The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1866-05-22

In this distance such 9distrIoution ofthe'
rise could not be made, aud there Is con-
sequently grade Of I'll feet per mile for
a distance Of twenty three miles. This Is
the sharpest grade known. The Glow in
cline, on the Turin and Genoa line, Italy,
is l47 feet per mile for six miles. The in
cline Of the Chanarcillo railroad at Copiapo,
Chill, 100 feet per mile for thirteen miles.
The Sommerding incline of Vienna and
Trieste railway, Austria, ll3 feet per mile
for thirteen miles. The Allegheny incline
on the Baltimore and Ohio railway, III
feet per mile for sixteen miles. The Tabon
incline on the Valparaiso and Santiago
railroad, Chill, 100 feet per mile for twelve
miles. So that this grade of the Mexican
road exceeds the most remarkable railway
grades in the world.
1t equally surpasscs any other road for
the immense elevation it crosses. The
Chanarcillo railroad, Chilli, crosses an ele-
walton 4, 400 feet above the sea; the Vienna
and Trieste, one at 2,sS7 the Baltimore
and Ohio, one at 1926; the Valparaiso and
Chill road, one at $50; and the proposed
railway over Mount Gents, in the Alps, one
at 5,Sl5. So that the Imperial Mexican
railroad crosses an elevation nearly double
the height of any railroad yet in operation.
Besides the wonderful nature of this
great achievement, there must be feats of
engineering at once bold and ingenious in
other respects. The mountain region is so
broken, so scanned with deep clefts, and so
INSTRUCTED with broken and diSjointed
masses often Of the hardest stone or lava,
that difficulties unprecedented must have
beset the engineer. We may form some
idea of the magnitude of some OF these
difficulties from the fact that the viaduct
across the river Mctlac, between Cordova
and Orizava, will exceed in height by
about $50 feet any structure OF the KIND
in the world. 1t is $50 feet high. What
would the travellers who are amazed at
the height of the Appomattox bridge, on
the Southside railroad, say to this one
across the Metlac, in Mexico!
There are engaged on this immense
work ten thousand men, six thousand
mules and horses; sixty tons of materials
are daily delivered on the line, aud the cX-
penditure alone on the transportation ser
vice is from one hundred and fifty thousand
dollars to two hundred thousand dollars per
month! The company engaged in the con-
structon of the road are erecting shops
along the line, and as their road progresses
they are actively employing expresses, so
that they are now able to forward mer-
chants light goods from Paso del Macho to
Mexico in six days, instead of twenty-one,
as heretofore.
This work speaks pretty well for the en-
terprise and energy of the MACMILLAN Go
vernment. 1t is very easy to talk of the
Emperor as "played out" and as having
to pack up and go; and, furthermore, to
call the Mexican nation worn-out and be-
yond recovery. But Government that
shows such proof of its life and activity
as is afforded in this gigantic undertaking.
the greatest of its kind in the worlds
certainly not IN articulo norris!
The contractors for this great road arc
Messrs. G. B. CRAwLEY & Co., of Eng
land. If company may, with only par
tial aid from the Imperial Government, con-
struct such work as this in Mexico, with
its unprecedented difficulties, and of
course outlay, it seems to us that the Co
vington and Ohio railroad should offer to
capitalists one of the greatest inducements
imaginable. 1t is comparatively an easy
and cheap work, and when built it will
have more transportation than this Mexican
road, cost infinitely less to operate it, and
yield therefore more clear profit on the in
vestment.