Chicago is the railroad heart of the United States. The stream of trade which is the life of the nation circulates through this heart and is transmitted through the great arteries, or trunk lines, into the smaller capillaries. The seaboard cities like New York, Philadelphia, New Orleans, San Francisco, and Boston may be likened to the lungs of this great body, for it is at these ports that the old blood is exchanged for new and sent back to the heart for distribution. Every throb of railroad policy that emanates from the heart is felt in all parts of the system, even down to minute capillaries like the Manchester, Dorset and Granville Railroad with 6 miles of track. And when the great trunk lines get together to decide what proportion of their freight receipts the M. D. & G. R. R. is to receive for carrying the freight those 6 miles, they are pretty likely to have their own way. Said M. D. and G. R. R. may not get its fair proportion, but it hasn't much to say in the matter.

The proportion of the through freight rate which the trunk lines have assigned to the New England railroads is lower than that accorded the railroads which feed the other Atlantic ports. And this accounts for the recent trouble with one of the finest terminals of the railroad system--the port of Boston, which is broad, "deep chested", protected, and well furnished with excellent docking facilities; and what is still more in its favor from the point of view of the steamship companies, it is some three hundred miles, one day, nearer Europe than is New York, the nearest of the other ports. The steamship companies are glad to dock at Boston and would do so if it were not for the fact that they find no goods on the Boston wharves waiting for export. No ship can be expected to bring cargoes in to port and depart with an empty hold. This freight differential has so blocked the roads that feed the port of Boston that there can be no such exchange and nature has closed the harbor.

For some time there has been a hearing going on before the Interstate Commerce Commission, in which Boston has been trying to get an equal differential with that of the other ports. The result of this hearing is in doubt, but it is self-evident that Boston will never become a great port until ships coming there can get return cargoes; and until Boston has a differential equal to that of the other ports. It will never have goods for export on its wharves.