This
time, having but little leisure, I rode in an automobile from one end to
the other through and along the path, looking occasionally toward the sky
for air-ships that were due to alight there on their way from Chicago to
New York.
In La Salle's packs, carried over that portage, were blacksmith's tools--
forge, bellows, anvil, iron for nails--and carpenter's and joiner's tools.
One might easily believe that they were left there--such have been the
products of that portage strip, two or three miles wide.
First, there has grown there the largest wagon factory in the world. The
path of the pack and the burden has here produced as its peculiar
contribution to civilization that which is to carry burdens, instead of
the backs of men, the world round.
Second, here stands the world's largest plough factory--a place from which
ploughs are sent to every arable valley that civilization has conquered
and made to feel its hunger.
Third, here spreading its acres, or arpents, of buildings across the high
ground between the two rivers, is the largest factory in the world for the
making of certain parts of the sewing-machine; in every community of any
size in the world it has an agency.
Pages:
355
356
357
358
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379