Southern shield., 1854-09-30
For tue State Go=ette d' Dcmocrot. rbe Case of Helena Stated.


 The first question being now settled, in fav- =. ofthe locomotive, whether will the business o Of tbo White river country take the upper od loJ S' m its route to New Orleans by way of IT%u INTEon,nbis. on the lower road on its route to Msn S1sr Orleans by way of Helena. The char New railroads are made up of two items, the Ses ,.;ns In pxpenses of the road, and the dvi- WoiH.'0 1- 0n the cost of construction. These ue'los s,e are in direct accordance with the mil Cnale 6n+ are on costly road uniformly high
 eaSg' ,' nTr on cheap road. It is unnecessary to
 CT liI' bis more fully; for the propositions in
 eAl'II,S Iasi clause of the foregoing sentence, are
 ul5 iuir p contained in the self-eyident proposi-
 .:,n GSri1 If the first clause. Having laid down
 tbosa lol nrinciples, 1 will now come directly to '1 The route of the Midland railroad has been definitely fixed. Running from the Mississip- nj at Helena, it connects with Little Rock by Tav w., of the mouth of Cache Nothing hay inc been done on the subject of the location of t6e Memphis and Little Rock Rail Road, 1 cannot opeak positively as to the route of that road. While physical facts would suggest the White river crossing from the mouth of Cache, I must, however, conclude, that this crossing is settled in favor of Devall's Bluff" S inasmuch as such settlement is indicated plainly in the best evidence bearing on the case-the late mail contract and lot specula- ton of one of the chief officers of the company. In the absence of any knowledge to the con- trary, I must therefore conclude, that the Memphis and Little Rock Railroad is intend ed to cross White river, if built, at Devall's Bluff The issue raised here is, however, above the question of route: the only object of thus considering the route is the general one of precision in every item of the subject
 The Memphis and Little Rock road, from Little Rock to Devall's Bluff, falls north of the prairies, and therefore, in crossing the roll ing upands of Pulaski and Prairie counties. presents, in comparison with the correspond ing section of the Helena road, earthwork. if not curvature and grades decidedly heavier; but in order to conduct the enquiry on terms of perfect liberality, I shall, in drawing the comparison between the two roads, concede to the Memphis road actual equality on the West of White river. This confines the issue to the section of the one road from Devall' Bluffs to Memphis, and of the other from Cache to Helena.
 On the Helena route the country from Cache to the Mississippi, being in fact the table land of Crowley's Ridge, is so admirably adapted to rail road purposes, as to require, at evenits objectionable points, merely sufficient earthwork to place the track a proper height above rain-shed. Superior to all overhows from rivers. creeks, expresses, rich in soil, thick with timber, unbroken by any depres- sons. except those of a few small streams, this route, from Cache to Helena, presenting one uninterrupted straight line of nine-tenths of its length, is unequalled, with the excep- ton of one in Illinois, by any other route on record. On the other hand, the route of the Memphis road presents formidable difficulties. In pronouncing its adoption as mail route absurd. late public meeting at DeS Arc, de- serbes in the preamble to its resolutions cer- tain portions of it as follows:-''The overflow in the White and Cache river bottoms, is eren noc Duly) fully ten miles wide, and from two otwalve feet deep And from St. Francis to Green Plains, is @ deep overflow from one to ten feet, coming from the St. Francis and Mississippi rivers" Cross ing the line of the terrible convulsion of 1872, theportion of thisroute between Memphis and the St. Francis, the line of overflow from each river blending midway in the bottom, must evidently present very serious difficulties in its eaYth-quake-rents. whether creeks, sloughs, lakes bayous, to the construction ofa railroad. But in order to save further remark, on this head, the practical value of all these difficult ties is setdown in the contractsaid to have been entered into for the construction of the Mem phiS and Little Rock railroad, at @25 GOO per mile of road. I adopt this valuation of those difficulties. The cost of the Midland railroad l set down at $I2, 900 per mile $l, ,25O more than the engineer $ estmate.- Another item in the comparison of the two roads is distance. The air-line distances be- tween Helena and Little Rock show, accord ing to the government surveys. difference in favor of Helena to the extent of 36 miles; and in order to avoid the debatable consideration of loss of distance, on the location of theriyal railroads, accept the airline difference for the actual difference. The Helena route then is shorter than the Memphis route, by thirty sixmies. H.