It is interesting to record that when the proposal to construct a canal from Liverpool to Hull was under consideration, about the middle of the last century, one of the arguments used in its favour was that it would enable American iron to be brought cheaper to the manufacturing towns from the ports of Liverpool and Hull, and so contribute to lessen the consumption of foreign European iron, “to the great profit of this nation in general, and our own ironworks in particular”; while it was even suggested that, in order to develop this branch of business between our then American colonies and the mother country, a bounty should be offered on the import of American pig-iron, thereby contributing to “clear the lands in America,” and “to preserve the woods in England.” The project to construct a new waterway through the manufacturing districts between Liverpool and Hull was strenuously opposed by a number of Cheshire gentlemen, who were the owners of the Weaver or Northwich Navigation, and who proposed to carry that waterway to Macclesfield, Stockport, and Manchester. In 1765, a plan was submitted for extending the navigation of the Weaver from Winsford Bridge, in Cheshire, to the river Trent, in the county of Stafford, there joining the Trent and the Severn by canals, and thereby “opening an inland communication between the great ports of Liverpool, Bristol, and Hull.” In view of the attention that has recently been given to the salt industry, it may be stated that the transport of that commodity was one of the principal reasons offered for the construction, in 1769, of a canal between Liverpool and Hull, _viâ_ Cheshire. At that time manufactured salt was carried on horseback “to almost all parts of Staffordshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, and Lincolnshire,” and it was stated that “so great is the home consumption of this article, that from the saltworks of Northwich alone, a duty of 67,000_l._ was last year paid into the Exchequer. At Northwich and Wisford are annually made about 24,000 tons.”[48] THE LEEDS AND LIVERPOOL CANAL.