port of Baltimore to Brownsville, Pennsylvania, on the Monongahela, where navigation by boat was almost always possible, was only two hundred and eighteen miles. Thus Baltimore was the natural eastern metropolis for the trade of the West. Moreover, Baltimore had, up to date, taken perhaps all advantages of her situation, and had grown rich in consequence; the building of the Cumberland Road had been of great benefit, for Cumberland was but the half-way house to Baltimore. Baltimore and Maryland had improved their opportunities by building many miles of fine roads, really extending the Cumberland Road to Baltimore and tide-water.
Baltimore's commercial prestige was secure so far as land ways were concerned. New measures calling for water ways now on foot, made popular by the great success of the Erie Canal, promised to overturn all previous considerations. The coach and freighter, it seemed, were now to be replaced by the easy-gliding canal-boat. Baltimore had been the metropolis for western trade during the reign of the freighter. Must she resign her place upon
