Chapter LXV

Description of the face of the country.--Agricultural and mining
productions.--Timber.--The Wallamet.--Columbia.--Dalles.--Upper
Columbia.--Mountains.--Rivers.--Mineral wealth.--Climate.--The
Northern Pacific Railroad.--Conclusion.

Thus far I have confined myself to the history of the Hudson's Bay Company, the early settlement of the country, its public men, the provisional government, adverse influence, and the American and Jesuit missions. We will now proceed to describe its geographical and physical position and value.

Previous to the treaty of 1846, all that portion of country lying south of the Russian possessions, west of the Rocky Mountains, and north of California, was called Oregon. By that treaty the 49th parallel was constituted the boundary line between the United States and the British possessions.

In the act of Congress passed August 14, 1848, the boundaries were thus defined: "All that part of the territory of the United States which lies west of the summit of the Rocky Mountains, north of the 42d degree of north latitude, known as the Territory of Oregon, shall be organized into, and constitute a temporary government, by the name of The Territory of Oregon." Unfortunately, though our national Congress contained many noble, intelligent, and talented men, none of them knew any thing about the country they were defining as Oregon Territory.

Thomas H. Benton, about this time, made his famous Oregon speech. In it he declared that all north of the 49th parallel of latitude was only fit for the poorest and most meager animal existence; that it was the "derelict of all nations," not fit for the subsistence of civilized man.

This impression of Mr. Benton was received from high British--and no doubt he thought the most correct and reliable--authority. In fact, in the mind of this, and many other of our statesmen, the entire territory was of but little value. It is scarcely necessary to say whence this impression arose, and for what purpose it was so persistently kept before the minds of our most eminent statesmen. The immense fur trade of the country, carried on at a nominal expense, was too profitable to allow the truth to be told, or an experiment to be made, to show the value of the soil, or the amount or variety of its productions. The soil, like the furs and the natives, must be misrepresented, neglected, and slandered, that it may yield its silent income to avarice and idleness.

The American missionary arrives in the country, and is assured by the Hudson's Bay Company that but a very small portion of the country is susceptible of cultivation; that no extensive settlements can ever be formed in it. These statements are made by men who have spent their lives in the country, and say they have tested the qualities of the soil faithfully, and found it to be unproductive. The missionaries partially believe these statements, and communicate to their friends in the east their doubts as to the extent and richness of the arable land in the country. In the mean time they must provide for their own subsistence. The Missionary Boards that sent them out are not able to pay the prices demanded for a continual supply of such food as can be raised in the country. This they knew and were prepared for it, and at once commenced to experiment upon the soil for themselves. Their first effort astonishes and delights them. Instead of a hard, barren, unproductive soil, as they had been told, it proves to be a light rich clay loam all through the Wallamet Valley, and in the interior, a dark, mellow, inexhaustible alkali soil, of the richest kind, and, when properly cultivated, very productive.

The missionary experiments are continued and extended. They soon begin to send glowing accounts to their friends of the richness of the valleys of Oregon--eight hundred bushels of potatoes, or from thirty to sixty bushels of wheat, to the acre. The American trappers and hunters gather into the Wallamet Valley, around the Methodist Mission. The Canadian-French, British subjects, who have become worn out and unprofitable to the company, are permitted to locate in the same valley, but, with the clumsy and imperfect farming implements furnished them, and their ignorance of farming, they were not able to accomplish much, and are still referred to, as proof of the worthlessness of the country.

The American settler comes in, and proves the truth of the missionaries' large farming stories, and finds that he can do, with two yoke of oxen, what it required six to do in the Mississippi Valley--his labor producing double pay. He is more than satisfied--he is delighted--with the soil, the climate, and country, and reports his success to his friends.

By this time a few peaches and apples have been produced outside the inclosures and garden of Fort Vancouver, which convinces the American settler that fruit can be produced in Oregon; and soon we find every known variety to be profitably cultivated.

_Timber._--The fir, spruce, and hemlock are superabundant, all along the coast range, from California to Puget Sound. The fir, pine, oak, ash, and maple are abundant in the valleys of the Wallamet and Cowlitz, and on the western slope of the Cascade range of mountains; there is also an abundance of pine, fir, oak, and maple on the eastern slope.

