Fordham's figures are as follows: "From Shawnee, Illinois, to New Orleans, $1 per hundred pounds, back $4½; to Pittsburg #3.50, from Pittsburg, $1; from Louisville 37½ cents; from Shawnee, or the mouth of the Wabash to Carmi, on the Little Wabash, 20 miles below us, 37½ cents ... to the nearest point of the Wabash to our settlement, 50 cents; down the stream to Shawnee, 5 cents per hundred pounds."[426] "Freighting down to New Orleans will pay the expense of going, and leave one or two hundred dollars surplus. But if, besides $700, the price of a new boat completely rigged, the owner has a capital of $1500 or $2000, he may make the voyage pay him from $500 to $1500. The whole trip is completed in two or three months."[427] "Trade from the general want of capital, and other causes with which I am unacquainted, is exceedingly profitable. 75 to 100 per cent is reckoned a good profit; 50 per cent is a living profit; 25 per cent will not keep a man to his business, he will look out for something else. I had the following account from a River Trader" A boat of 30 tons burden from Orleans to Louisville. _Dr._ 14 men at $75 $ 1,050. Board for 75 days 525. Extra pay to steersman 75. Wear of boat 100. -------- $ 1,750. _Cr._ Freight of 36 tons at $90 $ 3,240. Deduct expenses 1,750. -------- Clear profit $ 1,490.[1] [1]Fordham, E. P., Travels, 121. Groceries for Illinois had been received from Philadelphia or Baltimore, but in 1818 they came from New Orleans: coffee at 40 cents a pound; sugar from 22 to 50 cents; and tea at $2.50.[428] The steamboats coming up stream carried dry goods, pottery, cotton, sugar, wines, liquors, salted fish, and other articles; downwards their loading consisted of grain, flour, tobacco, bacon, etc.[429] At Harmony, Indiana, in 1818, a boat was being built, as a regular trader, to carry off the surplus produce, and bring back coffee, sugar, and groceries, as well as European manufactures.[430] Lead was received from Louisiana, and copper from South America.[431]