In addition to the force on the eastern end of this road, there has been assembled at the Pacific terminus an able corps of engineers and contractors, who have already commenced the construction there, and thus the great road across the continent will be pushed to final completion, probably within five years from the first commencement of the undertaking.
The road, as located by Engineer Roberts in his report, is laid from the head-waters of Lake Superior in a nearly due westerly line across the State of Minnesota to Red River, near Fort Abercrombie; thence "across the Dakota and Missouri Rivers to the valley of the Yellow Stone, and along that valley to Bozeman's Pass, through the Belt range of mountains; thence down the Gallatin Valley, crossing the Madison River, and over to the Jefferson Valley, and along that to the Deer Lodge Pass of the Rocky Mountains; thence along Clarke's Valley to Lake Pend d'Oreille, and from this lake across the Columbia plain to Lewis or Snake River; down that to its junction with the Columbia; along the Columbia to the Cowlitz, and over the portage to Puget Sound, along its southern extremity, to any part which may be selected."
A branch road is to follow the Columbia River to the vicinity of
Portland, together with a link connecting the two western arms.
By this route, which may be materially departed from in the final location, the distance will swell to near two thousand miles between the two grand termini, and it is estimated will cost, with its equipments, from seventy-five to one hundred millions of dollars.
The route of this road is known to be more feasible than was that of the present line to California. Its elevations are much less, and the natural obstructions of the mountain ranges more easily surmounted, while the climate invites, on account of its high sanitary character, both the immigrant and invalid.
The line from Omaha to California shows that for nine hundred miles the road has an average height above the sea of over five thousand feet, the lowest point in that stretch being over four thousand; while the corresponding distance, embracing the mountain ranges, along this Northern Pacific line, is near two thousand feet lower than the other, giving, in this difference in elevation, according to the usual estimate, over nine degrees advantage in temperature. This becomes important in an agricultural view, as well as in the immediate and constant benefit in the increased facility for operating a railway.
In addition, the curvature of the thermal lines of the continent bear away to the northward of the surveyed route of this great enterprise, insuring almost entire freedom from snow obstructions other than is common to any of the principal railway lines in the States themselves.
The extent of country tributary to this road is entirely unparalleled by that of any other. Along the present finished continental line an uninhabitable alkaline desert stands across and along its pathway for many miles, while the Northern line leaps from valley to valley, all more or less productive, and in which large supplies of coal and timber are found sufficient for ages to come.
Of this region, and the general line of this road, the Hon. Schuyler
Colfax writes as follows:—
"Along the line of the Northern Pacific Railroad, as it follows up the water-courses, the Missouri and the Yellowstone on this side, and descends by the Valley of the Columbia on the other, a vast body of agricultural land is waiting for the plow, with a climate almost exactly the same as that of New York, except that, with less snow, cattle in the larger portion of it can subsist on the open range in winter. Here, if climate and fertility of soil produce their natural result, when railroad facilities open this now isolated region to settlement, will soon be seen waving grain-fields, and happy homes, and growing towns, while ultimately a cordon of prosperous States, teeming with population, and rich in industry and consequent wealth, will occupy that now undeveloped and almost inaccessible portion of our continental area.