The Wallamet Valley is from forty to sixty miles wide, and one hundred and eighty long. It has less timber land than fine level prairie; through which winds with its tributaries the beautiful Wallamet, skirted all along its banks and level bottoms with cotton-wood, ash, alder, oak, fir, yellow pine, yew, and soft maple, with a small amount of cedar. This river has its source in the Umpqua Mountains; and its tributaries in the Coast and Cascade ranges,--the main river running north, or west of north, till it joins the majestic Columbia. Its meandering streams, and valleys composed mainly of prairie interspersed with groves of oak, pine, fir, and cotton-wood, make up a scenery which for beauty and loveliness can not be surpassed. The Cascade range on the east is dotted, at intervals of from a hundred to a hundred and fifty miles apart, with towering, snow-capped mountains from 15,000 to 18,600 feet high, and is cut at right angles, midway between the California Mountains on the south, and Mount Baker on the north, by the great river of Oregon, the noble Columbia, which forces its resistless current over its rocky bed, till it finds its way to the ocean.

Ascending this river from the ocean, for sixty miles, to the mouth of the Cowlitz, we find it lined on either bank with lofty and dense forests of spruce, hemlock, cedar, and fir, with scarcely a sign of prairie; from, this up, the timber is interspersed with prairie, till we enter the Cascade Mountains, one hundred and twenty-five miles from the ocean, and ten below the Cascade portage, which is five miles long,--now made by railroad; thence to the Dalles is thirty-eight miles, making fifty miles of the roughest and grandest river and mountain scenery on our continent.

Old ocean in its mightiest heavings is but a placid lake, when compared with this fifty-five miles of mountain roughness, grandeur, and sublimity, from various points of which may be seen Mounts Baker, Rainier, St. Helens, Adams, Hood, and Jefferson, with others of less note, all raising their lofty heads above the regions of perpetual snow.

Prominent among them stands Mount Hood, about thirty miles south of the Columbia, towering to the height of 18,600 feet, with his everlasting white cap on, and overlooking the lovely valleys of the Wallamet to the south and west; the Columbia and Cowlitz to the west and north; and the great upper basin of the Columbia to the northeast, east, and southeast. From the Dalles we ascend this mighty river fourteen miles by rail, where the water has worn its crooked course amid solid basaltic rocks to unknown depths, not exceeding a hundred and fifty feet in width, causing the river, in discharging its annual floods, to rise at this point over eighty feet in perpendicular height.

At the end of the railroad the steamboat receives the traveler, when, as he ascends the river, the land on either side diminishes in height, till he reaches Castle Rock; seventy-one miles above the Dalles. This is a lone pile of basaltic rocks having the appearance of an old castle in the midst of a great plain to the east, south, and west of it.

A large portion of this plain, lying along the river, is of course gravel and sand, dry, and comparatively barren; yet producing the artemisia, sage, and a luxurious growth of wild mustard in the early spring; with but little grass, and abundance of the low sunflower.

The lands back from the river are high rolling prairie, covered with rich bunch grass, having a light soil composed of pulverized basaltic sandstone.

This soil, to the eye of the careless observer, though it is thickly set with the bunch grass, generally appears barren and worthless; yet, with irrigation, or with winter grains, or grasses adapted to the soil, it can not be exhausted.

Twenty-five miles above Castle Rock stands the thriving little town of Umatilla, at the mouth of the river of the same name, and nine miles above is Windmill Rock. In ascending the river fifteen miles from this place, the land on either side rises to some fifteen hundred feet above the level of the river which occupies the entire bottom from rocks to rocks on either side; when the land suddenly drops from this high plain which extends from the Blue Mountains on the east to the Cascade range on the west, forming, as it were, a great inland dam across the Columbia River, fifteen hundred feet high at the place where the river has broken through the dam. As you pass out of this gap, in looking to the north and east, the eye rests upon another vast, high, rolling plain, in the southeastern part of which lies the beautiful valley of the Wallawalla. At the upper or eastern end was situated the Whitman or Cayuse Mission. Some six miles above is the flourishing town of Wallawalla. The most of this vast, high, rolling plain, and especially the valleys, have more or less of alkali soil; the high plains are similar to those we have just passed,--destitute of all kinds of timber, except at the foot of the mountains, and small patches of willow and cotton-wood, in some little nook or corner, near some spring or stream.

