WASHINGTON made eight tours into the west. After returning from the seventh to the headquarters of the army at Newburg, where it was quietly awaiting the conclusion of the negotiations for peace, he thus wrote to the Chevalier de Chastellux, October 12, 1783:1 Prompted by these actual observations, I could not help taking a more extensive view of the vast immense extent of country, which he is moved to call "a new empire," entrusted by divine favors to the young republic, and referring to the vigorous settlements there, and anticipating the states to come out of it, he adds: "When they get strength, which will be than most people conceive, One year now, and a century sooner etc." inland navigation of these United States from maps preceding have been constantly filling the east with surprises by the fulfillments of that prophecy. Irving well says: and the information of others; and could not but be struck with the immense extent and importance of it, and with the goodness of that providence which has dealt its favors to us with so profuse a hand. Would to God we may have wisdom enough to improve them. I shall not rest contented till I have explored the western country, and traversed those lines, or a great part of them, which have given bounds to a new empire. * After returning from his eighth tour in the following year, 1784, he wrote to Governor Harrison of Virginia his impressions made by it, and the letter is almost a state paper from its scope. Forecasting the development of that The suggestions of Washington in his letter to the governor, and his representation, during this visit to Richmond, gave the first impulse to the great system of internal improvements since pursued throughout the United States. Those eight western tours, short for a traveling salesman of to-day, but then very extended, elevated Washington from a provincial to a continental states 'Sparks' Writings of Washington,' Vol. IX, p. 62, October 10, 1784. 'Life of Washington,' Vol. IV, p. 459. man, and enabled him to say, from travel and study, what few have been able to say, then or since, that the west would show great strength "sooner than most people would conceive." * That growth has ever since kept in advance of the conceptions of the average Atlantic statesman, and is constantly surprising even the students of western development. A few aggregate statements, made up to date, will confirm the prediction of Washington, and the comments which we have made on it. Of the thirty-five cities classed in the last census as having a population of fifty thousand or more each, fifteen of them are beyond the Alleghanies. Even Boston, after all its annexations, is shut in, for its numerical positions, between Chicago and St. Louis-the latter a foreign town when Washington made the tour, and the former not born till near half a century afterwards. Between 1870 and 1880, the population of the United States increased 11,920,000. "This is three times the European rate of increase and double that of England or Germany." "The increase of population in the United States exceeds the aggregate number of inhabitants in three kingdoms of Europe, namely, Holland, Denmark and Portugal." When it is considered that the centre of population in 1880 was eight miles west by south from the heart of the city of Cincinnati, it will be seen that much of this increase must have * Sparks' 'Writings of Washington,' Vol. IX, p. 62, October 10, 1784. been in the west. And that centre is + 'Balance Sheet of the World for ten years, 1870 supplies, for American tables totally, -1880.' By Michael G. Mulhall, F. S. S., London, 1881, pp. 117, 118, 6. +Mulhall, pp. 111, 119, 38, 39, 118, 12. and for European so largely set forth in these vast figures, are furnished almost wholly by the west. All the wheat of New England would not call for her hot ovens three weeks a year. All the oats raised in New England in 1880 would feed all the working horses of the country only three days at a peck a day. The Americans now make one-fifth of the iron and one-fourth of the steel of the world one half of the gold and one half of the silver of the world's supply. ,. Taking, in globo, all the mining interests, of the world, the United States represents thirty-six, Great Britain thirty-three, and the other nations thirty-one per cent. of the total.* During the last ten years, 1870-1880, railway mileage has doubled in the United States, being forty-one thousand eight hundred and eighty-three miles. This is more than the entire increase in Europe for the same time. In the industries of the world, "at present Great Britain holds the foremost place, but the United States will probably pass it in the ensuing decade."‡ As to taxation in the United States, it is nine and one-fourth per cent. on the earnings of the people, as against thirty-one per cent. in Italy, seventeen and a half in France, and twelve in Great Britain. After this array of facts, measuring the growth of our country, in so many of the essentials in national prosperity, Mulhall may well say: "It would be impossible to find in history a parallel to the progress of the United States in the last ten years."§ 'Mulhall' pp. 110, III. +'Mulhall' pp. 113, 114. 'Mulhall,' pp. 3, 41, ¿ Page 108, It will be observed that the most of these items, as population, live stock and cereals, and the practical and special metals which have carried our nation, in a century, to the fulfillment of Washington's predictions, and to the very front among the nations of the world, were produced "out west." The aggregates given may not be unfamiliar to our princely and international men of commerce, and to eminent railroad men, but the great body of the people receive such statements with profound surprise and with the skepticism usually underlying the remark, "western stories." These immense gains of national strength have come people conceive.” 66 sooner than most The very extent and development of our new country have put it to a disadvantage before the older sections, as regards its areas and increase and importance to the entire body politic, by compelling statements of them which seem incredible to the unread and un traveled. Sometimes a lack of apprehension has been followed, rationally, by a lack of appreciation; and some times it has been so far measured and estimated as to create jealousy and stimulate repression by the older states. As to any attempts, however, locally and provincially, or nationally, to repress western growth, it was as futile as to serve an injunction on an active volcano, or move to stay proceedings in the process of an eclipse. Yet our history is not barren in this line. Failure to foresee and anticipate has led to some unfortunate neglects, and the loss of grand opportunities. Wealth has |