built in Lancashire from Sankey Brook to St Helen's; and in 1759, James
Brindley built the first important one, the Duke of Bridgewater's canal
from Manchester, and the coal mines of the district to the mouth of the
Mersey passing, near Barton, by aqueduct, over the river Irwell. From
this achievement dates the canal building of England, to which Brindley
first gave importance. Canals were now built, and rivers made navigable
in all directions. In England alone, there are 2,200 miles of canals and
1,800 miles of navigable river. In Scotland, the Caledonian Canal was
cut directly across the country, and in Ireland several canals were
built. These improvements, too, like the railroads and roadways, are
nearly all the work of private individuals and companies.

The railroads have been only recently built. The first great one was
opened from Liverpool to Manchester in 1830, since which all the great
cities have been connected by rail. London with Southampton, Brighton,
Dover, Colchester, Exeter, and Birmingham; Birmingham with Gloucester,
Liverpool, Lancaster (via Newton and Wigan, and via Manchester and
Bolton); also with Leeds (via Manchester and Halifax, and via Leicester,
Derby, and Sheffield); Leeds with Hull and Newcastle (via York). There
are also many minor lines building or projected, which will soon make it
possible to travel from Edinburgh to London in one day.

As it had transformed the means of communication by land, so did the
introduction of steam revolutionise travel by sea. The first steamboat
was launched in 1807, in the Hudson, in North America; the first in the
British empire, in 1811, on the Clyde. Since then, more than 600 have
been built in England; and in 1836 more than 500 were plying to and from
British ports.

Such, in brief, is the history of English industrial development in the