Imagine Wallawalla a little east of the center of a great plain one hundred miles wide, east and west, one hundred and eighty long, north and south, situated just inside of this great mountain dam we have described; with the majestic Cascade range of mountains on the west, the Blue Mountains on the east, and this vast open plain covered with bunch grass, and no tree in sight, except upon the mountains; you can then form some idea of the middle Columbia plains. Ascending to the north one hundred miles, over the same high rolling plains, you begin to find the yellow pine and larch; not in dense forests, but scattering trees, the ground beneath being covered with a species of coarse, wild grass. These woods form a delightful change to the traveler after riding for days beneath the scorching rays of a summer sun. As you near the forty-ninth parallel, the timber increases in size, quantity, and quality. The soil is light, and, when the frosts of winter give place to the sleet and rain of early spring, forms a soft, deep mud, till the ground becomes settled, which is generally about the first of May; then all this vast country is in full bloom, with its myriads of beautiful wild flowers.

The northern portion of Oregon, now Washington Territory, is beautifully interspersed with timber and prairie, in good proportions, and has a rich clay soil.

The whole country abounds in trap-rock and granite, singularly mingled with basalt. Near the mouth of Spokan River is found a splendid variety of marble; some sections of it are of a pure white, while others are beautifully clouded with blue, brown, and green. The face of the country is not so uneven as that further south.

Some sixty miles south of the forty-ninth parallel, we come to the mouth of the Okanagon River, which is the outlet of a chain of lakes in British Columbia, from which it takes its name; it has an extensive and rich valley for settlement.

At Colville, in the vicinity of the Kettle Falls, on the Columbia, are a United States military post, the Hudson's Bay Company's post, and a considerable settlement. Some fifteen miles from the mouth of the Spokan, and sixty from Kettle Falls, was located the Cimakain--or Rev. Messrs. Walker and Eells'--Mission. About sixty miles in a southeasterly direction is the Coeur d'Alene Italian Jesuit Mission.

Turning to the north, east, and southeast, we enter the gold and silver mountains of the Pacific Slope; this range is cut through by the Snake River, or south branch of the Columbia. Millions of dollars' worth of treasure is taken out of the mines within these desolate and barren-looking regions, and untold millions still await the miner's toil. The reader will remember that we are now traveling east. This range is, on the north of Snake River, called Salmon River Mountains, and on the south, the Blue Mountains; thence, on to the southern portions of Oregon, it joins the Sierra Nevada and Cascade ranges, bends to the west, and, near the forty-second parallel, runs into those vast promontories that jut into the Pacific Ocean.

Passing through this range of Salmon River and Blue Mountains, which are not as high as the Cascade range, we descend into the great basin of the Rocky Mountains, which is intersected by high, broken ranges running east and west for about three hundred miles, to what is usually called the top of the Rocky Mountains, and the eastern boundary of this vast basin. The principal rivers which flow into and through this immense plain, are the Boise, Snake, Portneuf, Owyhee, and their tributaries. On the north is Clarke's or Flathead River, which runs northwest into the Columbia, near the northern boundary of the United States.

In all the northern portion of this great inland mountain plain there is an extensive placer and quartz mining country, besides numerous rich farming valleys, with an abundance of timber for all practical uses; most of the rough, rocky ranges of mountains being covered about half-way up their sides with timber, till you reach the open prairies along the main valley.

To the south, and along Snake River, are the high barren sage plains, extending from the Rocky Mountains on the east to the Blue Mountains on the west.

There are large tracts of arable land in the region just described, though to the weary traveler coming from the green plains of Kansas or the valley of the Wallamet, every thing looks forbidding and desolate, especially during the dry season. But remove the sage from any of these dry, barren places, and the rich bunch-grass takes its place. As well might the farmer expect his wheat to grow in a hemlock wood or cedar swamp, as for any thing but sage to grow on these plains till that is destroyed. Hence, from the experiments we have made on the soils of which we have been speaking, we are confident that the greater portion of the country now and for years past pronounced barren and useless, will be found, with intelligent and proper cultivation, to rank among as good lands as any we have, and probably more desirable. As to timber, that must be cultivated till it becomes accustomed to the soil. Cotton-wood is found in small quantities all over this plain, in the vicinity of streams and springs. The northeastern part of this basin is Montana; the southwestern is Idaho. The mineral wealth of this country, especially that of north Idaho and Montana, is inexhaustible. Gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, cinnabar, and tin, are found in abundance in these Territories, and in eastern and middle Oregon.

