AND WHERE TO FIND ONE. 255 



frequently scorching it. She had no evergreens of conse 

 quence, and very few trees from which decent boards could 

 be sawed. Many prairies were ten to twenty miles wide 

 some were thirty to forty. The deep, black muck which 

 formed the soil was powdered into dust by drouth, or sod 

 den into mire by rain. The moment the prairie sod was 

 cut through, the wheels of each loaded vehicle sank, 

 through half of each year, nearly to the hub ; and thus 

 not only building materials, salt and groceries, but fencing 

 and fuel, were to be carted for long distances a load of 

 wheat being drawn to Chicago, and the proceeds converted 

 into a load of boards for fencing the journey out and 

 back often consuming a week. Many a load of produce 

 thus marketed, has seen nearly or quite its price absorbed 

 in the inevitable expense of the journey out and in. This 

 impelled the State to engage prematurely in the construc 

 tion of canals, which involved her heavily in debt, without 

 very materially improving her access to markets. Rail 

 roads followed in due season, and did her good service, 

 while, being constructed mainly by private enterprise, 

 whatever advantage accrued to the public was so much 

 clear gain. Still, extensive areas of her soil must have re 

 mained unimproved, uninhabited for ages, but for the con 

 struction of the Illinois Central Railroad. That great work, 

 munificently endowed with wild lands by Congress, starts 

 from Chicago in the northeast, and Dunleith in the north 

 west of the State, and converging to a junction near the 

 center, runs thence by a single line to Cairo in the extreme 

 south, at the junction of the Ohio with the Mississippi, the 

 work having thus a total length of over six hundred miles. 

 And, though not run as the profit of the stockholders 

 would have dictated, its course is precisely such as best 

 conduced to the settlement and growth of the State. Mil 

 lions of acres, else uninhabi table, are by it rendered among 



