The Mitchell capital. (Mitchell, Dakota [S.D.]) 1879-1918, 1906-08-31
A RAILROAD THROUGH THE SEA

IA RAILROAD TIL
From the Boston Transcript.
Someone once said of Cecil Rhodes that
,e Thought In ~continents.' Truly. like
I'll that fellowship of empire builders Of
which he is head and chief. his were long,
ong thoughts-as long as from the Cape
10 Cairoi" America does not produce quite
hat sort Of expansionist Qor which most
people will calculate a fervent thank
aeaven'), but it has at least one example
II q man whose main interest in life les
n laying his hand on the waste places and
making them g%lad-also profitable to all
concerned. Henry NJ. Flagler made" a
arge part of the state of Florida. The
east coast is practically his idea and now
ae has had another long thought. This
one stretches from New York and Chicago
TO Cuba and Panama
Changing cars Is an annoyance, accord
ing to general and well-founded convic-
lion. Says Mr.. Flagler. why, merely be-
:ause you want to go to Cuba, should you
be subject to the unpleasantness Of leav-
Ing the seat you took in your Pullman at
Boston, Philadelphia or Washington? Pre-
posterous! I shall carry you to Cuba by
idIl. A120 So 10 SuUd ny Idll yOo ~
go, IL you choose. probably next year.
The proposition sounds q trife strange
n view of the fact that nearly 200 miles
81 ocean separate the mainland Of Florida
from the pearl OF the Antilles; but 1t is
practicable. in spite of that, as all the
IDEAS OF men of this stamp are, in the long
:un. Is it not a notable fact that the
only practical things in the world are the
work Of dreamers,a or people who first de-
cided that It must be done and then found
4 way? Mr.. Flagler found a way to
carry out his idea by means of that chain
Of keys which run along the Florida coast
and terminated. some seventy-f1ve miles
Below Cape Sable, in Key West. His rail-
way, after leaving the mainland, passes
from key to key by a series of wonder
FULLY constructed bridges to Key West.
Then q tra.nferry takes the cars in charge
for some five or six hours, and finally the
same Pullman from which you waved
.arewel; to your home town draws up with
Sou in the station at C~ienfuegos or San
tiago or any other town on which your
fancy may decide. This is modern enter
prise tinged with a suggestion Of that
magic carpet upon which the Arabian hero
seated himself when he wished to fly from
Bagdad to Damascus.
Now a key IS a small island Occidental
~, 1t may be mentioned that the word
should be spelled cay but mapmakers have
made concessions to those who know not
foreign tongues and 1t does not require a
very vivid Imagination to picture the effect
Of passing over these tiny specks in a rail-
way train. The Stands are all right as
supports for the bridges, but at feature
IN the landscape, or seaScape, they are not
always important factors. A few, indeed,
ire of considerable si~ze-several miles,
.ven-but the majority are mere dots, and
one can have, looking from the car win
dow, the very curious impression of being
at sea in a train that rushes along at a
rafting good pace. The distances from key
to key are really much smaller than they
appear, for the tiny speck which seems
to lie far off on the horizon is probably
very much less than a mile distant. This
is a happy state of affairs, for 1t enables
the traveller to have his poetic illusion
without thereby sacrificing anything to
mere commonplace safety.
AS a matter of fact, the road is safe
enough in spite of the fantastic flavor
about the whole undertaking. Engineers,
many of them, said it could not be done,
but the best of them said the plan was
perfectly feasible. though tremendously
difficult. To quote our learned friend Ma.
cauley, EVERY schoolboy knows" that the
density of salt water increases as the euua-
tor Is approached, and here the railway
meets its first great difficulty. Steel would
corrode rapidly in those Florida waters.
Difficulty number two was furnished by
the lively little insect thai bores holes In
tho wood in those parts. Wood was ruled
out in many Of the places 1t fills salts
factorily in the north. These troubIes
overcome by the liberal use OF cement, II
remained Only for the railroad to feel its
way through q practically ~unexplored
country, and to lay Its roadbed in the
swamp and forest tangles. This it is doing
now. with armies Of men in different spots
along the line that leads from Miami to
Key West.
Follow the road below Miami which I'M
til recently was the '.jump.ng-ofr place.
Of civilization in Florida) and you will
find, miles in among the everglades, a
little village Of white tents, the dwelling
place Of workers on section one. Every
thing Is neat orderly, well-disciplined. 1t
must be SO. If men value their lives work
ing under the scorch.ng sun in among the
water-prairies. A big cement cistern
looms up among the tents, for there is no
water fit to drink in the everglades, and
every drop of the rainfall Is precious. Fail
ing that, tanks are brought down from
Miami. The hospital tent is supervised by
an alert physician. There is no chaplain
attached to these armies, but Sunday SER
vices are regularly held and there is no
dearth of exhorters.
Farther down, among the keys, other
regiments are camped and these are better
OH, LOT cool sea breezes blow and swamps
are fewer. Nearby is anchored a house
boat, not the abode OF pleasure-seeking
wealth, but the simple house of a super
~lntendent. who travels snail-like, carving
his house with him from key to KEY.
Great dredgers scoop up the soft rock and
pound it into bits while enormous rollers
press it into a smooth road, the haruesr
kind of q road in the void. Scores of boats
ply up and down-it would hardly be in
accurate to say hundreds, for there must
be nearly two hundred in all. There are
the big dredgers and piIe-drivers laying
the foundations of the piers, there are
big steamers carrying laborers and mater
ials. there are busy little despatch beats
rushing madly about on important err
rands. there are rowboats innumerable
doing everything that rowboats can do.
The wild birds ave left the keys for more
secluded spots.