The Sun.
London, England, 1860-01-05 00:00:00

various parties, and the charges which had been
brought against those connected with its manage-
ment. If we understood the line of his argument
correctly, he attempted to meet these charges by
instancing the admirable qualities which had been
displayed in carrying out the work, and quoted a
remark which he remembered to have heard Mr.
Hincks make some years ago—" Prudence, the first
of virtues, never could be used in the cause of vice."
He concluded by expressing a hope that this coun-
try had entered on a splendid career, in which the
results that would flow from the event of this day,
the opening of the Victoria-bridge, would play no
unimportant part. (Cheers.)
Mr. G. B. BRUCE said he had been asked to pro-
pose a toast, and it afforded him great pleasure to
do so. The company already had the melancholy
pleasure of drinking the memory of the late Robert
Stephenson; and he must now congratulate the
people of Canada on having among them so worthy
a relic as the bridge of that great man's genius.
He must also congratulate them on having enjoyed
the services of his friend Mr. A. M. Ross, a name
eminent from the cemmencement of railway enter-
prise, and one which was connected with this un-
dertaking from the beginning, It afforded him the
greatest pleasure, as an old pupil of Mr. Stephen-
son, to be seated that day by the side of Mr. Ross,
within the province of Canada. He remembered,
when in India, reading the report of a speech de-
livered in this city by Mr. Stephenson, in which that
gentleman spoke of a certain class of men whose
exertions, :talents, and skill, left to the en-
gineers nothing but the " poetry of engi-
neering." The idea struck him as a beautiful
one, ~and beautifully expressed ; and if ever
there was a company who by their exertions,
skill, capital, and enterprise, left to the engineers
nothing but the "poetry of engineering," it was the
firm of Pete, Brassey, and Co., who were so well
represented here by Mr. Hodges. He only repeated
what he had heard from Mr, Stephenson and Mr.
Ross, that much of the success of this undertaking
had been owing to the skill, energy, and unfailing
resources in difficulty of Mr. Hodges. He had ex-
amined closely and critically every part of that
work, the opening of which, whatever Mr. Hedges
might say, they were met to celebrate. No iron
tubas were ever put together over which passengers
might more safely pass. No masonry was every
heaped stone on stone with greater art, or with
more precaution to secure solidity and durability.
He was, therefore, justified in proposing on this
occasion the health of Messrs. Pete, Brassey, and
Co., and in coupling with it that of Mr. Hodges.
Before concluding, he would express his earnest
hope that the future of Canada might be typified
by the grandeur of this enterprise, and the rapidity
of her improvement equal that which had distin-
guished the construction of the bridge. (Cheers.)
Band—" For they are jolly good fellows."
Mr. HODGES replied on behalf of the contractors.
He said—lt gives me great pleasures to convey to
you my appreciation of the feeling with which this
toast was given and received by you. In carrying
out this great work over which you have this day
passed, we have had to encounter many difficulties
which are net apparent to you ; the greatest of
which, perhaps, has been caused by financial diffi-
culties consequent upon the period during which
this great work has been carried on. But, owing
to the skill and reputation of the contractors, the
work, notwithstanding these financial diffiulties,
has been brought to its present successful termina-
tion. And perhaps it would be well for me to say
that this work will last as a monument of their
ability to perform to the utmost whatever they may
undertake. On their behalf I thank you most
heartily and cordially for the way in which you
have drunk this toast.
His Lordship the Anglican Bishop of MONTREAL
then rose and said—l wish to be very brief in what
I have to say. Mr. Bruce has very properly joined
in the health which you have just drunk to the
honour of Messrs. Peto, Brassey, and Betts, the
name of Mr. Hodges, but it should also be given
separately, and I have claimed from him the right
to propose the toast. Of course Ido not speak here
as a politician, or take part in political controver-
sies, but in viewing the great and gigantic work
this day inaugurated,
whatever politicians may say
of disunion, I cannot but think that this groat iron
road is clasping the country closer together, and is
a proof and pledge of the unity of the interests of
this great country, whatever politicians in their
party squabbles may say to the contrary. Mr.
Hodges has laid out in this work at the rate of
about a thousand pounds a day during the last
seven years. Almost the whole of that money has
come from other countries than Canada. And when
we can show the great capitalists of Europe that
as a people we can be depended upon as reliable and
trustworthy, and as adequate to the erection of such
lasting works as this, and when we look at the rate
of interest in this country compared with what can
be obtained in the old country, the capital of Europe
must as necessarily flow into this country as the
St. Lawrence flows into the sea. For the rest, I
have only to say that I came here to-day, not merely
because I have taken a great interest in watching
this gigantic work of which you have heard, in
watching each pier in its erection, or in watching
the multitudinous rivets which have connected the

