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 and exports demands a corresponding increase in the facilities for inland transport.

Mr. Lionel B. Wells of Manchester in his paper on Canals—read before the Federated Institution of Mining Engineers sitting in Conference in 1895 said:—

"The tonnage of shipping entering our ports is threefold what it was forty years ago, and during that time the population has nearly doubled in number; therefore to supply our wants, six times as much transport is needed as in 1850. These figures help us in some degree to realize the enormous additions made year by year to the movement of traffic throughout the land. This conveyance has become a necessity for our food supply and our trade generally, and as the country increases in population and wealth, its transport also must continue to grow."

Mr. W. H. Hunter, of the Manchester Ship Canal, at the Conference of Mining Engineers (referred to above) said that he considered that the revival of interest in the subject of inland navigation, was one of the most hopeful of the economic developments of the present day, as it was indeed one of the most important. Without a really effective canal system it was impossible to provide cheap carriage for either minerals or manufactured goods from the industrial districts of the country lying at any distance from the sea-board, and without cheap carriage, minerals must remain in their native strata, and manufactures in those districts must languish and ultimately perish.