Knoxville weekly chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1875, 1870-11-02
4 TRIP TO CALIFORNIA.
Interesting Summary Of Noted POints---
Bridging the Missouri -.0yer the Plains
in Palace Cars.

ally, and fully intended To 10 so long be-
fore this. ! might give YOU a hundred
good excuses for my long delay, but they
would beof little interest. A brief account
of my journey and observations may he
more acceptable.
After leaving Knoxville and making
brief visits in Washington, Annapolis and
New York, | started my household goods
on their journey around Cape Horn,
left my family in Central New York, and
early in May began my overland journey
To California. The incidents OF travel are
much the same with all tourists and have
been so often described ON this route that
most people are familiar with them. Yet,
they are always new and interesting to the
traveller. The unriValcd scenery of the
Hudson, the pleasant valley of the Mo-
| hawk, the surprising landscape beauty of
Central and Western New York are al
ways new and enchanting; and then Nj
agara, indispensensiblc in its awfulness, as
! yeu see it while passing on am immense
| railroad train, across tnc Suspension
Bridge, eight hundred feet in length, and
! two hundred feet above the boiling cur
rent, is an object of interest that never
loses its power to amaze and fascinate the
| beholder In passing through Canada we
cross the Welland Canal, eleven miles from
! Niagara, where tall-masted and heavily
laded vessels apparently travel overland
from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario with
y
the other side of the Atlantic.
Passing ON through Hamilton, Dundas,
Loudon, and other thriving towns, we see
among the English, Scotch, French and
Irish subjects Of Queen Victoria, a cousid-
erable sprinkling Of negroes, who, in the
days OF slavery, fled from republican bond
! age to monarchical freedom. At Detroit
the train passes upon u ferry boat, large
enough to hold the whole Of ii except the
| engine, and we pass over the broad river
to the city SO quietly that We are scarcely
| conscious of the change. Forty miles
from Detroit we pass Ann Arbor, where
the State of Michigan has shown its wis
dom by concentrating its educational en-
terprise on one University, making il one
ofthe largest, and one of the very best in
| America; where DOlf1g ladies rs we'll rs
young gentlemen can enjoy all the adj
vantages of a University course. There
are other States that wonld do well to imi-
tate the wisdom and progressive enterprise
of the noble State of Michigan.
The ride across this State formed a pleas
ant contrastto.one | remember having had
in forty-six. when we went in short cars
bobbing tedjously along over broken strap
iron or bare wooden rails, from Detroit TO
Kalamazoo. From the latter place we
| then travelled by stage coach over sand and
| sloughs and corduroy bridges to "St. Jo, y
where we took n little tub of steamer in
which we tumbled across the rough lake to
Chicago, in a way that might well disturb
the stomach of even an old sailor. This
distance is now travelled so smoothly that
on my return by the night train, ] slept
quietly a large share of the distance aud
when | awoHe i'm the morning, found my
self across the river and many miles into
Canada.
OF Chicago, 50 boundless in commerce.
so gigantic in enterprise so incompatible
i'm facilities for transportation, and Withal
IN Nslnp ,ral
policy, ! need not stop TO speak. Like
Niagara, this young giant of cities l. an
object of universal wonder and admira-
ton.
Taking the Pullman Palace cars, lwith
hotel ear attached, we passed through the
State of Illinois, crossing the Mississippi
river at Clinton, on an iron bridge of rare
beauty as well as strength. Travelling
through Iowa to Council Bluffs, distance
of about five hundred miles, we are in II
farming country which extends on either
side aS far as the eye can reach, and Is as
rich and beautiful ~ can be found in
America. Our restaurant car furnished us
meals equal to those of II first-cla~s hotel,
and our dining-rOom windows looked out
upon a moving panorama of landscape
scenery more perfect than art, and more
varied than that exhibited in any gallery.
We crossed the Missouri river TO Omaha
on a steam ferry, where whole trains of
heavily laden freight cars are passed over
daily. and sent on over the Pacific Rail
road To san Francisco. They are construct
iug "a bridge over the river at this place,
. which viii Obviate the necessity of ferry.
The work is one of great magnitude, as the
river is wide and the bottom soft 10 a great
depth. The piers are made Of thick cast
iron pipes, eight feet in diameter; are
ioined together with bolt- and sunk end
wise in the water and soft mud, 4 new sec
ton being added rs the tube sinks, until it