Page:Historic towns of the southern states (1900).djvu/80

 sprung up, and in a few years the "National Road" joined Cumberland, on the Potomac, with the Ohio River. The connection between Cumberland and Baltimore was completed by means of a curious tax on the banks of Maryland. Thus the line of communication between Baltimore and Wheeling was continuous, over one of the best roads in the world. This and six other turnpikes were as seven great rivers, bearing their precious freight of grain, tobacco, dairy products and whiskey to Baltimore for foreign shipment; and in spite of overtrading and the resulting period of depression, such was Baltimore's progress that in 1825 Jared Sparks could say, "Among all the cities of America, or of the Old World, in modern or ancient times, there is no record of any one which has sprung up so quickly to so high a degree of importance as Baltimore." At this time the population of Baltimore was five times as great as it had been thirty years before, and commerce had increased proportionately. The causes of this remarkable progress were enumerated by Sparks as the advantages of Baltimore's local situation, the swift sailing-vessels, the San Domingan trade, the two great staples,