"_Owyhee Bullion._--John A. Post, internal revenue collector,
furnishes the following _resume_ of the bullion product from January
1 to November 1, 1866, as assayed by different parties. The figures
are greenback valuation:--

January $36,632 81
February 62,874 00
March 15,640 85
April 11,959 25
May 34,570 34
June 46,224 44
July 46,456 26
August 177,704 15
September 293,921 53
October 371,173 13
-------------
Total $1,073,256 78

"During the early part of the year, Mr. Post says, there was a great
amount of treasure sent out in various shapes, of which he could get
no account. To the foregoing must still be added the many tons of
ruby, silver, polybasite, etc., shipped just as it came from the
Poorman mine,--enough, at a rough estimate, to increase the total to
fifteen hundred thousand, at least. It is safe to say that the
product of the present year will be two millions, and that of next
year go beyond five millions."[22]

[Footnote 22] From the _Oregonian_.

"_Treasure._--There has been shipped from this city during the past
year, the sum of $8,070,600 in treasure. The amount passing through
private hands may be safely estimated at $3,000,000."[23]

[Footnote 23] From the _Portland Herald_.

We take the following from an official report to the Secretary of the Treasury, a copy of which has been sent to Congress:--

"From the best information available, the following is a near
approximation to our total gold and silver product for the year
ending January 7, 1867:--

California $25,000,000
Nevada 20,000,000
Montana 12,000,000
Idaho 6,500,000
Washington 1,000,000
Oregon 2,000,000
Colorado 2,500,000
New Mexico 500,000
Arizona 500,000
Add for bullion derived from unknown sources within the States
and Territories, unaccounted for by assessors and express
companies, etc. 5,000,000
-----------
Total product of the United States $75,000,000

"The bullion product of Washington is estimated by the
surveyor-general at $1,500,000. That of Oregon is estimated at
$2,500,000. Intelligent residents of Idaho and Montana represent
that the figures given in the above estimate, so far as these
Territories are concerned, are entirely too low, and might be
doubled without exceeding the truth. The product of Idaho alone, for
this year, is said to be $15,000,000 to $18,000,000. That of Montana
is estimated by the surveyor-general at $20,000,000. Similar
exceptions are taken to the estimates of Colorado, New Mexico, and
Arizona."

_The climate_ varies in the three sections of country we have described, exactly in the ratio of soil and timber. On the coast, contiguous to the ocean, we have more rain than we require. Like our superabundance of the tallest and best of fir-timber, there is so much of it that we would be glad if we could divide with the second and third places we have described. We have enough rain and timber to supply all the country; and perhaps, when we can cut down our tall trees, that filter the rain out of the clouds, they may get more and we less. Be that as it may, our winters are mild and rainy, our summers cool and pleasant, with sufficient rain and ocean mist to supply the vegetable creation with abundant moisture.

In middle Oregon the winters are mild and frosty, with a small amount of snow--seldom severe; farmers should feed stock a month or six weeks; summers warm, and sometimes sultry in July and August; rains in the spring and late in the fall, scarcely enough for the farmers' use.

In the eastern plain or great mountain basin, the winters are cold and dry, snow and frost severe. Snow seldom falls to exceed two feet in depth,--average winters, eighteen inches,--but it falls deep upon the mountains and remains till it is melted by the warm winds and sun of early summer, causing the summer floods. The principal rise in the rivers is during the mouths of June and July. Less rain, spring and fall, than in middle Oregon; summers dry and hot. In the northern part, the country is better supplied with rain. This may arise from the ranges of the mountain currents of air and the winds from the South Pacific Ocean along the inland plains, and the cool atmosphere around our snow-clad mountains. We will leave further speculation on this point to those who have had more experience in such matters than ourselves.

Taking the country as a whole, with our inexhaustible gold, silver, and other minerals; our extensive farming valleys; our vast forests of timber upon the borders of an ocean comparatively destitute of this essential element of civilization; there is no plausible reason why this western portion of the United States may not in a few years become the abode of industrious and thriving millions.

