Daily Los Angeles herald., 1881-08-14
Titanic Pre1ects.

ueo an OIuluHIy mHui ouu Wh'Sn
would turn the head of the staid
business man Of forty years ago.
The last railway is that, not CON-
tent with building the Southern
Pacific from San Francisco to the
Cult, the owners of the Central Pa.
cifio have resolved upon connec-
tion Of their own with the East, In
dependent of the Union Pacific.
Like . disgruntled married pair,
after some bakers dozen years of
the closest possible alliance, the
United States government solemn
iziDg the marital ceremony, these
roads have come to the conclusion
that they can do better apart. This
last movement is understood to be
designated to countervail Jay
0ould's triple headed project
which embraces the extending of
the Texas Pacific to the Pacific
Coast, the tapping of Nevada and
also the completion of the South.
ern Utah to the California Coast.
Should all these and the other
roads succeed In getting them
selves built, the Pacific Coast
would simply be gridironed with
railways. In addition to the Gen.
trail and Southern Pacific, we
should be able to go East from Cal.
ifornia over either the Central Pa.
cific. with a complete transconti.
mental line, or the Union Pacific,
which would have a terminus
somewhere In California, or the
Utah Southern, which would ram.
ify East via the Union Pacific,
joining that road where the Cen.
trail Pacific now does, or by the
Southern Pacific, which would
give a choice of two routes for
reaching the Atlantic seaboard, OF
by the Atchison, Topeka and
Santa Fe, which will pull ur
either at San Diego or San Fran
cisco, or by Jay Gould's Texas Pa.
cinc; or, last and perhaps notleast
by the Atlantic and Pacific, which
10 as ambitious as any of the othel
corporations; though, by this time,
it was supposed not only to be
dead but to smell as loudly as
Lazarus's carcass when the Savior
performed upon it the miracle OF
raising it again to life. This is a
dazzling array of projected railway
enterprises, to say nothing of the
extensions Of these roads towards
or into Mexico, the Atchison, To.
peka and Santa Fe having already
made lodgment in Gusymas, and
the Southern Pacific projecting 9
line to Port Isabel, on the Gulf o
California, within stones throw
of the Sonora line. To still further
round out this superb scheme o.
railways having as their objective
point the development Of the Pa
cific Coast, the Northern Pacific
Railway, which will have three
termini we'll to the north of San
Francisco, appears to be getting
itself built with q fair degree OF
rapidity, and the Central Pacific
folk announce their intention to
build branch road from Wads-
worth, in the State of Nevada, to
Mojave, in the State Of California.
One must pause moment to
take in the breadth and magnitude
OF such projects. They are impress
sive In the superlative degree.
They almost take away ones
breath. 1t requires men of tre-
mendous force and resources,
natural and acquired, to handle
schemes of such vastness. And yet
the ability to build these roads is
in some cases an evidence of the
extent to which the people have
been victimized by extravsgant
freights and fares; while, In others,
1t shows how very volatile the
American people are in investing
their money.
Three years ago, II a list of the
contemplated enterprises we have
enumerated above had been placed
before the American people they
would not have invested a cent in
the most meritorious of them.
They would have started back in
alright at the recklessness and
slight regard for business
prudence which would have
been confessed, practically, . by
the attempt to promote such q
multiplicity Of railways. After
declining, for years, to furnish
even money enough to keep rail-
way tracks in repair, to say MOTH
Ing OF building new track; after
looking with suspicion upon any
ono who even proposed to con.
struct . tramway to q coal mine,
with assured profits In sight; after
all this discouragement to the most
modest and legitimate enterprise,
We fnd no prospectus too extrava-
gsnt, no project too stupendous, for |
these very same people. They act,
for all the world, like q total ab-