st transatlantic
nations, and of easy access to extensive portions of our Atlantic
coast, it is the best point of exchange between foreign lands and our
own, and for the cities of the sea border of our Republic. As Tyre,
Alexandria, Genoa, Venice, Lisbon, and Amsterdam, in their best days,
flourished as factors between foreigners and the people of the
interior regions, whose industries were represented in their markets,
so New York grows rich as the chief agent in the exchange-commerce
between the ocean shores and the interior regions of our continent. As
our numbers have swelled, since we became a nation, from three and a
half millions to thirty millions, so New York, including Brooklyn and
other suburbs, has increased in population and wealth still more
rapidly, to wit, from twenty-five thousand to more than one million.
While the nation has increased less than tenfold, New York has grown
more than four times tenfold. In 1790 the city of New York contained
thirty-three thousand, and the State of New York three hundred and
forty thousand--the city having less than one-tenth of the people of
the State.

Believing that this most prosperous of the Atlantic cities will be
eclipsed in its greatness and glory by one or more of the interior
cities of the great plain, we have selected it as the champion of the
Atlantic border, to hold up its progress during the thirty years from
1830 to 1860, the most prosperous years of its existence, in
comparison with the progress, during the same period, of the aggregate
cities and towns of the plain. The result of our investigation, the
summing up, will be found in the following table. It will be seen that
many of the items are put down in round numbers--no document being
accessible or in existence to furnish the exact number of many of the
new towns, in 1830. The estimate for 1860 may, in some instances, be
above the figures which the census will furnish, but the over-estimate
for 1830 is believed to be in a larger proportion to actual numbers at
that time. Making a liberal allowance for errors, the result of the
aggregate cannot be materially varied from that at which our figures
bring us:

1830. 1860 Est. Increase.
New York, including Brooklyn
and other suburbs 234,438 1,170,000 5 times.

Cities and chief towns of
the great plain 270,094 2,706,300 10 " nearly

Leaving out the exterior cities of