The next most noticeable effect, as it seems to me, is the prodigious increase of commerce under the stimulus of modern agencies. It is estimated by Mulhall that as late as 1820 the carrying capacity of all the sailing vessels of the world—and there were then no others—did not much exceed 3,000,000 tons; yet this is less than one-sixteenth of the tonnage actually moved last year by the railroads of our New England states. This astonishing growth in the quantity of transported articles, and in so short a time, is sufficient to produce, as it certainly has produced, the most important and significant results; since the fact itself indicates a current volume of transport business compared with which the commerce of our grandfathers seems like the idle play of children. Because of this wonderful speed and cheapness of distribution, the average prices of food, fuel, clothing, building material and other necessary supplies have been greatly reduced, independent of the standard by which prices are measured. And this cheapening of most commodities has in turn brought a marked alteration, within a very brief period, in the style of living, dress, home-furnishings and the like, which makes the present conditions of life far more desirable and attractive than ever was known before. The effect of this cheap conveyance is also seen in the commonness of pleasure travel, the extent of immigration, the spread of population over new territories, and in all the employments and surroundings of the people everywhere. The railway is not only the chief means of developing uninhabited or thinly settled regions, but the same line may operate in both sparsely and thickly populated districts, since an indefinite number of trains can be moved on the same track. For instance, the 200,000 miles of railroads of the United States serve some 75,000,000 persons, distributed through an area, excluding Alaska, of more than 3,000,000 square miles; while in Great Britain about 22,000 miles of railway serve at least 45,000,000 persons, located within a mainland area of less than 117,000 square miles. Thus, in Great Britain as compared with the United States, one-ninth as much railway mileage reaches more than half as many persons, because of the density of a population confined within a territory not larger than one-twenty-fifth of the land surface of the United States.