The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1853-11-12
;, . ! ..
RICHM 0ND, VA
Richmond and Danvilie Raiiroad Co
We have obtained the following statement
of the business of this Road:

/ 0enave obtained the following statement
| OF the business of this Road:
| Gross busiaess of the Road for the f.c,1
year 10 oept, Soiii' 1893. SI6f gS5 27
Expenses fer the year.................. 9i,iIa 81
| Metz profits for the year........... e7o,s5s 70
This is most gratifying exhibit, espe
ciaiiy when 1t Ia taken into consideration that
tie road has not been in operation to Ogil.
bJ's, its present terminus, eighty four miles
from Richmond, until very lately; and that for
good part Of the last fiscal year it was not
in use for more than fifty miles. The
Danville Railroad is bearing fresh testimony
with every succeeding year. to the practical
wisdom which originated it, and the energy
| a1d prudence with which it has been con
daoted. We know that there are complaints.
and that sonle of its friends think the Road
| ought to meve ahead faster. But complaints
are to be expected. 1t is the proud preroga-
tive efthe Anglo Saxon race to grunble at
every thing; yet we should like to SEQ the
mortal who can hurry up public improve
| ment at faster rate than Whit. Tunstall.
But for that worthy gentleman, the Danville
Railroad wouldn't have gone at all. Every
one remembers the increduleus smiles with
which Tunstall's impassioned appeals for the
Road were received in the Legislature No
one believed for a moment that one of his
predictions of the success of the Road would
prove true. Yet, as everybody liked Tun-
| ssall-whO is prince of good fellows, and ia
himself, intellectually and oratorically, a loco
| motive of the FIRST class and as members of
the Legislature didn't want to be denounced
every hour of the day for their apathy and
sluggisaness, they passed his bill to quiet him,
gave him bis rails to stop his railing We
need not narrate how Tunstaii afterwards as
tonished them with one Of the most prosper
| Gus, solid, elegant railways in the United
States He exploded with a clap of thunder
| the vulgar delusion that the man Of eloquence
and the man of action are never combined
| in the same person. He has not only the
| tongue to persuade unbelieving Senates, but
there is electricity enough in his mental and
power for forty railroads, if some means
could be procured of applying it, We are
credibly informed that when he appears at a
railroad station, the locomotives grow sud
denly red, as if ashamed of being seen stand
ing STILL and begin to snort and prance as if
anxious that he should get on and take ride.
Yet there are "fast men" in Virginia. and we
very fast men they must be, who think that
Tunstall is too slow
We have been prepared, in this age of pro
eress. for many wonders,-to see steamboats,
regarded as behind the times,-railroads Civ
en- up for balloons,-and people finally travel
ing on streak of lightning-but we had
never expected to see the day when the word
sLosc should be associated with the word I'Wns-
tail. The bare thought of living among a
race who consider Tunstall slow man takes
the breath out of our body.
However, this is melancholy era for
presidents and other functionaries of rail
road corporations. Formerly these Offices
were considered as fixed and permanent
things, unless forfeitedby palpable incom-
potency or misconduct. But as public
works have multiplied and the salaries
have been increased, the odor of the flesh
pots has attracted hungry herd from the de-
serts The presidents, the directors, the sec
retaries End Themselves encompassed on eve
ry side by roaring bulls of Bashan. Where
as, in former days. we could not distinguish
the head of an Improvement company from
any other sleek, well fed and contented NOR
tai, we can now tellthe same man as far as we
can soc him. If you observe upon the street
one gentleman who appears more care worn,
nervous and fdgetty than any other man you
have ever met.-ifyou see him. looking anx-
iously up and down. at every corner, as if
afraid Of being run over,-if, ever and anon,
he puts his hand apprehensively to his throat
and carefully feels his head as if anxious to
assure himself that it is still on his shoulders,
that, good reader, is the president of a rail
road