age foreign trade, and nothing to aid the commerce of the interior, a commercial and financial monopoly has been fostered in the Eastern States materially affecting every branch of industry in the West, and absorbing, in no small degree, the profits of western labor. The improvement of western rivers, and the establishment of a Navy Yard at Memphis, are to be regarded by the people of the Mississippi valley as objects of primary importance. The improvement of the rivers is necessary to enable us to resist the encroachments of the great commercial and financial monopoly of the east; while the establishment of the Navy Yard will compel the disbursement of at least a small portion of the public money west of the Alleghanies. These facts are understood and fully appreciated by eastern men, and hence their obstinate opposition to those measures. The Navy Yard at Memphis should not be regarded as a local object it is an important part of a western system of commerce and finance, and the most remote inhabitant of the Mississippi valley is interested in its establishment. We are gratified to learn that a portion of the citizens of Memphis have taken what we regard as a correct view of the subject. We trust they will finally and utterly refuse to accept of the public property upon the terms offered by Congress, and invoke the Valley States to unite in a vigorous effort to obtain the necessary appropriations to carry on the work. Much has been said and published to disparage the policy of establishing a Navy Yard at a point so remote from the Gulf; and objections will doubtless continue to be urged against the location. by those opposed to the interests of the Western States; but we are persuaded that every well informed unprejudiced mind must admit that the establishment of a Navy Yard at a suitable point west of Cape Sable is imparatively demanded, in a national point of view, as a means of defence, and that no other place combines as many advantages for such an establishment as Memphis. This location, we believe, was first suggested by Lieut. Maury; whose opinions touching naval affairs are entitled to as much respect as are those of any man of this age. The proposition was discussed before the nation for several years, and was finally adopted as a great national measure. But at that day the mercantile and financial classes of the cast had not conceived the idea of absorbing the entire commerce of the west through the agency of railroads. But regarding the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi as their great commercial highway to the Western States, it was natural that they should favor a measure calculated to protect the transit of commerce on that route. Their connection with the west by railroads presents the subject in a new light; and it is now their policy to oppose every measure calculated to facilitate the transportation of commerce on the Mississippi and its tributaries, or give security to its transit across the Gulf. Will the people of the Mississippi valley submit to this policy without an effort to resist it? As additional evidence in favor of the location of a Navy Yard at Memphis as a means of national defence, and the advantages of that location in comparison with other places, we copy the following extract from a communication by Lieut. J. N. Brown, U. S. N., in answer to certain inquiries addressed to him by the citizens. of Memphis. U. S. NAVY YARD, Gentlemen: I have received your letter of the 26th inst., requesting from me a "succinct statement of the advantages and importance to the nation at large, but more especially to the South and West, and to our Gulf defences, of a constructive Navy Yard at Memphis." While I am convinced that I cannot do justice to the subject, I will try to answer, briefly, to the spirit of your letter. It seems to me that Memphis offers "advantages to the nation," for a constructive Navy Yard, from the fact that it is situated in the very center of the greatest supply of materials for ship building in the known world. These materials can be drawn together here at less cost, perhaps, than to any other point in the Union. Memphis has also the advantage over every other proposed building point, of being, under all circumstances, inaccessible to an enemy; hence materials which are not "perishable," or which may be preserved for years, could here be safely accumulated. Memphis is also nearer the shores of the "Mexican Gulf," than any of our Atlantic Navy Yards; it presents too in its superior climate advantages as a building station over either the extreme North or South. In whatever enters into warlike preparations, calculations should be based upon the contingency of actual war. In time of war with an enemy superior to the United States at sea, the Memphis Navy Yard is the only one which could readily, and safely, draw to itself, by water transportation, every thing requisite for building and equipping ships or steamers. In point of economy this would be a most decided "advantage," many of the materials for ship building being so unwieldly as almost to preclude their being transported by land. These are some of the advantages which, it occurs to me, "Memphis presents as a constructive Navy Yard," in a national point of view. To the South and West its importance seems the greater, the more we reflect upon the subject. In time of war, the Pensacola Navy Yard could not certainly be relied on, either as a place for building or repairing ships; because though the entrance to Pensacola Bay is well guarded, the fortifications are there so placed as to offer little defence against a land attack upon the Navy Yard. With such a fleet as the English now have in the Baltic, acting on the Gulf against us, nothing less than an army, outside of the forts, could save the Pensacola Navy Yard from destruction-and that Yard destroyed, we should have from the capes of Virginia to the mouth of the Del Norte, two thousand or more miles of Southern coast, without the means of building or equipping ships of war. Memphis "as a constructive Yard," is important to the South and West, from the consideration that without it, our whole coasting trade on the Gulf, throughout a protracted war, might be destroyed at no greater cost to the enemy than keeping three or four small steamers in commission there, because the Atlantic ports being blockaded, no vessels could escape from them, or if they could, an enemy's squadron off the Bahamas, would divert them from a course toward the Gulf. It is true that even with every facility here for building ships we might have this trade for a time destroyed, but we should then, at least, compel the enemy to do this work at some cost to himself as well as to us. A NEW STYLE OF BRICKS.-Amongst the more recent inventions patented by English manufacturers perhaps the most important and interesting is that by Mr. Summerfield, of the Glass Works, Birmingham Heath, for what are termed chromatic glass, or glass-faced grooved bricks. It has already attracted the attention of several eminent architects and builders, and there is little doubt this new description of brick will come into extensive use. By Mr. Summerfield's process, red or other clay can be combined with class, and this will secure durability, entire resistance to moisture, and give an ornamental appearance to the building. The form of the brick is also, by means of a groove at the side and end, made so as to add greatly to the strength of the erection, the joints by this means being brought nearly close together, forming a neat exterior, and the morter acts as a wedge, from the shape of the groove.-[Railroad Record.] |