_The Northern Pacific Railroad._

The following article on the Northern Pacific Railroad is from the pen of Mr. Philip Ritz:--

"Having spent most of the last year in traveling through Washington,
Idaho, and Montana Territories, and having crossed the continent in
midwinter, partly on both of the great railroad routes, and at the
earnest request of Ex-Governor Smith, of Massachusetts, who is
president of the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, and of some
members of Congress, I compiled, while in Washington, the following
statistics, on the practicability of the Northern route:--

"On the first section of the country from Puget Sound, there are two
routes, both practicable; one _via_ the Columbia River, to the mouth
of Snake River; the other _via_ Snoqualmie Pass and Yakima River, to
the same point. On either route there will not be much heavy
grading. There is on this section an abundance of the finest timber,
excepting on that part of the Columbia from the Dalles to Snake
River, and a short distance of the route from Yakima to the mouth of
Snake River.

"The second section, lying between the Columbia River and the Bitter
Root Mountains, a distance of about two hundred and twenty miles, is
over a rolling prairie country, with splendid grazing, and fine
timber on the Spokan River, a distance of about one hundred miles.

"On the third section, which includes the mountainous part, a
distance of two hundred and fifty miles, and lying between the 116th
and 112th degrees of longitude, the grading will, in places, be
heavy, and will require three or four short tunnels. This will
include the entire Rocky Mountain district, the work on which will
be heavy, but not more difficult than on the Baltimore and Ohio
road, between the Ohio River and Harper's Ferry. On this entire
section there is an abundance of the finest timber. On this section
there is considerable good wheat land, as has been proven by the
fine crops raised in Hell Gate Valley last season.

"This extends from the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains to Lake
Superior, a distance of about one thousand and ten miles. The route
here passes over a rolling prairie, susceptible of settlement the
entire distance.

"It will be seen that the entire distance on this route, between the
head of Lake Superior and Puget Sound, is about 1,810 miles, and
that there is scarcely a mile of the entire country but will
eventually be settled. It is much shorter than any other route
across the continent, connecting navigable waters. The mountains are
much lower and the country much more fertile. It is really the only
easy pass across the American continent, for it is the only part of
the continent where two large rivers rise immediately together and
flow in opposite directions--the Columbia cutting its way entirely
through the mountains on a water level to the Pacific; and the
Missouri connecting with the great plains bordering on the lakes.
The Rocky Mountains at this point are really so low, that the
miners, last summer, actually took large streams in ditches from the
waters of the Missouri, over the divide to the Pacific side for
mining purposes. In consequence of the low passes through to the
Pacific, the climate is warmer than it is in the mountains in the
latitude of Salt Lake City, 400 miles due south. I crossed the
summit of the Rocky Mountains near Deer Lodge Valley, in Montana, on
the 17th of December. There was no snow; the roads dry and dusty,
and the weather mild and pleasant, and none of the streams frozen
over. When I reached Salt Lake City, the snow on the Wasatch and
Rocky Mountain ranges was twenty-six inches deep, and the night we
crossed the Wasatch range, the thermometer stood at ten degrees
below zero, and Green River and all those streams in the mountains
had been frozen over six weeks, so that the stage rolled over on the
ice. Such was the difference in the climate of the two routes. The
differences in the real wealth and resources of the two routes is
perhaps even greater than that of climate. The central route, after
it leaves the mining country of Nevada, around Virginia City, passes
up the Humboldt country toward Salt Lake, for a distance of 500 or
600 miles, over the most desolate and barren country on the American
continent. The country has neither mines, timber, nor any other
redeemable quality about it. Salt Lake Valley is a small and rather
fertile valley; the only fertile spot for hundreds of miles. From
Salt Lake City to Denver, a distance of six hundred miles, the route
lies over an alkali and sage plain. On the other hand, there is not
one mile on the northern route that does not either furnish timber,
grazing, agricultural lands, or minerals, and, in some instances,
all together. Montana is just in its infancy; its mines scarcely
prospected; and yet, last season, according to the report of the
Treasury Department, Montana stood second on the list in the amount
of gold produced; California producing $25,000,000; Montana,
$18,000,000; Idaho and Colorado, $17,000,000 each; and Nevada,
$16,000,000.

