10 
ROUTE NEAR THE FORT Y-SEVENTH AND FORTY-NINTH PARALLELS. 
amount, and expensive; there will he frequent roch-excavation, and the hulk of the rock- 
excavation in the entire route will he in this section. It is evident that the difficulties of con¬ 
struction Avill he great, and the cost excessive. 
Upon the passes of the Rocky mountains, Governor Stevens says : “ It is not doubted there 
are other passes in this portion of the Rocky mountain range, even better than those explored ; 
they are indicated by the general depression of the mountain range, with the greater fre¬ 
quency of the streams stretching out to meet each other from the opposite slopes of the mount¬ 
ains ; and I consider it important that, in future operations^ a whole season should he devoted 
to their thorough examination, and that instrumental surveys should he made of the pass 
found to he the most practicable'. ’ ’ 
Leaving the Spokane, the route enters the Great Plain of the Columbia, a table-land stretch¬ 
ing from the Coeur d’Alene to the Cascade mountains, a distance of 200 miles. Its central 
and western portions are of trap formation, and are described on the map as sandy, rocky, 
and sterile. Its summit, 800 feet above the Spokane river, is readily attained, the treeless 
plain is crossed in a distance of 110 miles, and a .suitable point for crossing the Columbia 
river, 400 or 450 yards wide, reached, 140 miles distant from the Spokane. This point is about 
equally distant from the navigable waters of the Pacific in Puget sound and in the Columbia 
river. The whole intermediate space is occupied by the Cascade mountains, with their 
secondary chains, spurs, and high, broken table-lands, through which there are but two 
passes reported practicable for a railroad—that of the Columbia river and that of the Yakima, 
sometimes erroneously called the Snoqualme. 
The Yakima Pass gives the most direct route to Puget sound, the distance by it being 150 
or 160 miles shorter than by the Columbia River Pass. It requires a tunnel through rock, 
(siliceous conglomerate,) either 4,000 yards long, 3,000 feet above the sea, or a tunnel 11,840 
yards long, 2,400 feet above the sea. The reconnaissance did not extend westward from the 
summit more than three miles. The evidence respecting the amount of snow found on the 
summit of the pass at the close of winter, makes it probable that it is then 20 feet deep there. 
This question should be satisfactorily settled, and the reconnaissance completed, before the 
practicability of the pass can be considered established. In the opinion of the officer making 
the reconnaissance—Captain McClellan, Corps of Engineers—the pass is barely practicable, 
and only at a great cost of time, labor, and money. Under every favorable condition of position 
the construction of either of the proposed tunnels would be seriously objectionable ; but where 
the position itself is so unfavorable, the final advantages should be very great to determine 
the selection of this route. The information now possessed is sufficient to decide against this 
route. 
The route by the pass of the Columbia follows that river from the Great Plain, being gen¬ 
erally located, as far as the Dalles, in bottom-lands which present no difficulties. From the 
Dalles to near Vancouver, 90 miles, the rocky bluffs close upon the river, and the work required 
will be similar to that of the Hudson River railroad along the mountain region. In the opinion 
of Mr. Lander, “the high floods to which the Columbia river is subject, are serious obstacles 
to obtaining the best location for cheap construction offered by its valley.” In 1854, the rise of 
the river during the flood was 10 feet above spring level, and II feet above summer level. 
The Columbia river is navigable for sea-going vessels to Vancouver, the point now reached ; 
but the unfavorable character of the entrance to that river, and the great superiority of the 
ports on Puget sound, seemed to render it expedient to adopt some one of the latter as the 
Pacific terminus of this route. Continuing down the Columbia, therefore, through bottom¬ 
lands, to the mouth of the Cowlitz, the route enters the wide and comparatively flat and wooded 
valley of that river, ascends it, and, crossing over the wooded and prairie plains, which, 
“though not fully explored, are sufficiently well known to insure the unusually favorable 
character of the country for the construction of a railway,” reaches Seattle, the best port on the 
east side of Puget sound. 
