Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 10.djvu/212

 THE WORLD'S FAMOUS ORATIONS

continent full of raw material, capable of an internal commerce which would rival the com- merce of all the rest of the world.

Suppose every year new millions were flock- ing to her shores, and every one of those new millions in a few years, as soon as they tasted the delights of a broader life, would become as great a consumer as any one of her own people.

Suppose that these millions, and the 70,000,000 already gathered under the folds of her flag, were every year demanding and receiving a higher wage and therefore broadening her mar- ket as fast as her machinery could furnish pro- duction. Suppose she had produced cheap food beyond all her wants, and that her laborers spent so much money that whether wheat was 60 cents a bushel or twice that sum hardly entered the thoughts of one of them except when some Democratic tariff bill was paralyzing his business.

Suppose that she was not only but a cannon- shot from France, but that every country in Europe had been brought as near to her as Baltimore is to Washington — for that is what cheap ocean freights mean between us and European producers. Suppose all those coun- tries had her machinery, ht-r skilled workmen, her industrial system, and labor 40 per cent, cheaper. Suppose under that state of facts, with all her manufacturers proclaiming against it, frantic in their disapproval, England had been called upon by Cobden to make the plunge T7S

�� �