The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1872-04-29

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The Chesapeake and Ohio No,,te.
Mfs Hedfeld bas travelled over portion
oftKe routsof the Chesapeake and Ohio road
between Charleston and the White Sulphur
BE says: ssI... III
The route for the road follows New river.
md enters into some OF the toughest couil-
try, through which railroad wat ever built.
In the economy of nature no place seerna
to have been left for New river, and It has
had to cut q way for itself. Itss way il mar
row its descent is rapid; distractions in
some instances rs large rs Pixies Opera-H House
abound in its bed huge boulders have rolled
down from the mountain sides into It.; II
dashes itself into white foam against. these
and against the mountains which it cannot
move; it dashes from side to side in its mar
row obstructed bed, leaping into angry BIZ
lows, and becoming white with rage, and
roaring like Niagara continually.
No man has ever travelled along its bank,
and seen its mad waters plunge md roar
against their rock-bound prison walls, and
sald he ever saw the like before. / doubt il
there is in America wilder, rougher, more
angry, tempestuous, and dangerous stream.
than this New river, along which the Chesa-
peake and Ohio road Is being built. The
walls of rock that hem it in are from fifty to
three hundred feet high, and at sharp turns
the SIMPLIFYING river strikes these walls with
awful fury. But the walls are the noun
tains, and immOvable, and the angry waters
leap back upon themselves, white with foied
fury. r....
'Illink Of a large river, reader, that de-
sends over narrow, INSTRUCTED, rocky
bed at from twelve to twenty-five feet to the
mile. Is it 4 wonder that its waters dash
and leap, and foam and roar, and make quick
work with everything that gets into them.
Along this, Americas widest river, the
Chesapeake and Ohio road is being built.
For miles and miles it is cut out of the solid
rock that walls in this mad river. 1t is GER
tainly an engineering feat unparalleled in
the South and not common anywhere. When
the route was being surveyed the engineers
had to be suspended over the cliffs with
ropes, and their provisions packed on the
backs of men, as not even a mule could pick
its way along on the steep side of the noun
tain overlooking the river.
We clambered along in the narrow path,
when there was one, sometimes crawling,
sometimes climbing, and sometimes rolling,
stopping now and then to see the army OF
men, divided into small squads, below us,
as they blasted the rocky face of the noun
tain off into the river. Blasts are made here
that take from seventy-five to hundred
kegs of powder at time, and throw into
the river six or seven thousand yards of
rock. For twenty miles up and down the
river blasting is going OH continually, the
reports echoing through the mountains like
thunder, and much louder than artillery
firing. The clear sky overhead was in strange
contrast with this peal on peal which the
ears said must be thunder.
The throwing Of great masses of the noun
tain into the river, making its already narrow
bed still narrower, has added nothing toward
its tractability or serenity. 1t daShes against
the new instructions in white rage, and fairly
leaps up toward the workmen, as if to bring
them down into its mad maelStrom and dash
hem to destruction.
If had not seen the men actually at work,
and about thousand of them at that,
would not have believed that even the reck-
less New York developers of this enter
prising age would attempt to build road
through snch miserably-rough country
For over dozen miles the grading alone will
cost from forty to eighty thousand dollars Il
mile. The road-bcd has to be cut out of jag
ged and ragged, and rough and high, bold
cliffs that form the wall which fences in the
mad river. Yet through all these difficulties
the road is skilrully carried at low grade,
the highest, believe, being less than twenty
five feet to the mile. When we consider this,
New river should be thanked for furnishing
i passage-way between the OHIO and the sea-
board at so easy grade, even if it is Il wicked
and most unaccountable stream.
At place called the Blue Hole, where the
| water dashes square against the mountain and
| then turns sharply to the right, having fallen
over twenty feet to the mile for five consccll-
tive miles, tunnel has been made into the
side of the mountain to accommodate the
curve. This Blue Hole is deep beyond the
power Of any man yet to measure. And to
give the reader an idea of the wicked river, !
will statea fact which has been demonstrated
namely, that the difference between low
water mark and hgh-water mark at this point
is sixty weight feet
All along the mouth of the river, where the
hardest work begins, to this point, the labor
ers were husily cutting way through the
rock for the road-bed. The sound of one
blast would hardly die away before another
was heard, showing that the bold and har
dened face of the mountain, which had stood
| the storms and watcr-laShings of dozens 0
centuries, was at last giving way before th
power and skill of man.
THE OLD DoM1NIoS.-A great many peopl
Yesterday visited the new iron steamer Oh