TRANSPORTATION A MEASURE OF CIVILIZATION As the several peoples inhabiting the earth have progressed from barbarism through the different stages of civilization, the transportation occasioned by their wants and desires has kept a close pace. By a study of the transportation--travel, movement of goods and commodities--and the means and facilities for its accomplishment, the relative civilization of any people, their rank and position may be accurately surveyed, graduated, and estimated. The highways of a nation, whether they be of the land or sea, or both, are most vital elements in its progress and could almost as well as transportation be considered the measuring rod of civilization. =Stages in Civilization.=--Sociologists differ as to what constitute the several stages of civilization. One might trace the development of man through literature, another through art, another through government; others consider his economic activities the more fundamental factors. The most widely used economic classification, according to Ely,[1] is based upon the increasing power of man over nature and consists of (1) Direct Appropriation, (2) The Pastoral Stage, (3) The Agricultural Stage, (4) The Handicraft Stage, and (5) The Industrial Stage. These stages are well illustrated in English history. The stage of direct appropriation corresponding to the prehistoric period and up to 54 B.C., when the Romans overran the island of Britain; the Pastoral stage from this time to the invasion by William the Conqueror, 1066; the Agricultural up to about the discovery of America, when a great impetus was given to travel and discovery; the stage of Handicraft, from 1500 to the invention of the steam engine and its application to manufacture at the beginning of the eighteenth century; the Industrial stage, to the present time. While these stages necessarily overlap each other considerably, it will be seen that as one declines the next is ushered in with some radical change in government or in economic or industrial condition. The present day--immediately following as it does the Great World War, out of which have issued many scientific discoveries and inventions, notably those advancing the theory and practice of air navigation, with many potential possibilities in new lines of transportation; and the setting forth of an idea which is capable of leading to a better understanding or even a confederation of nations and altering all forms of national government--may be the beginning of a new stage of civilization.