Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1853-06-25
GRAND NATIONAL CENTRAL HIGHWAY FROM ST
LOUIS TO SAN FRANCISCO.
Copy Of a Letter from the Hon, Richard Rush TO
the Hon. Thomas H. Benton.

planting trees and shrubs upon my grounds and in such
like usual work for week twoa species Of work. how
small the scale of it, not to be postponed at this sea-
son Of the yearhas prevented my earlier acknowedg
ment Of the copy your interesting letter to the people
Of Missouri the central national highway from the Mis-
sssipp the Pacific which you had the goodness to
send me- In sitting down acknowledge it now do
with any the less cordially and thankfuness, but
perhaps more as the delay has given time to
think Of it, read the whole pamphlet when it first came
and found it refreshing well instructive pastime
like intellectual tonic The statement of Mr.
Leroux, with COL Fremonts letter. made me think that
the route you recommend is the best frankly owning that
have had attention little drawn hitherto to the other
routes. but what makes chiefly and largely your
debtor the occasion the parts that follow this state
ment and letter. good both of them seem to me to be-
Louis the XIV asked the Duke Of vivonne plump
and fine looking gentleman Of his court what was the be-
nett Of reading The sprghty duke replied thatt had
the effect upon his mind that his maesys cartridges
had upon his cheeks-made it plump So when you burst
upon with the reflections, illustrations, and facts al
astounding old they are, when revived and ap
piled in connection with your subject that to be seen
page eight and onward of your invigorang pamphlet
it pumps up the mind. 1t it out Of the common
place lazy thoughts into which all of prone to
slide until strong fapper comes 1t fires us with de-
sire to do great things by bringing back to contem
plation the great things that have been done.
When you tell of the city Alexander the Great built
supersede Tyre the main street Of which five miles
long, thousand feet wide with coonaded and
ed footway of hundred feet each side when you
mind that the Pyramids standing long before that
time; jog memories with the authentic realities of
the vast chain of communication throughout the Roman
empire by highways stretching than four thousand
miles in length, going through mountains which they
perforated and crossing the broadcast and rapid
streams bold arches thrown Them the middle Of
this grand highway being raised into terrace command
ing the adjacent country and paved with stone in
so solid that parts of it still exist to challenge
curiosity and admiration when you remind further,
from our own Prescots glowing pages, that the Pc
ruvians before Spain got possession there had road
from fifteen hundred to thousand miles long conduct
ed painless seras buried in snow with galleries
for leagues through the living rock and rivers
ed by bridges that swung suspended in the air. and
ravnes of hdeous depth, which filled up with solid
masonry, besides overcoming other difficulties and obsa
Giles to have appalled, the most courageous engineers Of
modern tmeswhen you carry back to all these things
of the past to unhinge ones Startling
moments come 1t makes half afraid lest in
our days we have dwndled down to pigmies become a
set of Rip Van Wrinkles young Rips and old Rips all to-
geher with little hope of being wound up the
bodness and grandeur of those old fellows who lived
long before US and who they could revisit the EARTH
might be very muck disposed to laugh at US all To be
serious let us follow up the matter little for it is full
of pith.
If the Macedonians, Egyptians Romans, and the
semicivized Peruvans could do all that you wildly
and pertneny recall without the steam engine for land
water the electric telegraph to let each other know
IN winkling what was going or the thousand and
modern inventions in machinery for cheapening and
expeditng labor and multiplying SO prodgiousy its pro-
ducts, what would they not have done if like ourselves
they had had all these too 1t is enough to make us
blush think of it. But rather let take lessons from
it. In the spirit of progress let determine to improve
in the resolution of will 1t is too late to
learn however long may have been baskng in the de-
lusions of already attained perfection. DR.. Franklin
taught himself to write good hand which somehow
other had got spoiled by taskng himself to write copy
day after he had forty and Cato first learned
Greek at sixty. Why should not wake up to what we
capable of doing, and bestir ourselves accordingly
In Of your speeches some years ago remembered
that you drew very striking very taithiu very penuu
full picture of the characteristics of the Dutch and re-
member when was among them, in 1929, to have seen
the seacoas in the neghborhood of Haerem carts
employed in cartng sand to distance OF some miles into
the country where the soil consisted only of bog The
sand shot down into the bog and mixed with it. The
same returned the sandy region loaded with bog
which shot down into the sand when similar inter-
mnglng took place. By going with this process for
days and weeks, toeraby good soil the result in
both places Certain vegetable substances would grow
in it, when nothing whatever would have grown in the
sand bog by itself Our Western folks and the folks
on Atlantic side too, who such large bodies of
good land to be had cheap incline to smile at this
Dutch mode Of making land but let stop moment
The country which that remarkable people thus and in
other ways worked up exhibited in the sixteenth century
accumulation Of inhabitants in the space
than known in any other part of Europe OF more in
dustry than found elsewhere, and of more
tional wealth than possessed by the
Der Of men, So says Lord Brougham in of his works
and he Also that the spendor and of Holland
the consequence of any natural advantages but
great variety of defects in her climate and situation
These put man upon his efforts in all manner of ways
open by any possibility to his enterprise and industry
Now, what would the making OF this railroad to the
Pacific which you recommend by such comprehensive
gent, and anmang views-what, in truth, would it be-
compared to what the Dutch have done, even if you
intimate the United States employ fifty thousand
laborers upon it !? Almost nothing The Dutch, as
Votare said Of them scooped their country out Of the
1t was like creation. Having country,
they made for themselves that produced the maryes
recounted. God and nature gave country of i'm
mense natural fertility and advantages in oil respects
yet comparatively sleep them, Notwithstanding
all say of ourselves and the many things we have
ally done very honorable TO us, far have gone
But nations like individuals have duties commensurate
with their situations and il has been the maxim Of
ambition that aspires durable superiority to consider
nothing done while any thing which wisdom and hon
or prompts remains undone To my vision, to yours
inducements to construct this national ghway the
Pacific are urgent. Taken in the high sense of nation
al duty, pride, and interest the inducements quite
mandatory. Not n month, not day should be lost to-
wards it, From those to whom much is given much is
expected
We have got an incidentally important dominion upon
the Pacific and shall lose 1t If we do not set about
protecting ii in earnest War will come upon us Of
these days IL will Later from some Of
the which produce all wars, while human passions
remain; and il may come like thief in the night 1t is
part of prudence however atterng il may be to our