Year: 1877

but not less intimately eonuectd with
our interest as state. and especially


with the interest of northern Texas.
When Columbus started upon the voy


sge which resulted in the discovery OF


new hemisphere, his object was


not to find new countries but q


western passage TO Asia The then
recent discovery by the Portuguese
of the passage around the Cape oil
Good Hope from the Indies, and
the immense advantages Portugal


had derived from it had directed the
attention of Europe in that age of ad
venturous navigators to the subject of a
more direct and faeile route TO the East
Indies. Asia.;by nature the most IA
vored portion of the globe, had bee II
peopled. states and empires had been
established, cities in size aud grandeur
never since equalled had been built
and passed away to desolation. A
mighty civilization had crowned her
with its utilities and adorned her with
its grsces, before Europe had a-place in
history or was recognized as part of the
known world The products of her
soil and the rich material and exquisite
finish of her fabrics, the countless num-
bers and unequalled skill of her handi-
crafts men has made the trade with
Asia the support of the commerce of
the world as far back in time as COM
merce has history For three
thousand years the people who
have been the carriers, the nation
which has conducted the trade of Asia
to Europe, has grown rich and power.
fui and great it gave to Tyre
the strength which enabled her to
check for nine months the conquerine
career of Alexander, to Carthage the
wealth and the power which SO long
held suspended between her and Rome,
the future dominion of the world;
the stopping of the caravans, that for
long time carried this trade overland,
10 get water from her wells, built up
Palmyra, in almost fabulous splendor,
in the Syrian desert; it gave to Venice
her merchant princes and marble
palaces, and made her for centuries the
bnlwark of christendom against the in
tidei Turk it lifted the Netherlands
from their sandbanks and driftwood in
the ocean to the naval power which so
long commended with England for the
mastery of the seas, and it constitutes
to-day the chief constituent of the world
girdling commerce of England.


W might trace it more infinitely, and
IN every age demonstrate from history
that the nations who have controlled
this commerce have been the leading
commercial nations of the world, and
that without an exception they have
grown rich, and powerful, and great.
This trade now offers itself to the peo
pie OF the United States. The inspira>
ton of Columbus was prophetic, and
though lost sight of for time in the
splendors of fortunate results, after
near four Centuries it passes to its uni
fieation, foreshsdowing consequences
less momentous only than those which
followed the discovery of a new world
The body of this trade is to cross the
continent of America and the Texas


and Pacific railroad is to be the main
artery through which it is to flow. Its
low grades and its exemptions from
SHOWS. with its directness of course (its
Pacific terminus being within the trade
winds) to Asia, must make it the prin-
eipal railroad route for this trade, but
no one railroad or two can supply its
demands


In no long time after the Texas and
Pacific railroad is completed, double
track will be begun, while, as the de,
mands of its trade and of the country
which it trayerses may prompt branch-
es will start off from it, thus
bestowing the benefits OF its inter-
oceanic connections upon every portion
of our state and especially upon every
part of the south, and securing TO our


whole country a participation in thBt
trade which, as we have hastily and im-
perfectly sketched, has showered wealth
upon all who have been able to possess
it at any time during the past thirty
centuries