ls, and much fewer commercial advantages than those of the North.

This first natural cause of inferiority is united to another cause
proceeding from the laws. We have already seen that slavery, which is
abolished in the North, still exists in the South; and I have pointed
out its fatal consequences upon the prosperity of the planter himself.

The North is therefore superior to the South both in commerce *m and
manufacture; the natural consequence of which is the more rapid increase
of population and of wealth within its borders. The States situate upon
the shores of the Atlantic Ocean are already half-peopled. Most of the
land is held by an owner; and these districts cannot therefore receive
so many emigrants as the Western States, where a boundless field is
still open to their exertions. The valley of the Mississippi is far more
fertile than the coast of the Atlantic Ocean. This reason, added to all
the others, contributes to drive the Europeans westward--a fact which
may be rigorously demonstrated by figures. It is found that the sum
total of the population of all the United States has about tripled in
the course of forty years. But in the recent States adjacent to the
Mississippi, the population has increased thirty-one-fold, within the
same space of time. *n

[Footnote m: The following statements will suffice to show the
difference which exists between the commerce of the South and that of
the North:--

In 1829 the tonnage of all the merchant vessels belonging to Virginia,
the two Carolinas, and Georgia (the four great Southern States),
amounted to only 5,243 tons. In the same year the tonnage of the vessels
of the State of Massachusetts alone amounted to 17,322 tons. (See
Legislative Documents, 21st Congress, 2d session, No. 140, p. 244.) Thus
the State of Massachusetts had three times as much shipping as the
four above-mentioned States. Nevertheless the area of the State of
Massachusetts is only 7,335 square miles, and its population amounts
to 610,014 inhabitants [2,238,943 in 1890]; whilst the area of the four
other States I have quoted is 210,000 square miles, and their population
3,047,767. Thus the area of the State of Massachusetts forms only
one-thirtieth part of the area of the four States; and its population
is five times smaller than theirs. (See "Darby's View of the United
States.") Slavery is prejudicial to the commercial prosperity of the
South in several different ways; by diminishing the spirit