TABLE NO. 6.-Number of bales of cotton received at Saint Louis by river and by rail during the past ten years.

TABLE NO. 7.-Statement showing the average freight charges by steamboat from Saint Louis to New Orleans during the years 1873 and 1874.

ABLE No. 8.—Average freight charges from Saint Louis to New Orleans by the barge line for the years 1873, 1874, and 1875.

TABLE NO. 9.-Flour and grain received at Saint Louis by river and by rail, each year, 1865

TABLE NO. 10.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight received at Saint Louis from the East by each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE NO. 11.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight received at Saint Louis from the West by each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE 12.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight received at Saint Louis from the North by each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE 13.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight received at Saint Louis from the South by each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE 15.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight shipped east from Saint Louis 'y each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE 16.—Statement showing the tonnage of freight shipped west from Saint Louis by each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE 17.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight shipped north from Saint Louis by each railroad and river for five years.

TABLE 18.-Statement showing the tonnage of freight shipped south from Saint Louis by each railroad and river for five years.

APPENDIX No. 14.

ANSWERS TO INQUIRIES IN RELATION TO THE COMMERCE OF NEW ORLEANS, AND THE COMMERCIAL MOVEMENTS TO AND FROM THAT CITY BY RIVER AND BY RAIL, BY MR. HENRY G. HESTER, SECRETARY OF THE NEW ORLEANS COTTON EXCHANGE. 1876.

Question 1. Please to describe the various trunk railroads into New Orleans, stating the connections of such roads north and east, also facts in relation to the ownership of management of such lines.

Answer. New Orleans has but two trunk-lines of railway, viz, the New Orleans, Saint Louis and Chicago, and the New Orleans and Mobile Railroad.

The New Orleans, Saint Louis and Chicago Railroad is the result of a consolidation in July, 1874, of the New Orleans, Jackson and Great Western Railroad, leading northward from New Orleans, La., through about the center of Mississippi, to the town of Canton, in the latter State, which was opened for business in the year 1859, and the Mississippi Central Railroad, from Canton, Miss., to Jackson, Tenn., and thence by a recent extension to Cairo, Ill., where connection is made by boat across the Mississippi River with the Illinois Central Railroad for points north, east, and west. This company has continuous line from New Orleans to Cairo of 545 miles with a branch 21 miles long from Durant to Kosciusko. The two roads had been worked for some years prior to consolidation by the Southern Railroad Association, which also worked as a branch line the Mississippi and Tennessee Road from Granada, Miss., northwest to Memphis, say about 100 miles. A glance at the following statement will show the importance of this route, and that the amount of its business entitles it to rank as the second leading railroad corporation of the South:

This line traverses one of the most productive sections in the cotton belt, and transports to New Orleans about 14 per cent. of the quantity received at that point, as will be seen by an examination of the following table:

It serves as a partial outlet for cotton from Mississippi, Tennessee, and Arkansas, and connecting at Jackson, Miss., with the Vicksburgh and Meridian Road, rurning east to Selma, Ala., transports the staple in moderate quantities from the center of that State to New Orleans.

Notwithstanding its extensive business, the expenses of this road in repairing dam ages to the lower end of the road from the Bonnet Carré crevasse of the Mississippi and the cost of the Cairo extension have caused it to fail in prompt payment of its indebtedness. On the 10th of March, 1876, the United States circuit court of New Orleans issued an order placing it in the hands of a receiver.

Suits have been brought in the United States circuit court for Mississippi and that