16 PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 



tleinen, and it was not until 1844 that Congress granted him a 

 small appropriation for the establishment of a line from Baltimore 

 to Washington, a distance of only forty miles. 



The result of this little experiment is that the whole civilized 

 world has become one vast network of telegraph wires, and it is 

 now considered one of the greatest inventions of the age. 



We look back over the history of railroads, and see the first 

 little road that was built in the United States, between Schenec- 

 tady and Albany, New York, distant only sixteen miles, traveling 

 at the rate of ten miles an hour, with a stationary engine on top 

 of the hill to haul up and lower down the small train of cars. 

 We see the engineer, who was imported from England, with his 

 broad-rimmed hat and swallow-tailed coat, his barrel of wood and 

 water on the tender of the locomotive, and we look on top of the 

 car, and see the brakeman seated, with his foot on the brake, 

 ready when the whistle blows " down brakes," looking more like 

 a stage driver in comparison with our brakemen of the present 

 day. The small coaches, with seating capacity for six or 

 eight persons, look small indeed when compared to our manin- 

 cent and commodious Pullman Palace sleeping, dining and par- 

 lor cars, accommodating fifty to sixty persons each, making up a 

 train of a dozen cars or more — all drawn by a single monster 

 locomotive that climbs the snow-capped Eocky Mountains with 

 apparently little or no effort, bringing the Atlantic and Pacific 

 shores within a few days' travel of each other, thus binding and 

 strengthening the bonds between the Eastern and Western 

 people. When the first steamboat steamed up the Hudson Eiver, 

 it was looked upon as a miracle ; and, as the hundreds of specta- 

 tors who lined the shores, gazed with awe and curiosity at the 

 movements of the walking-beam of the craft, many of them con- 

 cluded the end of all things was approaching. 



We next call your attention to the wonderful invention of Mr. 

 McCormick, to whom we are indebted for that very ingenious, 



