urged by him with great energy as a commercial necessity for the State. But inaction at that time left the prize to be carried off by New York through the construction of the Erie Canal. At present, however, there is a fair probability of the work being completed, as the existing Virginia canal, of which the proposed line is an extension, has fallen into the hands of a French company which, it is said, intends to prosecute the work without delay, as soon as its charter shall have been fully confirmed.

These Virginia railroad and canal enterprises, although of the highest importance on account of their influence in developing the resources of the country, are only subsidiary to a still grander project that is intended to divert to Richmond a portion of the commerce of the Pacific. Richmond has now direct communication with Memphis. The Railroad from Memphis to Little Rock, Arkansas, will be finished within a few months. A Texas company has undertaken the work of building a road that will unite Northern Texas and the Rio Grande with Arkansas. General Fremont is now pushing a railroad through the Mexican provinces of Chihuahua and Sonora, that will connect the Rio Grande and the James River via Little Rock and Memphis, with Guaymas, in California: hence, before the expiration of another year it is expected that Richmond will be in direct railroad communication with San Francisco.

The railroad and canal improvements in the other Southern States are also of considerable importance. In Alabama recent arrangements have connected the Will's Valley and Chattanooga Railroad into the Chattanooga and New Orleans line. This road will be completed to the Alabama State line in October next, and the cars will be running to Gadsden within eight months. A short link of thirty miles-which is now being graded-will then connect Selma with Chattanooga. This road will open up the grain lands of Alabama to the great Northern and Western markets, and will impart new energy and industry to one of the finest sections of country in the Union. The Charleston, Atlanta, Memphis, Topeka, and the New Orleans and Chattanooga railroads will all cross the Coosa River near Gadsden, and that place will then become, next to Atlanta, the most important railroad centre in the interior of the Southwestern States. Louisville and Cincinnati are competing for the commerce of the GulfStates, and the capital of these wealthy cities has been available in improving and perfecting the communications with Mobile, Vicksburg and New Orleans. Nearly all the Southern cities are taking measures to extend their railroad communications with the interior. Savannah was almost the first to put in order its old roads and plan new connections. Charleston has evinced a decided activity in the matter, and is once more in direct railroad communication with the Mississippi River at Memphis. In a word, from almost every seaport along the Southern coast connections are being effected with one or another of the leading trunk lines that compose the admirable net work of Southern railroads. North Carolina seems to be the most backward, but the project of repairing the Dismal Swamp Canal, which will probably be soon completed, will open that State to a new career of industry and wealth.

Our limits preclude us from presenting in detail all of even the larger

roads projected, and much less can we make room to describe the numerous shorter enterprises in progress in the Southern States. Enough has been given to indicate that the Southern people manifest an energy and interest upon the subject, that could scarcely have been anticipated at the close of a long and exhausting civil war. They have been greatly aided in the work of industrial reorganization by the liberality and wisdom of the Government in restoring the military railroads at the close of the war to the original owners on payment of a fair valuation for improvements in the roads and the rolling stock. Indeed, it is not easy to see how any progress could have been made in case a different policy had been adopted by the authorities at Washington.

The vigor thus manifested at the South in opening these great lines of Southern trade is also very important, in that it facilitates the restoration of society to a healthy condition, and thus affords effective guarantees for the future. With the establishment of easy intercourse with distant markets, the vexed labor problem was divested of half its difficulties. To all classes the one resort of industry was the only possibility of the future. In this view, the restoration and improvement of the great highways of modern travel is invested with a grand significance. It has smoothed past troubles and will lead to still higher benefits. Politics and government are dependent upon and controlled by the social and industrial condition. All that is now required is confidence and security, and when these shall have been obtained, the South will enter upon a new career of prosperity.

DEBT AND FINANCES OF LOUISVILLE.

The public debt of Louisville is made up of what is called the Debt Proper and the Contingent Debt-the latter being loans of the city's credit to certain Railroad Companies. The following is a schedule of the Debt Proper:

The bonds issued as loans of the City's credit, forming the contingent debt (being endorsements) are described in the following statement:

As collaterals for the security of the principal and interest of these endorsements the city holds the bonds of the corporate beneficiaries, secured by deposits of stocks or mortgage on their properties. The whole of the debt bears interest at the rate of 6 per cent. per annum, payable semiannually at the banks named in the tables or at the City Treasurer's office. As against its debt proper, the city holds property of great value-in endorsements, escheats, and real estate ($2,125,520 67), market-house property (48,344 96), stocks of various companies ($1,549,253 70), House of Refuge Property ($81,191 77), notes, personal debts, &c.

