The very
circumstances from which a contrary presumption would originally have
been drawn, have (singularly enough) principally contributed to its
extraordinary progress. Lancashire owes the canals, by which the
commercial thoroughfare of that end of England has been turned from
the Humber to the Mersey, to the enterprise of a _Peer_. It owes the
docks, which have about them almost a Roman presentiment of future
greatness, to the spirit of a _Corporation_. It owes the taste and
accomplishments, by which the character of its wealth has been raised
above the drudgery and fanaticism of money-getting, almost entirely to
the zeal of a few _Dissenters_. The name of Governor Clinton is not so
pre-eminently united with the canal policy of America, as is the name
of the Duke of Bridgewater with the canals of England. He staked his
last shilling on the chance of thus cutting out an inland north-west
passage to the Atlantic. The corporation of Liverpool, by an
enlightened application of their vast resources, have accelerated,
consolidated, and secured the realization, of every expectation and
contingency which fortune threw in their way.
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