Echo Canyon is a ravine 7 miles long, about half a mile broad, flanked by precipitous cliffs, from 300 to 800 ft. high, and presenting a succession of wild and grand scenery. In Weber Canyon the river foams and rushes along between the mountains, which rise in massive grandeur on either side, plunging and eddying among the huge masses of rock fallen from the cliffs above. Along a part of the chasm the railway is cut in the side of the steep mountain, descending directly to the bed of the stream. Where the road could not be carried round or over the spurs of the mountains it passes through tunnels, often cut through solid stone. A few miles farther the line reaches the city of Ogden, in the state of Utah, the territory of the Mormons. This territory contains upwards of 65,000 square miles, and though the land is not naturally productive, it has, by irrigation, been brought into a high state of cultivation, and it abounds in valuable minerals, so that it now supports a population of 80,000 persons.

We have now arrived at Ogden, where the western portion of the great railway line connecting the two oceans unites to the Union Pacific we have just described. This western portion is known as the Central Pacific Railroad, and it stretches from Ogden to San Francisco, a distance of 882 miles.

The portion of the line which unites Sacramento to Ogden, 743 miles, was commenced in 1863 and finished in 1869, but nearly half of the entire length was constructed in 1868, and about 50 miles west of Ogden, the remarkable engineering feat of laying 10 miles of railway in one day was performed. It was thus accomplished: when the waggon loaded with the rails arrived at the end of the track, the two outer rails were seized, hauled forward off the car, and laid upon the sleepers by four men, who attended to this duty only. The waggon was pushed forwards over these rails, and the process of putting down the rails was repeated, while behind the waggon came a little army of men, who drove in the spikes and screwed on the fish-plates, and, lastly, a large number of Chinese workmen, with pickaxes and spades, who ballasted the line. The average rate at which these operations proceeded was about 240 ft. of track in 77½ seconds, and in these 10 miles of railway there were 2,585,000 cross-ties, 3,520 iron rails, 55,000 spikes, 7,040 fish-plates, and 14,080 bolts with screws, the whole weighing 4,362,000 lbs.! Four thousand men and hundreds of waggons were required, but in the 10 miles all the rails were laid by the same eight men, each of whom is said to have that day walked 10 miles and lifted 1,000 tons of iron rails. Nothing but the practice acquired during the four previous years and the most excellent arrangement and discipline could have made the performance of such a feat possible as the laying of eight miles of the track in six hours, which was the victory achieved by these stalwart navvies before dinner.

The line crosses the great American desert, distinguished for its desolate aspect and barren soil, and so thickly strewn with alkaline dust that it appears almost like a snow-covered plain. The alkali is caustic, and where it abounds no vegetation can exist, most of the surface of this waste being fine, hard grey sand, mixed with the fragments of marine shells and beds of alkali.

The third great mountain range of the North American continent is crossed by this line, at an elevation of 7,043 ft. above the sea level. The Sierra Nevada, as the name implies, is a range of rugged wild broken mountain-tops, always covered with snow. The more exposed portions of the road are covered with snow-sheds, solidly constructed of pine wood posts, 16 in. or 20 in. across: the total length of snow-sheds on the Sierra Nevada may equal 50 miles. These sheds sometimes take fire; but the company have a locomotive at the Summit Station, ready to start at a moment’s notice with cars carrying tanks of water. The snow falls there sometimes to a depth of 20 ft. in one winter; and in spring, when it falls into the valleys in avalanches, sweeping down the mountain-sides, they pass harmlessly over the sloping roofs of the snow-sheds. Where the line passes along the steep flank of a mountain, the roofs of these snow-sheds abut against the mountain-side, so that the masses of snow, gliding down from its heights, continue their slide without injury to line, or sheds, or trains. Where, however, the line lies on level ground, or in a ridge, the snow-sheds are built with a strong roof of double slope, in order to support or throw off the snow. From Summit (7,017 ft.) the line descends continuously to Sacramento, which is only 30 ft. above the sea level, and 104 miles from Summit. About 36 miles from Summit, the great American Canyon, one of the wildest gorges in the Sierra Nevada range, is passed. Here the American River is confined for a length of two miles between precipitous walls of rock, 2,000 ft. in height, and so steep that no human foot has ever yet followed the stream through this tremendous gorge (Fig. 53). A few miles beyond this the line is carried, by a daring feat of engineering, along the side of a mountain, overhanging a stream 2,500 ft. below. This mountain is known as “Cape Horn,” and is a place to try the nerves of timid people. When this portion of the line was commenced, the workmen were lowered and held by ropes, until they had hewn out a standing-place on the shelving sides of the precipice, along whose dizzy height, where even the agile Indian was unable to plant his foot, the science of the white man thus made for his iron horse a secure and direct road. (Fig. 54.)

