A Sportsman 245 



on to California. The connecting point at that time 

 was at Promontory, some seventy miles west of Ogden, 

 a barren and desolate place, undesirable for a union 

 place of two prominent railroads, and the intervening 

 distance east was acquired by the Central Pacific Rail- 

 road from the Union Pacific, giving each road many 

 advantages over the barren Promontory. The racing 

 of both roads building across the continent under the 

 Enabling Act of Congress — so bountiful in the giving 

 of the credit of the government in its guarantee on 

 the second mortgage bonds, and outright gifts of 

 many millions of unoccupied land — was eager and 

 exciting, as I was witness of, from frequent pas- 

 sages over the building routes from 1865 to 1869. 

 Despite the enormous aid of the government, and the 

 immense stakes worked for, there were periods during 

 the building when the distinct bodies of workers on 

 each side of the continent were at their wits' ends to 

 provide ready means to meet their expenses. Im- 

 mense discounts were made in the selling of the bonds, 

 even those guaranteed by the United States govern- 

 ment. It was at a time when the credit of the 

 government was largely strained by the necessity of 

 providing over three thousand millions of dollars for 

 the expenses of the Civil War, when at times a dollar 

 of the United States government was not worth hfty 

 cents on a gold basis in the markets of the world. 



The government required the iron rails laid down 

 to be of American manufacture, which cost both roads 

 at many times, over one hundred dollars per ton, and 

 which in some instances were laid over native iron 

 beds, from which Bessemer steel rails have since been 

 made, and much superior to the wrought iron used, 



