REMARKS. 
43 
The aiding in a different manner of the first section of the main stem of the Platte Valley 
line, or, as regarding the surface passed over, in reference to more rapid extension, would 
resolve this question to its salient points, north of latitude 39. 
Finishing, then, the comparison of these two great routes to Puget Sound, I will conclude by 
remarking that, while the impracticable nature of the western mountains shuts the northern 
route from the Pacific terminus, it was the very facility of connexion with the Pacific that first 
gave character to the southern. While the one passes along exposed frontier for a distance of 
fifteen hundred miles, and in direct vicinity of a great navigable river, the other becomes, for 
over half its length, the main trunk of a more important road through central American ter¬ 
ritory which is entirely undeveloped. The one has been reduced to a local; the other is still a 
national requirement. Upon the one, facilities for communication can only exist by artificial 
means; upon the other, they are already abundant by the act of nature. The lumber of the 
north is needed in the south ; connexion with the west is claimed by the east. The northern 
route affords neither, and the southern route offers both. I claim, then, the question for the 
southern. 
REMARKS. 
No elaboration in office of the rough data of field reconnaissance can entitle them to be re¬ 
garded as the results of survey. 
The profile of the map transmitted, although comparing favorably with that of other routes, 
does not delineate the actual railroad line. 
When the preferable route of a Pacific Railroad is selected, by the comparisons of reconnais¬ 
sance, the location line of that route will be placed, by careful instrumental survey, and it may 
then be accurately delineated; but the lineal section of barometric levels, with which the side 
examinations of reconnaissance have been connected, must not be supposed to occupy that posi¬ 
tion. Presented as the profile of a route, when not accurately placed, it will lead to erroneous 
conclusions on its merits; and even when accurately placed, the mere approximations of the 
instrument used do not furnish a result regarding time nor undulations of surface. Again, 
from the small scale on which a profile of two thousand (2,000) miles of line must be presented, 
the remarkable differences between the flat plain over which the rail may be used without 
grading, and the broken country, which needs costly and tedious operations for reduction to 
grade, are not perceptible. 
Two examples may be given: 
The height of the Pass of the Walla-Walla, (Blue mountains,) compared with the level of the 
Grande Ronde valley, both measured by Colonel Fremont, on the common emigrant wagon- 
trail to Oregon, would show it as impracticable for a railroad ; yet, the approach to that pass, 
by the side-hill location—afforded for over forty (40) miles, by which the grade of the road is 
“ kept up” and never allowed to descend to the level of the Grande Ronde valley at all—shows 
the fallacy of presenting the profile of the wagon-road as that of a railroad line. Again, in the 
second instance, a profile of the extreme northern route would show (on paper) a flat, or slightly 
inclined surface, approaching the Rocky mountains on the east, and descending from them on the 
west; whereas, in reality, of the country on the east, the greater part of the line is undulating 
and of slopes, over which the locomotive engine cannot pass without grading. On the. west, the 
line shown on the profile would appear of facile gradients ; while, on the contrary, from being 
confined to almost impracticable mountain gorges, to adopt such gradients the road must abso¬ 
lutely lie in the beds of torrents, where occur freshets of thirty (30) feet in height. The barom¬ 
etric profile is serviceable in showing the relative height above the sea of the grand divisions 
of the route, as follows: 