vast tubes together—not merely because I wished
to join with you in celebrating its opening, but be-
cause I wished to pay personal respect to Mr.
Hodges, who in after years will be remembered
with pride—remembered for his integrity, honesty,
and ability, and the Christian principle with which
he has endeavoured to provide for the education of
the young and the spiritual supervision of all the
people connected with the works in which he was
engaged. I look upon that asa noble example that
all employers of large numbers of men ought to
follow, they having no business to congregate to-
gether large bodies of men and not provide for their
spiritual welfare. And when the greatest works
existing, of which this is one, shall have crumbled
away—when, as our great English poet says,
" The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherits, shall dissolve,"
—the integrity of character, the honourable prin-
ciple, the Christian philanthropy which has actuated
Mr. Hodges will remain. These things have their
record through all eternity. I propose to you indi-
vidually, as he deserves, the " Health of Mr.

This toast was drunk with the greatest enthusi-
asm and applause, and followed by music from the
band.
Mr. HODGES, in reply, said—l can only thank
you—more I cannot say, and then resumed his seat.
He then rose again and said—l seem by some means
to have gained the esteem of most of you, and I
have gained it at the expense of others. (Cries of
" No, no.") The staff I have had under me have
done the work—l have done nothing. I had hoped
and intended to say a great deal in their behalf,
but little time remains for me to do so, as I mean to
ask the ladies to promenade in this tube, for the
last time they will have the opportunity of doing
so. But I wish to perform a duty to those to whom
lam so much indebted. And I will say this, that
whoever will engage any of the staff, whether en-
gineers, whether foremen, whether sub-contractors
or mechanics, they may think themselves happy in
having secured the services of honest and talented
men, second to none in the world. I give you,
with all my heart and soul, "The staff—engineers,
foremen, sub-contractors, mechanics, and staff at
Birkenhead."

Drunk with the usual honours, and the band
having played a march,
Mr. DuNcaN, C.E., replied on behalf of the staff.
Ho said that they would soon probhbly be dis-
persed, some of them moving to lands beyond the
sea ; but they would never forget the pride and
satisfaction with which they had worked under
these contractors and Mr. Hodges. They would
never forget the kindness and sympathy which had
been shown them, the very kind way in which Mr.
Hodges had proposed their health ;and the manner
in which that large and distinguished assemblage
of the people of Montreal had drunk it.
Mr. HODGES then told the ladies he hoped they
would promenade through the tube as this would be
the last opportunity for them to do so. He then called
upon all, previous to dispersing, to join with him
in drinking the last toast, and concluded by giving
" The Ladies."

---
enthusiasm, after whic e
The good old toast,
bda rnudn skt r with
unpo " l II Ic ekr e 9 sf
a health to all good lasses.”
con-
siderable
After the collation and speeches
walked
guest
distance down the tube, some of them as far as the
aelkreedovfeorr, a
some number of the
centre tube. Here the opening
to enable them to pass through,was large enough
e to the Nuns Isle,
upon the river rushing below. and to look down
with its surface of
broken ice, upwards on one s)
Laprarie, &c., and on the other to Stf. Lambert, St.
Helen's Island, and the city, of thefront of which
m this
one gets perhaps' the best possible view f
point. Here, too, one gets the best idea o the im-
mense extent of the work, looking in either direc-
tion along a line of nearly a mile of iron tubes.
Before closing this account of the virtual opening
of the Victorial Bridge, it will not be out of place'
to state that the bridge has been subjected by the
English engineers, as we understand, to the most
severe tests.
Waggons loaded with stones to their
1 utmost capacity have been drawn over it by three
locomotives attached together, and a strain produced
equal to three or four times that which can be pro-
duced by ordinary freight trains. It is after such
a test Mr. Bruce declares that no better or stronger
work can be found anywhere. We feel we may
congratulate Mr. 'lodges, the contractors, the en-
gineers, the company, the' city, or rather the whole
country, that this truly gigantic undertaking is
thus triumphantly completed—that tlg3 immense

