It looks, therefore, as though the United States, with its new advantages, which begin when the first vessel is passed through the Panama locks, would have a good chance of securing for the future the main share of the South American trade. Its cotton, iron and steel goods, electrical machinery, etc., will be able to compete on very different terms with those of England and Germany. Cotton manufactures have reached Chile and the other countries of Pacific South America by a rather absurdly roundabout route. The raw cotton has been grown in the southern parts of the United States, carried to Europe for manufacture, and brought back to South America _via_ the Straits of Magellan. These goods will, we may be sure, tend in future to go direct from the American factories _via_ New York, Charleston, or New Orleans, without trans-shipment, thus saving about 7,000 miles of transportation. A very small part of the American trade with these countries has passed by the Panama railroad. The rates charged by the steamers which have picked up the goods for the west coast at Panama have been kept so high as to be practically prohibitive. It has actually been cheaper to send goods from the United States by way of England or Germany--that is, a journey of 14,000 miles--than by way of Panama, a journey of three or four thousand. One of the surest results, then, of the Panama Canal opening will be a rapid development of the Pacific coasts of America, especially of South America, and a great expansion of trade between these countries and the United States. The effect of the canal on the Atlantic coasts and hinterland of South America will naturally be less striking. There has never been much interchange of trade between the two coasts of the southern continent, for the simple reason that their products are not complementary but mostly identical. Most of the trade of the eastern coast states is with the countries of the North Atlantic. But some trade to the more northerly and tropical parts of this coast is certain to flow through the canal. Lumber from the Pacific coasts of North America is used in Atlantic South America, and a part of this trade, which is likely to grow in extent, will be passed through the canal. It should be noticed, however, that the temperate reaches of the eastern coast of South America farther to the south will be nearer the Pacific coasts of the United States and Canada _via_ the Horn and the Straits of Magellan owing to the big easterly projection of Brazil.