n people. Chicago, with $200,000,000 of property swept away by the
flames, laid amid the ashes the foundations of that new Chicago which is
the inland metropolis of the continent, brimming with the spirit of
American progress, and the blood in every vein bounding with American
energy. Boston plucked profit from disaster by establishing her claim as
the modern Athens in architecture as well as literature, and Charleston
learned, amid her ruins, that northern sympathy was not bounded by Mason
and Dixon's line. The South taught a similar lesson in return when the
cry from flood-stricken Johnstown touched every merciful heart.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

The American Republic the Most Powerful of Nations--Military and Naval
Strength--Railways and Waterways--Industry and Art--Manufactures--The New
South--Foreign and Domestic Commerce--An Age of Invention--Americans a
Nation of Readers--The Clergy--Pulpit and Press--Religion and Higher
Education--The Currency Question--Leading Candidates for the Presidency
--A Sectional Contest Deplorable--What Shall the Harvest Be?

Thirty-two years ago the very existence of the American Republic was in
the balance. Today it is the most powerful of nations, with forty-five
stars, representing that number of States, on its flag, and unequalled in
population, wealth or resources by any other civilized land. The men of
America are not herded away from industry to drill in camps and garrison,
and wait for a war that may never come. They continue to be producers,
but should the need arise they would be found as good soldiers as any in
the world, and for fighting on American soil better than the best of
Europe. The American navy is already formidable, and becoming more
formidable every year, and the spirit of the men who fought under
Bainbridge, Decatur, Hull and Perry survives in their descendants.
However great the improvements in naval machines the men on the ship will
always be of more importance than the armament. The American Republic has
the men, and is fast acquiring the armament.

The people were never so closely united as now. Every new railway is a
muscle of iron knitting together the joints of the Union, and no other
nation has a railway service equal to that of America. Railways span the
continent from New York to the Golden Gate. The traveler retires to rest
in the North and wakes up in the sunny South. And still he can journey on
in his own country, under the American flag, day aft