These lines of railway, connecting Omaha with Sacramento, are remarkable evidences of the energy and spirit which characterize the Anglo-Saxon race in America. The men who conceived the design of the Central Pacific Railroad, and actually carried it into effect, were not persons experienced in railway construction; but five middle-aged traders of Sacramento, two of whom where drapers, one a wholesale grocer, and the others ironmongers, believing that such a railway should be made, and finding no one ready to undertake it, united together, projected the railway, got it completed, and now manage it. These gentlemen were associated with an engineer named Judah, who was a sanguine advocate of the scheme, and made the preliminary surveys, if he did not plan the line. The line is considered one of the best appointed and best managed in the States; yet the project was at first ridiculed and pronounced impracticable by engineers of high repute, opposed by capitalists, and denounced by politicians. An eminent banker, who personally regarded the scheme with hopefulness, would not venture, however, to take any stock, lest the credit of his bank should be shaken, were he known to be connected with so wild a scheme. And, indeed, the difficulties appeared great. Except wood, all the materials required, the iron rails, the pickaxes and spades, the waggons, the locomotives, and the machinery had to be sent by sea from New York, round Cape Horn, a long and perilous voyage of nine months duration, and transhipped at San Francisco for another voyage of 120 miles before they could reach Sacramento. Add to this that workmen were so scarce in California, and wages so high, that to carry on the work it was necessary to obtain men from New York; and during its progress 10,000 Chinamen were brought across the Pacific, to work as labourers. Subscriptions came in very slowly, and before 30 miles of the line had been constructed, the price of iron rose in a very short time to nearly three times its former amount. At this critical juncture, the five merchants decided to defray, out of their own private fortunes, the cost of keeping 800 men at work on the line for a whole year. We cannot but admire the unswerving confidence in their enterprise displayed by these five country merchants, unskilled in railway making, unaided by public support, and even discouraged in their project by their own friends. The financial and legal obstacles they successfully surmounted were not the only difficulties to be overcome. They had the engineering difficulties of carrying their line over the steep Sierra, a work of four years; long tunnels had to be bored; one spring when snow 60 ft. in depth covered the track, it had to be removed by the shovel for 7 miles along the road; saw-mills had to be erected in the mountains, to prepare the sleepers and other timber work; wood and water had to be carried 40 miles across alkali plains, and locomotives and rails dragged over the mountains by teams of oxen. The chief engineer, who organized the force of labourers, laid out the road, designed the necessary structures, and successfully grappled with the novel problem of running trains over such a line in all seasons, was Mr. S. S. Montague. The requirements of the traffic necessitate not only solidly constructed iron-covered snow-sheds, but massive snow-ploughs to throw off the track the deep snow which could in no other way be prevented from interrupting the working of the line. These snow-ploughs are sometimes urged forward with the united power of eight heavy locomotives. Fig. 55 represents one of these ploughs cleaning the line, by throwing off the snow on to the sides of the track. The cutting apparatus varies in its arrangements, some forms being designed to push the snow off on one side, some on the other, and to fling it down the precipices; and others, like the one represented, are intended merely to throw it off the track.

