WESTWARD, ACROSS THE GREAT PLAINS. 



better than they knew, and laid the foundation for a \ast, and ahiiost endless 



system, which penetrates the entire reejion 



of the great South-west, and whose eastti n 



portal now stands open as the gate\\a\ t 



Mexico. Crossing Ohio, Indiana, 



and Illinois, the train finally 



reaches St. Louis at 7.30 of the 



evening of the second day from 



New York. In the great Union 



Depot, transfer is made by merely 



stepping from track to track, and 



taking a car of the Chicago and 



Alton, or the Missouri Pacific, at 



nine p.m. ; and, after a comfortable 



night in the " sleeper," one arrives 



in Kansas City at nine in the 



morning. Another change is made 



here in the fine Union Depot, and 



an hour later, at ten, one is settled drwving room car, 



for a ride of fifty-four hours and ''^^^ ^ "• 



1,157 miles, which can be made 



without leaving the car, until the Rio Grande, the Mexican boundary, is reached. 



From Chicago (where change is made in Union Depot for cars of the Burling- 

 ton Route) the time is about twenty hours to Kansas City, where connection is 

 completed with the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad. 



Just thirty years ago, the Rev. E. E. Hale wrote, in a little book on Kansas, 

 "There is not at this moment (Aug. i, 1854) a tcram or village of -whites in Kansas 

 or Nebraska." Were this not history, it would seem most incredible, in view 

 of the present condition of this great and flourishing State, with its thousands of 

 churches and schoolhouses, its cities and progressive population. 



The belief of this talented writer, that "the Territory of Kansas, from its posi- 

 tion, is the great geographical centre of the internal commerce of the United 

 States," was shared in, at a later period, by other intelligent citizens of Boston; 

 and it is to the foresight of these men that the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe, 

 and the Mexican Central railroads, form one great system, extending from the 

 Missouri River to the Aztec capital, a distance of over 2,300 miles. It was some 

 seventeen years ago that a few enterprising men interested themselves in the 

 railroads of Kansas, then in their infancy ; but it was considered a great risk even 

 to build the road which was to connect the Missouri River with Topeka. But 

 these few capitalists evolved from chaos a liberal and successful corporation: "the 

 infant soon became a giant," and has been the most important factor in the settle- 

 ment and development of that vast country lying between the two great rivers, 

 the Missouri and the Rio Grande. It has lent a helping hand to the farmers of the 

 prairies of Kansas, the stock-men on the plains of Colorado, and the miners in 

 the mountains of New Mexico. To every business, to every industry, this benefi- 

 cent corporation extended aid, and while its engines chased the Indian and the 

 buffalo from the fertile prairies, and spanned the arid wastes of desert, the settlers 

 who followed in the wake of its engineers were encouraged to build homes, to 



