Business can be done cheaper in Boston than in New York; and yet New York has drawn away from us a large proportion of our legitimate business,--the sale of our manufactured goods; and this loss can be directly attributed to a defect in our railroad system, which can and should be remedied. I say defect, but, more properly, the want of a strong and independent line of railroad through to the West, controlled in the interest of Massachusetts. Why, Mr. President, if we could withdraw from New York the firms and business that represent the sale of Massachusetts goods, it would more than cover the burnt district of this city, and double the business of Boston; and New York would feel that her loss was much greater than the Boston fire. And why is it that our goods are sent to New York to be sold? Simply because New York has _three_ great trunk routes to the West, which control the transportation of the Southern and Western productions, and the owners, who are the merchants, follow their goods, and are the customers who purchase our manufactured goods of New York houses, and ship them in return over these same trunk lines, giving them a large and profitable business; which should be and can be controlled, by proper management, in the interest and for the benefit of a through line or lines from Boston to the West. To-day Boston is without a through and independent line to the West, and while we are shipping our goods to New York to be sold, to be transported over the great lines leading South and West, our _own_ Western road, so called, in 1872, according to the annual report of the directors, carried through from Boston to Albany 112,071 tons of freight, and from Albany to Boston 556,202 tons--more than four times as much _from_ the West than is carried _to_ the West; which state of things would be reversed if the sale of our goods was made here instead of New York; but this can only be accomplished by a through line West, controlled in the interests of Massachusetts, and not in the interest of New York.