The Davenport gazette. [volume] (Davenport, Scott Co., Iowa) 1841-185?, 1854-06-15


terpriscs, and the intense activity 81 capt
tai seeking for profitable investment, sne :,
new districts in the process OF geograPn'ea'
eXtenton, some advantage over those Wnose
boundaries are fixed and which are merely
filing up. | remember Rochester when
had hut thousand inhabitants, ana Mhcii
houses were sprlnglng M VITA the s'us'ps .,
forest trees around them. tisnaW apcaattei
city with forty thousand Inhabitants ! re-
member when Buffalo was Struggling VII
lage with fifteen hundred men, women anu
children, all told. 1t has now at least sev-
enty thousand inhabitants, and is one OF the
most flourishing and attractive Of our from
tier cities. | saw a steamboat there on
Friday last three hundred aud fifty feet long
and fitted up. in some respects, IN a style OF
costliress unequalled even by the maeniii
cent ocean steamships Of Mr.. Collins.
Every thing about this western region
wears the aspect 81 wealth, commercial pros
perity, financial power and an energy that
scouts all opposition in the execution 81 It's
purposes Of improvement. appeal TO all
who stand around me. I, say whether tbs
sketch is overdrawn i'll the outline, Or over
eolored in the detail. Let me pussue this
subject lttle further.
went to Lake Huron in 1919 in the fist
steamboat that was ever upon those waters
and on her first trip--the"W alk-in-the-W a
ter.n commanded by Captain Job Fish
do not remember how many days we were
between Buffalo and Michilmackinac.
know the name Of our vessel was very des-
efiptive hefper!ormance. In the language
of the poet, .Shc walked the waters like
thing OF life;'' but she merely walked. II
seemed to Us at that day very quick voyage,
but it was immt surahy SLOW when GEM
pared with the twenty miles an hour regu-
larly made by more than one OF the steam
ers tha, now run from Buffalo to the wes-
tern extremity OF Lake Erie. Detroit was
then little more than single line OF build
inrs along the bank Of the river, y It'll do not
recollect how many inhabitants. II is now
a thriving, well-bult city with forty thous-
and inhabitants, with all the embeilish
mcnts 81 modern art, and advancing rapidly
like Buffalo and Rochester, in population
and wealth Cleveland, saw ten. There
mav have been SIX or seven hundred souls
where there are now forty thousand We
looked into Lake Michigan, bat we saw
nothing there, except military sutton at
Green Bay and fleet Of canoes with liFe
hundred Indians, on their way 10 Drum
monl's Island, at The northwestern cxtr nifty
Of Lake Huron, to receive their annual pres
ents from the agents II the British govern
ment. What a comment Is this on our
proeress ThirtY-tise years ago the Indian
tribes living within Our territory we're
subsidized BY foreign government and
With ua friendly motive. But et that pass.
The Indians have gone 10 the Rocky Noun
tains Or Is their fathers. aud We are happily
IN t.rHs ofanity with ottr ancient adversary.
Cheae5, one Of the great cities uf the Lakes
With seventy thousand lubabtt4ats, did not
exist TIL 1881 We saw ii last Sunday
in ail its beauty ana promise, banked by the
waters Of Lake Michigan ON one side and
the aids, spread Prallies on the other. The
ahorieuIl races have disappeared. The
forests they possessed are disappearing al
50; and civilization has planted her stand
ards and is erecting the monuments o. her
empire over the whole face of this new
western world. ! trust my auditors, md
especially the iairer potion q ibcm, will
MT set me doa;n is a contemporary Of Their
prorentors when sneak Vt having been
an eye witness % this metam1rphUsis 81
the wilderness into abodcs Of civil zed men.
assure you, ladies, | ain not very greatly
on the wrong side ot fifty, or on that which
NAV, perhaps, be better called the right side,
If fife has been vel! spent There is apcr-
iod land in making this suggestion ] feel
sure III your sympathy when We M. little
scrupulous as to the enumeration OF our
years. Suffice il tosay, we are"o! Il certain
age" and that phrase il understood, by gem
eral consent, q silence all questioning
Iou wiIi not, / am sure, ascr3bc to me any
sach feeling OF dclicacY when make this
voluntary confession. protest that my or
II motive is u do justice to the age Of this
youug ceuntry, which Ill half my uwn life
time, MT single bound, If we consider it as
part OF the lille time IF nation, has sprung
rom witness and harbarism - social re-
fnement, rural beauty and physical power.
We have, as yet, gentlemen, only reach
ed the Mississippi. But the tide tpopula-
ton has flowed far bryordit, Iowa, the great
State, of which we have merely touched the
boundary, enc OF the youngest OF the Amer
lean sisters, is still west of us. With |
knoE- not how many hundred thousand in
habitnnts-you. fellow citizens OF lowa,
cannot tell yourselves from week II week
how many people you have, SO rapidly is
Immigration adding to your numbcrs-with
fifty thousand square miles aud the richest
fifty in body in the whole Union,-if the
reports D. the government surveyors are to
be trustcd--no estimate can be formed OF
the rap;dity OF her growth Or the standard Of
wealth and strength she is destined TO ut.
tain. We lave come from the Atlantic
ocean TO the Mississippi river by an unintcr-
rupted line OF railroads. Ii we had come sew
en- months later, we could have gone on ID To-
wa City, nearly sixty mlrs further vest, by
an extension OF the same iron track, which
has brought us here. II is unnecessary for
me to say 10 you, fellow citizens 81 iowa
that railroad j. Dow in progress Of con.
structiun frorn Davenport, on he Masissiu-
pi whore We naw stand, to Council Bluffs
on the Missouri, by the Mississippi & Mis-
souri, Railroad Company, for the work is go-
ing Oh under your oWn eyes. The two rIg-
crs are three hundred miles apart The
grading ON the first sixty miles viii be fin.
ishcd in September and The rails, which are
now arriving in New York, will be laid be-
fere the first Of January next. One hun
dred and twenty miles more are ready to be
pu, under contract This road must aud wiil
be promptly completed. |, is tn great
highway TO Nebraska, and IFS speedy com.
pleti0n is vtally connected with the future
pros pcrity Of that Territory
Let it not be supposed that we are 70 stop
at the Missouri river. The character Of the