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 destroying the monopoly of the adjacent country, and advantageous to the whole country; for though some rival commodities may be introduced into the old markets, yet many new markets will be opened by increasing population, enlarging old and erecting new towns, augmenting individual and aggregate wealth, and extending foreign commerce.

The prosperity of ancient Egypt, and China, may in a great degree be attributed to their inland navigation. With little foreign commerce, the former of those countries by these means attained and the latter possesses, a population and opulence in proportion to their extent, unequalled in any other. And England and Holland, the most commercial nations of modern times, deprived of their canals, would lose the most prolific sources of their prosperity and greatness. Inland navigation is in fact to the same community what exterior navigation is to the great family of mankind. As the ocean connects the nations of the earth, by the ties of commerce and the benefits of communication, so do lakes, rivers, and canals operate upon the inhabi-