Special Topics.—Readers should consult the bibliographies listed above for references on particular industries. The histories of Ringwalt, Hammond, and Swank are likely to prove especially useful.
Sources.—The chief source is the annual report on commerce and navigation, which is cited hereafter by abbreviation, Com. & Nav. Reports for the years from 1789 to 1823 are in the collected set of American State Papers; later reports must be sought in the set of Congressional documents. The Check-list of Public Documents, Washington, 3d. ed., 1911, is an indispensable aid in using government publications.
Early American Commerce
Colonial.—**Weeden, **Bruce, **Beer. More general in character are the various writings (see A. L. A. Catalogue) of *John Fiske, *C. M. Andrews, *Alice Morse Earle, *Sydney G. Fisher. On commercial policy of the colonies see (besides Beer, and Hill cited below) A. A. Giesecke, American commercial legislation before 1789, Univ. of Penn., N. Y., 1910. On manufactures see Rolla M. Tryon, *Household manufactures in the U. S., 1640-1860, Univ. of Chicago Press; on shipping, R. D. Paine, *Ships and Sailors of old Salem, N. Y., 1909, and R. E. Peabody, *Merchant venturers of old Salem, Boston, 1912.
Early National Period.—Mahan, **War of 1812, vol. 1; Fiske, **Critical period, Boston, Houghton, 1899, $2; McMaster, **History, and **Chapter 9 of Cambridge Mod. Hist., vol. 7. On the development of the commercial organization, S. E. Baldwin, American business corporations before 1789, Amer. Hist. Review, April, 1903, 8: 449-465; G. S. Callender, **Early transportation and banking enterprises, Quarterly Jour. of Econ., Boston, Nov., 1902, 17: 111-162. On commercial policy, William Hill, **First stages of tariff policy, Pub. Amer. Econ. Assoc., 1893, 8: 452-614; T. W. Page; **Earlier commercial policy, Journal of Pol. Econ., Chicago, 1901-2, 10: 161-192; Henry C. Adams, *Taxation in U. S., Baltimore, 1884.
CHAPTER XLVI
INTERNAL TRADE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE, 1789
577. Development of internal trade 1789-1914.—It will be impossible, in the later chapters of this book, to describe in detail the development of the internal trade of the United States. This trade has grown to such proportions that, at the present day, it far outranks in volume and importance the foreign commerce of the country. The reader may be trusted to realize this fact, and to have some knowledge of the character and organization of internal trade at the present day. It is not probable, however, that he knows the humble origins from which this trade has risen; and a description of the conditions and character of internal trade about 1789 will enable him to appreciate the progress of the past century, even though the different steps in progress receive but scant mention in the narrative.
578. Condition of the roads; effect on freight traffic.—The roads, which furnished the only means of communication and transportation by land, were still the earth roads of the colonial period, thick with dust in summer, and absolute sloughs, with mud a foot or more deep, during the thaws of winter and spring. During the greater part of the colonial period wagons were a rarity, because there was so little opportunity to use them. Men used mere sledges on the farm, and traveled or carried their produce from one farm to another on horseback. In the northern States the facilities for land carriage were good in only one season, winter, when the periods of sleighing enabled the people to make the market trips and visits which were impracticable at other times. Even near the large towns laden carts had to be drawn by two to six oxen, when there was no snow on the ground.
When there was no other means of transportation, as in the case of the settlements west of the Alleghany Mountains, wares were carried over the roads in wagons, sometimes for a distance of hundreds of miles; but such instances of extensive land transport were exceptional, and the freight charges were so high that only articles of the first necessity, as salt and iron, could pay for carriage.
579. Sparsity of passenger traffic.—Some men lived and died in the town where they were born, without visiting another town a dozen miles distant. There was so little intercourse between the adjoining towns of Easthampton and Southampton, on Long Island, that each town preserved individual peculiarities of pronunciation down even to 1800. Throughout the colonial period, and even in the days of the early Federal government, it was very difficult to collect delegates at a political gathering; and it was not uncommon for men to make their wills before starting to a State convention in Pennsylvania. Travel by stage-coach did not become of importance until well into the nineteenth century. In 1783 two stage-coaches, consuming a week or ten days on the trip, sufficed for the travel between Boston and New York; though a few years later (1794) twenty stages were employed. Postage rates for a single letter ranged from 8 to 25 cents, according to the distance, and mails were infrequent.