By unifying the various interstate systems of commerce and transportation, the iron and steel industry has greatly expanded. The chief centre of this industry is the valley of the Ruhr River. Coal-measures underlie an area somewhat larger than the basin of the river. To the industrial centres of this valley iron ore is brought by the Rhine and Moselle barges from Alsace-Lorraine and Luxemburg, and also from the Hartz Mountains.
In the importance and extent of manufactures, Germany ranks next to Great Britain among European states, and because of the extent of their coal-fields the Germans seem destined in time to surpass their rivals. The manufacture of textiles is one of the leading industries, and, next to Great Britain, Germany is the heaviest purchaser of raw cotton from the United States. The Rhine district is the chief centre of cotton textile manufacture. Raw cotton is delivered to the mills by the Rhine boats, and these carry the manufactured product to the seaboard. Central and South America are the chief purchasers.
Woollen goods are also extensively manufactured, the industry being in the region that produces Saxony wool. In Silesia and the lower Rhine provinces there are also extensive woollen textile manufactures, but the goods are made mainly from imported wool. Argentina and the other Plate River countries are the chief buyers of these goods. There is a considerable linen manufacture from German-grown flax, and silk-making, mainly from raw silk imported from Italy.
The great expansion and financial success of the manufacturing enterprises is due very largely to the admirable organization of the lines of transportation. The rivers, with their connecting canals, supplement the railways instead of competing with them. They are utilized mainly for slow freights, while the railways carry the traffic that demands speed. The possibilities of both inland water-ways and railway transportation have been utilized by the Germans to the utmost, with the result of a very low rate both for coal and ore, and for structural iron and steel. The latter is carried from the various steel-making plants in the Ruhr Valley to the seaboard at a rate of eighty to ninety cents per ton.[70]
LÜBECK
BREMEN