The valuation of taxable property, as a basis for the taxes to be collected in 1867, was-for city tax $48,561,983, and for water tax $57,823,727, the latter including the value of merchandize ($9,261,744) not taxable for city purposes. The valuation for the years 1860 to 1867, both for city and special purposes, is given in the following table:

The assessment law appears to have been modified between 1865 and 1866, and "personality," formerly only taxable for water purposes, was transferred to the city valuation. Under the head of "Residuary" there was formerly from $3,000,000 to $6,000,000 listed as liable to water, &c., tax; also an additional slave valuation. These items, no longer existing, made a larger difference between the two lists than is at present observable -that difference being for the years 1866 and 1867 "merchandize" alone. The following statement shows the amount of taxes collected for 1866, and the purposes for which collected:

The total tax listed for this year was $867,288 76, and the amount col

lected was, as above, $791,759 87, leaving in default $75,528 89. The listed tax indicates a rate of about 14 mills for city, and 1 mill for water tax. The other principal sources of revenue (other than income from investments) are license fees and rents of wharves and market houses. These (which belong to the sinking fund) have produced yearly for the past six years the amounts stated below:

The increase of revenue from these sources is very satisfactory. We have no means of ascertaining the amount of the general taxes for a series of years.

The aggregate receipts into the City Treasury from all sources in 1866 amounted to $1,250,752 35, and the expenditures to $1,175,014 61, leaving a balance to credit of $81,737 74, or, after adjustment of warrants out standing at the commencement ($16,669 61) and close ($6,976 66) of the year a clear balance of $72,044 79, which, added to the cash in Treasury January 1, 1866 ($255,366 82), leaves a cash balance of $327,411 61 for future appropriation.

The chief objects of expenditure in 1866 were: almshouse, $14,064 65; bounty fund, $31,326 57; city court and city officers, $31,026 76; city revenue proper, $40,365 85; schools, $105,680 28; engineer and fire department, $92,830 67; gas, $27,449 37; house of refuge, $34,589 95; hospital, $23,678 32; pumps, wells and cisterns, $89,786 78; sinking fund, $198,645 25; street improvements, $186,025 78; water fund, $57,303 02; wharves, $11,147 35; workhouse, $28,041 46.

The sinking fund account is supported chiefly from licenses, market and wharf rents, &c., and including $144,952 93 balance from previous year had in 1866 disposable funds to the amount of $464,946 31, and paid away $229,023 70, leaving a balance of $235,922 60.

The value of investments (bonds, notes and stocks) held by the sinking fund at the close of 1866 was $515,334 59.

The general financial condition of the city is shown in the following list of assets and liabilities, December 31, 1866.

The population of Louisville, according to a local census taken in 1866, was 125,800, and the

An answer, not subject to fits," is not necessarily falsified by the fact that the life-insured has had one or more fits. But if the question had been, "Have you ever had fits?" then it is said that any fit of any kind, and however long before, must be stated. But if a man had a fit when a young child, and forgot to mention it, or considered it wholly unimportant, and it had nothing to do with his state of health, it would hardly be held a falsification which would avoid the policy.

As there is always a general question as to any facts affecting health not particularly inquired of, a concealment of such a fact goes to a jury, who are to judge whether the fact was material and whether the concealment were honest. As when a life insured was a prisoner for debt, aud so without the benefit of air and recreation; and where a woman whose life was insured had become the mother of a child under disgraceful circumstances, and the insurers defended against the policy on this ground, the question was submitted to the jury, whether the concealment of these facts was a material concealment.

If the policy and the papers annexed or connected put no limits on the location of the life-insured, he may go where he will. But if, when applying for insurance, he intends going to a place of peculiar danger, and this intention is wholly withheld, it would be a fraudulent concealment.

If facts be erroneously but honestly misrepresented, and the insurers, when making the policy, knew the truth, the error does not affect the policy. Nor does the non statement of a fact which diminishes the risk, or concerning which there is an express warranty.

If upon a proposal for a life insurance, and an agreement thereon, a policy be drawn up by the insurers and presented to the insured and accepted by them, which differs from the terms of the agreement, and varies the rights of the parties concerned, equity will interfere and deal with the case on the footing of this agreement and not of the policy. But it may be shown by evidence and circumstances that it was intended by the insurers to vary the agreement and propose a different policy to the insured, and this was understood by the insured, and the policy so accepted.