her friends held in Leland Stanford's store
after the day's business was through. There were seven of these men all
told, not one of them worth less than half a million, and each ready to
stake his entire property in the enterprise, if it promised success. The
maps of the new-comer were consulted, the lines carefully studied, and
the result of their deliberations was the temporary organization of what
is now known as the Central Pacific Railroad Company of California. The
engineer in whose representations so much confidence was placed soon
proved that he was worthy of that confidence; money was forthcoming; an
adequate surveying party was sent out; and in the summer months of 1861,
Judah demonstrated the existence of a route by the South Yuba River and
the Donner Pass greatly superior to all other projected lines, with no
insuperable engineering difficulties, and capable of defence against all
interruption by freshet or snow. In the mean while the State Legislature
had granted a charter to the incorporators in July; and at the first
stockholders' meeting Stanford was elected president and Huntington
vice-president of the company. It was evident, however, that an
undertaking of such vast dimensions could not be completed without
government help; and the Sacramento party, confident that in Mr. Judah's
surveys lay the solution of the Pacific problem, repaired at once to
Washington, and opened anew the railroad agitation.

While the energy of the West was still engaged in penetrating the
secrets of the formidable Sierra, a movement meaning work began to
develop itself on the Eastern border. As a general statement, and
without reference to individual routes, it may be said that in the
Northern cis-Mississippi States there are two separate railroad systems,
running in lines about parallel from east to west; the upper combination
of routes debouching at Chicago, the lower, or central, at St. Louis.
These lines are slightly entangled with the roads concentrating at
Cincinnati and Indianapolis; but the division into an upper and lower
route is sufficiently preserved to admit of distinct classification. The
capitalists of both the great cities which form the terminal points of
these systems had long been equally alive to the vast possibilities of
the Pacific trade, and were eager, not only from local pride, but also
from knowledge of the simplest principles of commercial policy, to
secure to their respective communities the main b