Acting under the law authorizing him to fix the rates within the limitations stated by the law itself, President Taft issued a proclamation fixing the toll at $1.20 per net registered ton on all ships of commerce, other than those carrying cargo from one United States port to another. The net registered ton is the unit of measuring a ship's cargo-carrying capacity, used throughout the world in general, and by British shipping in particular. It consists of 100 cubic feet of space, so that when a ship is measured its net registered tonnage is determined by the number of these units of space it contains. A ton of cargo seldom fills a hundred cubic feet of space; frequently it will not fill more than 40 cubic feet. The charge per ton of actual freight under this toll of $1.20 per net registered ton ranges from 44 to 80 cents a long ton upon the freight carried, depending upon the class of cargo. Such a toll adds from 2 to 4 cents per hundredweight to the freight rate between two points through the canal. It might cost 5 cents to take a barrel of flour from Colon to Panama, or vice versa. While ships will be charged tolls on the basis of net registered tonnage, not all ships carry freight upon that basis. In the majority of cases cargo is taken on at "ship's option"--either by weight or space. Forty cubic feet is estimated as the space occupied by an ordinary ton of freight, and ships usually carry cargo at rates based on that amount of space for each ton. The 40 cubic feet method of determining the amount of cargo carried is adopted by maritime interests because a long ton of wheat occupies about that amount of space. From this it will be seen that for the purpose of collecting tolls the United States allows 100 cubic feet of space for a ton, while the ordinary shipping firm allows only 40 feet per ton. Thus it happens that a shipowner charges the shipper for carrying 2-1/2 tons where the United States charges the shipowner for carrying 1 ton. Notwithstanding the fact that the shipowner collects for the carrying of 2-1/2 tons where he pays toll on 1 ton, he still has to pay what seems, in the aggregate, a large sum of money each time his ship passes through the canal. An ordinary 5,000-ton ship will be charged $6,000 for passing from one ocean to the other. A ship like the _Cleveland_, the first around the world tourist steamer advertised to pass through the canal, will have to pay $14,000 for the 12-hour trip from Colon to Panama. A steamship like the _Lusitania_ will have to put up some $30,000 for a single passage. The average ship will pay from $5,000 to $10,000 for its passage. This seems like a high rate, even though it does amount to only 2 or 4 cents per hundredweight of cargo, but when one takes into consideration the time saved in passing through the canal, and the cost of maintaining a ship on the high seas, the rate becomes a reasonable one.