingly important market for western produce but for the grave difficulties of transport. There was practically no route for commerce except the mountain trail, which could not be utilised for the bulky products of the West. At the same time the roads in the sea-coast States were in a desperate condition. Many proposals had been made for turnpike and canal improvements; and Gallatin's famous report (1807), providing for an elaborate system connecting all sections of the country, was an expression of the popular feeling of the time. It was not till after the war of 1812 that any serious beginnings were made; but, during the next twenty years, the progress of improve- ments in internal communications was an important factor both in politics and commerce. The problem of the moment was to secure facilities of transport which should bring the farming sections of the East into connexion with their own rivers, unite the traffic of the eastern river districts, connect eastern rivers with those west of the mountains, and develop a system of western waterways by connecting the Lakes with the Ohio and the Mississippi, while branch canals led to the interior farms. Such enterprises required a far larger capital than was available in the home money markets; and extensive borrowing from England became necessary. The credit of the home companies, however, was insufficient for such purposes; and the only solution was the issue of State bonds or grants from the Federal government in support of the necessary improvements. Government aid was therefore resorted to in support of nearly every enterprise of the kind; and the contributions of the State governments were, in view of the resources of the time, enormous. The demand for such improvements was especially strong in the West; and the reason of this can be easily understood. Soon after