While this contest was going on between American ship-owners and ship-builders on the one hand and the alien combinations who control our ocean commerce on the other, a vast amount of American capital was gradually invested in shipping under the British flag, and at least an equal amount awaited any reasonable encouragement to build ships in this country to sail under the American flag. Of course, it would have been folly for the men who controlled this capital to invest it in American ships with a clear handicap of at least 15 to 20 per cent. against them in operating expenses, ton for ton, in competition with the aided, fostered, and subsidized fleets of England, Germany, and France. For a long time this mass of capital was held in hope of the adoption of a policy by our government that would tend to lift the handicap and equalize as far as possible the burdens of operating American ships as compared with others. But when Congress adjourned March 4, 1901, leaving the shipping question where it had been ever since the Civil War, and offering, if possible, less hope than ever before, the mass of American capital that had been held back was let loose. Soon rumors that a great merger of British steamship lines with the International Navigation Company was in progress filled the air. It soon appeared that there was plenty of American capital to invest in ships under foreign flags, but none under the American flag so long as the existing situation might last. The ship-owners may have been patriotic, but their patriotism was not enthusiastic enough to make them willing to pay a penalty of 15 to 20 per cent. for the sake of it. This movement soon took shape in the organization of the International Mercantile Marine Company, in which was merged the control and management of the International, the White Star, the Leyland, and the Atlantic Transport Lines; the whole forming by far the greatest aggregation of vessels and tonnage ever grouped under one control. This control was American,[2] but the ships were of British registry except six, built by the Cramps and several others,—the “St. Louis,” “St. Paul,” “Kroonland,” and “Finland,” American built, and the “New York” and “Philadelphia” (formerly the “Paris”), British built, but admitted to American registry by the special Act of 1892. Footnote 2: Since this was written, the whole ownership of the Line is British.