Sacramento is 1,775 miles from Omaha, and is connected with San Francisco by a line 139 miles long. At San Francisco, or rather at Oakland, 1,911 miles from Omaha and 3,212 miles from New York, is the terminus of the great system of lines connecting the opposite shores of the vast North American continent. San Francisco, situated on the western shore of a bay, is connected with Oakland by a ferry; but the railway company have recently constructed a pier, which carries the trains out into the bay for 2¼ miles. This pier is strongly built, and is provided with a double set of rails and a carriage-road, and with slips at which ships land and embark passengers, so that ships trading to China, Japan, and Australia can load and unload directly into the trains, which may pass without change from the shores of the Pacific to those of the Atlantic Ocean. San Francisco is a marvellous example of rapid increase, for the population now numbers 170,000, yet a quarter of a century ago 500 white settlers could not be found in as many miles around its site. The first house was erected in 1846, and in 1847 not a ship visited the bay, but now forty large steamships ply regularly, carrying mails to China, Japan, Panama, South America, Australia, &c., and there are, of course, hundreds of other steamers and ships.

The descriptions we have given of only two lines of railway may suffice to show that the modern engineer is deterred by no obstacles, but boldly drives his lines through places apparently the most impracticable. He shrinks from no operations however difficult, nor hesitates to undertake works the mere magnitude of which would have made our forefathers stand aghast. Not in England or America alone, but in almost every part of the world, the railways have extended with wonderful rapidity; the continent of Europe is embraced by a network of lines; the distant colonies of Australia and New Zealand have thousands of miles of lines laid down, and many more in progress; the map of India shows that peninsula traversed in all directions by the iron roads; and in the far distant East we hear of Japan having several lines in successful operation, and the design of laying down more. In connection with such works, at home and abroad, many constructions of great size and daring have been designed and erected; many navigable rivers have been bridged, and not seldom has an arm of the sea itself been spanned; hundreds of miles of embankments and viaducts have been raised; hills have been pierced with innumerable cuttings and tunnels, and all these great works have been accomplished within the experience of a single generation of men, and have sprung from one single successful achievement of Stephenson’s—the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, completed and opened in 1830. We in England should also have pride in remembering that the growth of the railways here is due to the enterprise, industry, and energy of private persons; for the State has furnished no funds, but individuals, by combining their own resources, have executed the works, and manage the lines for their common interest and the public good. It is said that the amount of money which has been spent on railways in Great Britain is not far short of 500 millions of pounds sterling. The greatest railway company in the United Kingdom is the London and North-Western, which draws in annual receipts about seven millions of pounds; and the total receipts of all the railway companies would nearly equal half the revenue of the State.

The construction of railways over lofty ranges of mountains will be found illustrated by the brief notices in other pages of the Union Pacific line in the United States, and of the St. Gothard railway over the Alps. In such cases, the track has been to a great extent carried over the spurs or along the sides of the mountains, so that such inclines might be obtained as the ordinary locomotive was capable of ascending. The expensive operation of tunnelling was resorted to only where sinuous deviations from the more direct route involved a still greater expenditure of initial cost, or a continual waste of time and energy in the actual working of the line. Sometimes winding tracks, almost returning by snake-like loops on their own route, as projected on the map, were required in order that the ascent could be made with an incline practicable for the ordinary locomotive. In the earlier development of railways, there were to be met with cable inclines, where the traction of the locomotive had to be superseded or supplemented by that of a rope or chain wound round a drum actuated by a stationary steam-engine. The more powerful locomotives of the present day are able to mount grades of such inclination that the employment of cable traction is no longer requisite, except in but a few cases. Railways had carried passengers about in all parts of the world for many years before the engineer addressed himself to the problem of easily and quickly taking people up heights of steep and toilsome ascent, sought generally for the sake of the prospect, etc. Such, at least, has been the object of most of the inclined railways already constructed, but to this their utility is by no means limited, and as their safety and stability has been proved by many years of use, they may find wider applications than the gratification of the tourist and pleasure-seeker.