expenditure of money upon it has at last achieved
a practical result,

The immense importance of the Grand Trunk
Railroad is beginning to be realised by the people
of the United States. The Chicago Tribune com-
mences an able article on this subject with the fol-
lowing glowing introduction :—" The Jesuit mis-
sionaries, who first penetrated the central portions
of the American continent, were possessek of indo-
mitable energy and magnificent conceptions. De-
riving their ideas from the grandeur of the lakes,
and the rivers, and the prairies which they were the
first to explore, they established a cordon of military
posts between Quebec and New Orleans, and for
years cherished the sublime scheme of grasping the
entire continent. The commencement of the year
1860 will witness Quebec and New Orleans con-
nected by bands more powerful and enduring than
were dreamed of by those old exploring heroes. In
the comparison, military posts are but as cobwebs,
and for all time to come commerce will bind, as by
hooks of steel, Quebec and New Orleans to Chi-
cago, the great central city of the continent. The
magnificent conception of the old Jesuits will soon
be more than realised."

The road is completed to Sarnia, and is now in
good running order, with the exception of the Vic-
toria Bridge, which, however, will he ready for
trains to pass over it in the early part of December.
The Tribune says :

" No man would dare to estimate the advantages
which the opening of this road will confer upon the
West. The first thing to be noticed is the esta-
blishment of a weekly mail between Chicago and
Liverpool and London. A contract with our Go-
vernment has already been obtained, and the first
mail between Chicago and London is to be made up
on Wednesday evening, Nov. 23, and will leave this
city on Thursday morning, Nov. 24,:at eight o'clock,
connecting with the Royal Mail steamer which is to
leave Portland on Saturday morning, the 26th. The
European mail will leave this city thereafter every
Thursday morning, connecting with Saturday
morning's steamers from Portland. Passengers
leaving with the mail on Thursday morning will
be sure of the connection at Portland, as the steamer
will be delayed till the mail train arrives. There
will be but one change of cars, after the Victoria-
bridge is finished, between this city and Portland.
In the above paragraph we have spoken only of
Portland. In the summer cars will run to Quebec,
and the ocean steamers will sail from that city.
The distance from Chicago to Portland is 1,129
miles; time only 48 hours."
Turning to the South, the editor says that only a
small rail of 24 miles requires to be finished on the
" Mississippi Central," and this is to be done before
the Ist of January, when there will be all rail, via
Chicago, between New Orleans, Quebec, and
Portland : _ .

" The locomotive will run from the mouth of the
St. Lawrence to the mouth of the Mississippi, and
the distance which it took the old Jesuits in their
bark canoes weary months to accomplish will be
made in logs than four days. Who can doubt that
the opening of this great line from gulf to gulf will
work a vast change in the business of the continent ?
Who can doubt that Chicago, situated at the head
of our magnificent inland seas, on the dividing ridge
between the valleys of the Mississippi and the St.
Lawrence, and near the centre of this great thorough-
fare, will reap immense advantages from its comple-
tion ? It will be interesting to put the distance and
the time between Portland and New Orleans in
tabular form :

Miles. Hours.
Portland to Chicago 1129 .. 48
Chicago to Cairo
Cairo to Columbus 25 .. 1
Columbus to New Orleans 526 .. 26

Total 2045 931
It will be seen that the time between New Orleans
and Chicago will be less than two days ; between
New Orleans and Portland about four; and fourteen
days will suffice for the passenger to pass from New
Orleans, through the heart of the American conti-
nent, and across the Atlantic to the capital of the
British empire. Was ever Arabian tale more truly
strange and astounding ?"
The Boston Transcript has also an article on
the same road, from which we take the following
extract :

" Some few weeks ago, our readers may remem-
ber, in the telegraph despatch of the day, a state-
ment that representations had been forwarded to
the State Department at Washington, in regard
to the efforts being made at the -West, by the
agents of the Canadian roads, to attract freight
from our own roads, via Canada; and, judging by
the quantity of freight brought by the Portland
steamers, we doubt not the statement referred to
was correct. The boats of the Portland Steam
Company have landed at Central Wharf about
1,400 barrels of flour per day for the last few weeks,
with immense quantities of ether merchandise. To-
' day we saw landing • a lot of cotton, which had
been shipped from Memphis to Boston via Mon-
treal and Portland, at a cost, as we learned, of about
4 dols. per bale. So large has been the increase
of freight from the Grand Trunk road, that the
Portland Steam Company have found it necessary
to increase the number of boats • and also, we learn,
they have leased another berth of the Central Wharf
Company, and are now erecting a large warehouse
to accommodate their increasing business. When
the great bridge across the St. Lawrence at Mon-
treal shall have been finished, which will probably
be accomplished during the present month, freight
will then come from St. Louis to Portland with but
two transhipments, and must, we think, prove a
very popular route from the west to the east.'