"The mountains of Montana are a perfect net-work of quartz ledges,
immensely rich in gold and silver. Five years from this time, I
believe there will be as much as $40,000,000 of gold and silver
taken from the mines of Montana per year; more than one-fourth
enough to build and equip the Northern Pacific Road, ready for use.
There are also immense mines of coal, iron, copper, and lead, in the
country. The northern route crosses but one range of mountains, and
that at a point which, so far as the experience of white men have
gone, is known to be as passable in winter as the Michigan Central
Railroad. In deciding the question of relative distance, we must
consider the entire distance between Liverpool and Canton. Say the
mean latitude of the North Pacific route is 46 degrees, and of the
Central 37-1/4, and a difference of nine degrees exists. Now a
degree of longitude (longitude contracting as we approach the poles)
is about six miles shorter on the former than the latter. There are
240 degrees of longitude between Liverpool and Canton; this makes
the navigator's distance, on the line of the North Pacific, 1,440
miles less than the Central. This longitudinal difference is quite
an item. This difference in distance is not the only item in favor
of the northern route. It is an established fact that every sailing
vessel, bound directly from San Francisco to Hong Kong, comes up to,
and even beyond, the latitude of Puget Sound, before striking
directly west, in order to take advantage of the wind currents of
the Pacific Ocean. Time, these days, being an important
consideration in commercial transactions, the argument would still
be in favor of the North Pacific route, admitting rates of
transportation to be equal on both lines. But these rates would not
be the same, even if the distance of the two were equal, for the
reason that the country would be self-supporting on nearly every
mile of the Northern route, while on the Central, for hundreds of
miles between Salt Lake and Nevada, not a tie for the track, nor a
stick, nor a pound of coal for fuel can be had. All these things
must be brought from abroad.

"Now, owing to adventitious circumstances,--the discovery of the
precious metals in California, Nevada, and Colorado, and the
settlement of Mormons in Utah,--the bulk of local business seems to
be on the side of the Central route. But Montana will soon outstrip
California in the yield of gold; besides, the route passes through a
country susceptible of settlement all the way from Lake Superior to
Puget Sound, and there is no doubt but that five years hence there
will be as much local business through Minnesota, Dakota, Montana,
Idaho, Washington, and Oregon, as through Nebraska, Colorado, Utah,
Nevada, and California. Accident gives the Central route the present
pre-eminence; nature insures the Northern the final victory.

"It is not generally known, the large amount of business that was
done in Montana last season. From May, 1866, to October 1, 1866, C.
C. Huntley carried, on his line of stages between Fort Benton and
Helena, 2,500 passengers, and during the same period 9,500 tons of
freight passed from Benton to Helena; 4,375 freight-wagons passed
over the same route; 45 steamboats, with passengers and freight,
arrived at Fort Benton from St. Louis and other points in the east,
and this, be it remembered, is the first season that this trade has
been carried on to any extent, and also, that this is but one point
in the Territory. It is really the commencement of a great trade,
that will require a vast capital, and employ the energy and industry
of a large number of persons.

"There are no less than four lofty ranges of mountains to cross on
the Central route, the Rocky Mountains, at Bridger's Pass, being the
most passable crossing; the Wasatch, the Humboldt, and the Sierra
Nevada are barely passable in summer. By the way of Pen d'Oreille
Lake, on the Northern route, freight can be taken from the Columbia
to the Missouri nearly all winter. Another advantage possessed by
the Northern route is, that at present the distance is less than 600
miles between the head of steamboat navigation on the Missouri and
Snake rivers, and when the boats are completed which are now
building on the Pen d'Oreille Lake and Clarke's fork of the
Columbia, the land travel will be reduced to about 390 miles.

"Did time and space permit, I might give further proof of the
superiority of the Northern route. In my comparative reasoning, I
have made these distinctions with no invidious feeling. The sooner
San Francisco is connected by rail with New York, the better for
Washington and Montana, in common with all the mountain regions. It
is gratifying to see our friends to the southward prosecuting their
enterprise with so much vigor. But I am perfectly satisfied in my
own mind that the time will come when the trafficking wealth of
Europe and Asia will be poured across the mountains and valleys of
Washington and Montana Territories.

"Our prospects, it is true, look rather dull here at present, the
whole energy of the Pacific coast being concentrated in building the
Central road, and for a short time we may expect dull times. The
attention of capitalists can not be diverted from this enterprise
much longer, and when once fully examined, there will be millions of
capital ready to invest in it.

"Let us open up the Mullan road and the lake route, and all other
routes to the Missouri River, and invite travelers and emigrants to
come this way and see the advantages of this northern country, and
then we will have no trouble in getting money to build a railroad."