The toothed rail or rack which was formerly supposed necessary to obtain power of traction on rails has been already mentioned (p. 101), and as early as 1812 such a contrivance appears to have been in use in England, near Leeds, the invention of a Mr. Blenkinsop. This mode of traction received no development or improvement worthy of notice until Mr. S. Marsh constructed, in 1866, a railway ladder—for so it may be called—for the ascent of Mount Washington in the United States. In this case there was a centre rail formed of iron, angle iron laid between and parallel to the metals on which ran the wheels of the carriages. In this centre rail angle irons were connected by round bars of wrought iron, which the teeth of a pinion of the locomotive engaged, so that a climbing action, resembling somewhat that of a wheel entering on the successive rounds of a ladder, was produced, and in this way an ascensive power was obtained sufficient to overcome gravity, the gradient not much exceeding a rise of one foot in three at any point (12 vertical to 32 horizontal). This railway was completed in 1869, and for more than a quarter of a century it has carried thousands of tourists to the summit of Mount Washington without a single fatal accident. This system of ascending mountains was soon adopted in Europe with certain improvements, for in 1870 an inclined railway was constructed to the summit of the Rigi, in which a system of involute gearing was substituted for the ladder-like rounds of Mr. Marsh. A certain vibratory action, due to the successive engagements of the teeth in the central rack, which was somewhat disagreeable for passengers, was soon afterwards obviated in the Abt system, in which two racks are used, with the teeth of one opposite the spaces of the other, and a double pinion provided, so that greater uniformity in the acting power is obtained. With certain modifications in detail, such as horizontal instead of vertical pinions, this system has been largely adopted wherever cables have been dispensed with. In the inclined railway by which Mount Pilatus, near Lucerne, is now ascended, horizontal teeth project from both sides of a centre rail, and these are engaged by horizontal pinions. The incline here is very steep, being in places nearly 30 degrees; teeth perpendicular to the plane of the incline would have offered a less margin of safety than those on the plan actually adopted. In some places, as among the Alps, and more particularly in South America, there are railways in which the ordinary mode of traction and that with the rack are combined; that is, where the gradient exceeds the ordinary limit, a central rack-rail is laid down, on approaching which the engineer slackens his speed, and allows pinions, moved by the locomotive, to become engaged in the double rack, by which he slowly climbs the steep ascent until a level tract is reached which permits of the ordinary traction being resumed.

Instead of climbing the inclines by rack-work rails, there is another system which offers great advantages for economy in working, and one generally resorted to where the incline can be made in one vertical plane. This is the balanced cable, in which the gravitation force of a descending car or train is utilised to draw up, or assist to draw up, the ascending car or train. These cars are attached to the ends of a cable which passes round a drum at the top of the incline, and means are provided, according to circumstances, so that the drum may be turned, or its revolutions controlled by brakes. When there is a water supply at the upper end of the incline, a simple and economical mode of working the cable is available; for all that is necessary is to provide each car with a water-tank capable of being rapidly filled and emptied. The upper car is made the heavier when required, by filling its tank with water, when it raises the lower car, and on itself arriving at the bottom, the water is discharged before the load to be taken up is received.

Many inclined railways are now in operation in various parts of the world, as at Mount Vesuvius, where two of the slopes have a combined length of 10,500 feet; at Mount Supurga and at Mount San Salvatore there are others. At Burgen-stock in Switzerland there is one having a slope 57 feet vertical to 100 feet horizontal. These are cable inclines; but a rack is also used with a pinion regulated by a friction-brake to avoid accident, in case of the cable parting. The largest inclined railway in America is at the Catskill Mountains, where an ascent of 1,600 feet is made in a horizontal distance of 6,780 feet. In this a novel plan has been adopted for compensating the varying weight that has to be moved, for it is obvious that at the commencement the load at the top of the incline has to raise not only that at the bottom, but the whole weight of the cable also, equal to 35,000 pounds of wire rope, and again after the middle point has been passed, the descending power is constantly increasing, while the load being raised is diminishing. Now, in order that the engine may work with more uniform effect, the engineer has not made the incline a straight line, but with the slope lightest at the bottom and gradually increased towards the top, so that the line is really a curve in the vertical plane, and has at every point just the inclination required for balancing the weight of the wire cable, as this shifts from the one track to the other. Instead of a rack pinion and brake to control a too rapid descent from any accident, the cars are provided with clutches, which are automatically thrown out on wooden guard-rails, when a safe speed is exceeded. Inclined railways have also been constructed to the summit of Snowdon, in North Wales, and to that of the Jungfrau, in Switzerland.