TILE GREAT ST. LAWRENCE VICTORIA

BRIDG.E.

A great event has just occurred in Canada. The
Victoria-bridge, the greatest work of Robert
Stephenson, has been opened for traffic. We be-
lieve that seven years and upwards have been con-
sumed in the construction of this wonderful bridge,
and at. last a train has passed over it, and the St.
Lawrence is no longer an obstacle to free communi-
cation between the Canadas and the United States.
This bridge is the most magnificent work of the
kind in existence; for, although within our own
island we have the bridge across the Menai Straits,
yet in every point the Victoria-bridge is far superior.
'The St. Lawrence, as may readily be seen by a
reference to the map, together with the great chain
of lakes, actually divides North America in two,
from the Rocky Mountains to New Brunswick.
There is, indeed, an admirably planned wooden
bridge at Niagara, but it is not to be mentioned
as a rival of the stupendous achievement at
Montreal. The provinces of the North American
Union are now so intimately connected by iron
lines that all that was' wanting to bring the
Union into close communication with Canada
was to span the St. Lawrence, and this has now
been done. It seems a prosaic test to apply to
a work which appears to have been inspired by
the very poetry of engineering, but to us there
seems something very prophetic of the future in
the simple statement of freight carried over the
Victoria-bridge during five nights after it had been
opened for traffic. We read tluit from west to east
there passed 162 cars, containing 11,723 barrels of
flour, 1,552 barrels of pork, 140 bales of cotton, and
110 tons of general goods. From east to west there
passed 130 cars, containing 524 tons of general
goods, 170 tons f iron, and 39,000 feet of lumber.
Now, this looks very prosaic and commonplace, but
let us see what it means. Here we have evidence
that the corn-growers, the provision merchants, and
the cotton-planters of the United States are ready
and eager to avail themselves of this opening for
traffic. On the other hand, and on the Canadian
side, all persons engaged in the timber and iron
trades, and, as we may presume, the general mer-
chants in this mother country, are nothing loth to
meet the produ'3ers of the Union half. way. This
simple register of commercial transactions, which
at the first glance reads like a mere invoice, is more
significant than any of the considerations which
were urged with exuberant rhetorical power by the
speakers at the opening banquet.
It must be remembered that, independently of
the engineering difficulties of this undertaking, the
work had to be carried on in a climate which for
many months of the year is almost Arctic in its
severity. It is said, however, that no iron tubes,
despite of these drawbacks, have ever been put to-
gether more scientifically or securely, and that rever
has stone been heaped upon stone with greater
care to insure durability than in the case of the
Victoria-bridge. It is, indeed, to be doubted if
ever a monument has been raised by human hands
which can offer a- prouder memnrial of the race
which reared it than the Victoria•bridge. To
Robert Stephenson is due the merit of its concep-
tion ; to Messrs. Peto and Brassey the praise which
belongs to the contractors for such a work when
successfully executed. We believe that the great
bulk of the money which has been etnployed upon
the construction of the line and the bridge has
cone from the pockets of British capitalists.
Thethe Victoria-bridge will, as we
trust,all openingproveof
the commencement of a new era
in the prosperity of the Canadas. An epoch of
steady industry and an absence of political turmcil
and squabbles are all that is needed to place the
provinee!., of British America in as favourable a
States What
alsvtlhtaeitr
imsosmtfaeinly rtunait.eeqiulivraelds oisf tthheaUt United
should inspire confidence in the honest manage-
ment of their finances and in the industrial deve-
lopment of their country, We confess, however,
we cannot read of this opening
of the Victoria-
bridge without a pang of regret, Alas for Robert
Stephenson ! Alas for the great engineer who a
few years bacl lookod down upon the ice-drift 91