The harbor facilities at the various ports are of the best. The docks and basins are usually arranged so that while the import goods are being landed the export stuffs are made ready to be loaded. The facilities for the rapid transfer of freights have been improved by the reconstruction of the various river estuaries so as to make them ship-channels. The estuaries of the Clyde, Tyne, and Mersey have been thus improved, while Manchester has been made a seaport by an artificial canal. The British merchant marine is the largest in the world, and about ninety per cent. of the vessels are steamships. _London_ is the capital; it is also one of the first commercial and financial centres of the world. The Thames has not a sufficient depth of water for the largest liners, and these dock usually about twenty miles below the city. The colonial commerce at London is very heavy, especially the India traffic, and it is mainly for this trade that the British acquired the control of the Suez Canal. _Liverpool_ is one of the most important ports of Europe, and receives most of the American traffic. The White Star and Cunard Lines have their terminals at this port. _Southampton_ is also a port which receives a large share of American traffic. The American and several foreign steamship lines discharge at that place. _Hull_ and _Shields_ have a considerable part of the European traffic. _Glasgow_ is one of the foremost centres of steel ship-building. _Cardiff_ and _Swansea_ are ports connected with the coal and iron trade. _Queenstown_ is a calling point for transatlantic liners. _Manchester_ is both a cotton port and a great market for the cotton textiles made in the nearby towns of the Lancashire coal-field. _Leeds_ and _Bradford_ and the towns about them are the chief centres of woollen manufacture. _Wilton_ and _Kidderminster_ are famous for carpets. _Birmingham_ is the centre of the steel manufactures. _Sheffield_ has a world-wide reputation for cutlery. In and near the Staffordshire district are the potteries that have made the names of _Worcester_, _Coalport_, _Doulton_, _Copeland_, and _Jackfield_ famous. _Belfast_ is noted for its linen textiles, and also for some of the largest steamships afloat that have been built in its yards. _Dundee_ is the chief centre of jute manufacture. =The German Empire.=--The German Empire consists of the kingdoms of Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and Wuertemburg, together with a number of small states. The "free" cities of Hamburg, Bremen, and Luebeck, whose independence was purchased in feudal times, are also incorporated within the empire. The present empire was formed in 1871, at the close of the war between Germany and France. The merging of the states into the empire was designed as a political step, but it proved a great industrial revolution as well.