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survey the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal route, and the work was done by government engineers. When railways superseded highways, the government was almost persuaded to complete the old National Road with rails and ties instead of broken stone. When the Erie Canal was proposed, a vast scheme of government aid was favored by leading statesmen;^[1] the government has greatly assisted the western railways by gigantic grants of land worth one hundred and thirty-eight million dollars. The vast funds of private capital that have been seeking investment in this country, at first in turnpike, plank, and macadamized roads, then in canals, and later in railways, has rendered government aid comparatively unnecessary. In the last few years the only work of internal improvement aided by the government is the improvement of the rivers and harbors, which for 1904 takes over fifty millions of revenue a year. The sum of $130,565,485 has been well spent on river and harbor improvement in the past seven years. Not only are the great rivers, such as the Ohio

1. Historic Highways of America, vol. xiv, p. 57.