ribery often repeated, what else is it?
Why should it cost a specific $200,000 to pass any proper bill through
Congress? $25,000 to convene a Territorial Legislature? $10,000 to
$20,000 a year to influence justly a few Californians? Influence thus
exercised is as, palpable as it is direct.

Nature and Value of Picnics.

But ends are sometimes attained by indirection. The Letters tell how.
For example:

"I have been working for the last two month to get a party, of say, 25
Southern members of Congress to go out to California and over the line
of the Southern Pacific and see what we have done and our ability to do.
* * * I told Senator Gordon of Georgia if he could get up a party of the
best men of the South we would pay all their expenses, which. I suppose
would not be less than $10,000, and I think it would be money well
expended." (No. 208. N. Y., July 26th, 1876.)

But these Southern gentlemen seem to have been somewhat hesitating, as
attest:

"I have telegraphed to-day to you to get some of the prominent men of
San Francisco to telegraph to Gordon, Senator from Georgia, with other
Southern men to go. While Gordon and some others are not afraid to go,
G. tells me, that some of his friends do not like to go on an invitation
from the R. R. Co." (No. 213. N. Y., Aug. 7th, 1876.)

And the fear of a thoughtful constituency appears to have resulted in
"some doubts."

"You must have had a lively time in getting so many good names signed
and sent on in so short a time, inviting our Southern brethren to come
to Cal. I saw Gordon and several others just before Congress adjourned,
and they said they would go, but I have some doubts about it, as most of
the members of Congress are looking after their re-election." (No. 221.
N. Y., Aug. 25th, 1875.)

By the light of the above extracts may perhaps be interpreted the
meaning of the news that has just come by telegraph that the "Senate
Committee on Pacific Railroads will take a trip, soon after Congress
adjourns, to San Francisco by way of the Union, Central and Southern
Pacific systems--in Senator Brice's private car."

Protest and Petition.

It would be an interesting, and to me a congenial task, to further
analyze the Letters; to show what tools the monopolists secured, and how
they worked with them; to set forth how rivalry was met and defeated;
railroads--such as the Santa Monica--absorbed or paralyzed, and many
things were done and undone. But