The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1869-05-09
Prominent Departures.

The Pacific RaiIroad-The Inst Rail-
Wealth Of Fremont's Great Basin-The
Prospect.
Tomorrow, finishing at noon, the last
sleeper (of mountain mahogany, tipped with
Nevada silver) and the last rail (of Missouri
steeD and the last spike (of pure California
gold) required to make through connection
by rail between New York and San Francisco,
three thousand two hundred and eighty-five
miles, will be laid at Ogden, in Utah Terri :
tory, the junction of the Central Pacific Rail-
road from Sacramento, on the Sacramento
river, in California, and the Union Pacific Rail
road, from Omaha, on the Missouri river, in
Nebraska. The length of these two national
roads, separate and collectively, is as follows:
Union Pacific Railroad, westward from
Omaha 10 Ogden ....................1,0 32 miles.
Central Pacific Railroad, eastward from
sacramento to ogden ................. S64 miles.
Total length of the two lines .......1, s96 miles.
This linking by rail the Pacific and
Atlantic oceans) is the Pacific Railroad, built
by such liberal subsidies of lands and bonds
| from Congress as to enrich the two companies
concerned in its construction. The first act
on the subject was passed in 1862, in the midst
of our late civil war. At that time the pros
pect for building the road within shorter
period than twenty years was very slim.
There were, first, the heavy drawbacks of the
war, and, second, the forbidding character of
at least twelve hundred miles of the region to
be traversed-a waste OF timberless plains,
chains of continental mountains and Asiatic
deserts-a region which, excepting a few
small patches here aud there, APP
peared to be utterly worthless. Hence
the liberalty of Congress in its subsidies of
lands and bonds Since then the boundless
mineral treasures of all those Territories have
been revealed-the richest discoveries of all
being those of only the other day, the White
Pine silver mines of Nevada, in district rep
resented in the best maps of last year as a
blank Never was there such a run of luck
to any great enterprise since the first voyage
of Columbus westward in search of the
Indies
The richest States of the Continent in their
mineral treasures are springing up over all
that vast Asiatic section which twenty four
years ago was thought to be a second edition
of Arabia, hardly worth the mules lost by
Fremont in his first explorations-we mean
that interior desert region of Fremonts Great
Basin From the facts and figures of map
and report before us of the White Pine silver
mountains Of Nevada, it is, we think, likely
| that they will not be exhausted with the ex-
traction of thousand millions of silver. They
are, evidently, richer and more extensive
than those Of Zacatecas in Mexico, from which
seven hundred millions Of silver have been
drawn, and are much of the same formation
as those Of Potosi, in Bolivia, which have
yielded sixteen hundred millions of silver.
| This Pacific Railroad will be the only outlet
for these treasures of Nevada and of those of
Utah, the line Of travel, and more or less the
line of exports and imports of the miners of
Nebraska, Kansas eastern Division branch
road), Wyoming Montana has the Missouri
river) Colorado, Idaho, Oregon, Washington.
Nevada and California.
This way business of passengers and freight
with the through passenger traffic. will be tn,
| muulHCent support Oh tniS racine Railroad.
Over line of thirty-two hundred miles b,
rail there can be no heavy freight business
between San Francisco and New York. II
will be cheaper by way Of Panama or Cap,
Horn. The teas and silks of China, TO
instance, coming by this road from San Fran
cisco and in the way of trade, will hardly il
any considerable quantities come farther cas-
than St. Louis or Chicago, so that San Fran
cisco, 10 the Eastern Asiatic trade, will be th
port of entry and delivery for this Pacii
road and New York will hardly experience
change Thirty-t hundred miles of rail is to-
much to divert the trade of Eastern Asia acros
our Continent to New York. Only an isthmu
ship canal will draw II for the United State
east of the Mississippi away from the route o
Cape Horn and Good Hope. But the gol
aud silver Of our mining States and Territorie