THE PACIFIC RAILROADS. 
peers Es 
CHAPTER I. 
HISTORY OF THE PROJECT. 
Ir we were to start from the very commencement of the 
‘Pacific Railroad project and trace its gradual development, 
‘we should glance in succession over all the great events 
which have crowded so thickly upon each other during the 
last twenty years of North American history. All influenced 
‘it one way or another, some retarding and others hastening 
‘it towards maturity. At the close of the Mexican war in 
(1848 the people of the United States found themselves 
possessed of the whole country lying between the Mississippi 
and the Pacific Ocean. California, New Mexico (now New 
Mexico and Arizona), and Texas were then united under the 
one flag; and not Jong after this event the Pacific Railroad 
question became a pet subject for speculation amongst the 
Most advanced promoters of railway enterprises. 
The first printed notice of such a scheme, however, dates 
; much further back, for in the New York Courier of 1837, an 
article was written by a Dr. Hartley Carver, advocating a 
_ Pacific railway. As is usual in such a case, the doctor had 
_ his reward ; ; by some he was considered a wild enthusiast, by 
q others a smdine 
_ One year only after the conclusion of the Mexican war 
