Suppose now the second line of communication is gone--the graceful span of the Poughkeepsie bridge a mass of twisted steel in the channel of the Hudson. What is the third line of communication? It consists of the aristocratic old Boston and Albany leading due west out of Boston, and threading Worcester and Springfield and Pittsfield--each of these a manufacturing center of no mean importance--and finally coming to Albany, and of the Delaware and Hudson, which, bending southwest from Albany, finds its way through the anthracite hills of Pennsylvania and eventually by way of Harrisburg to the main base at Philadelphia or Baltimore. This line also intersects the east and west trunk lines. The fourth line of communication? Alas, we must believe that the capture of these three widely separated lines is almost humanly impossible. When they are gone the New England head is fastened to the body of the nation only by a thin artery indeed. For the fourth line of communication is a wavering, roundabout railroad, practically all single-track, which follows close to the Canadian border. It is of conceivable military importance only in the unthinkable event of a quarrel with our cousins to the north. In such a catastrophe this line, of potential military value, could be made of actual value only by double-tracking and by almost complete reconstruction. * * * * * Enough now of the possibilities of the cutting of the main military base of the nation. Go south with me for a moment from Washington and see the strategic position of our railroads along the more southerly portions of the Atlantic coast. Cross the Potomac on the nameless steel structure that superseded the historic Long Bridge more than a decade ago and yet is of hardly less military importance. For the trains of every railroad running south from Washington must cross upon its tracks. Of these railroads, three are the trunk stems that, while running many miles back from the actual coast, still serve it. They are the Southern Railway, the Seaboard Air Line, and the Atlantic Coast Line. These three railroads and their direct connections reach from Washington to Norfolk, to Charleston, to Savannah, to Mobile, and to New Orleans--the most important of the southeasterly ports. One of their most interesting connections crosses the keys of Florida and does not stop on its overseas trip until it reaches the last of them--Key West, which is almost within scent of the cigar fumes of Havana. If we ever had to send another army into Cuba, Tampa would be completely out of it.