visions demanded that the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Company permit its rival to ascend the Potomac Valley.[1] Baltimore went wild over the passage of the act. A public dinner, fireworks, the ringing of bells, and a salute of a hundred guns gave evidence of the feeling at the Maryland metropolis. "The citizens of Baltimore had, indeed, 'evident cause' to rejoice at the triumph which had been achieved. All the important provisions of the bill, looked to the interests and had been framed with a view to the aggrandizement of the city. Its great leading object was, to secure the completion of the rail road to the Ohio river, and the completion of the canal to Cumberland, and its connexion with Baltimore by the route that might be found most conducive to the prosperity of that city. The enthusiasm of the occasion was, therefore, all embracing, on the part of the citizens of Baltimore. In the public demonstrations that were ordered, no dis-
- ↑ The canal had been built at this time only to Holman's Dam, twenty-six miles above Harper's Ferry, eighty-six miles from Washington; twenty-six miles more were under way.—Report of the President and Directors. . . April 22, 1835.
