to-day, and yet not be half full,
and the city of St. Louis will number a million of souls. New York City
and San Francisco, as the two great _entrepots_ of trade; Chicago and
St. Louis as its two vital centres; and New Orleans at the mouth of our
great national canal, the Mississippi,--will become nations rather than
cities, out-stripping all the great cities of ancient and modern
history. As far as the resources of the West are concerned, one Pacific
railroad, with two or three branches, will not suffice; we may need a
road along every parallel. The West is still in a large degree _terra
incognita_. We know it only in parts. We are indeed aware that
California is already competing with Russia and the cis-Mississippi
States in the production of cereals, and that the mineral region of the
West now annually yields gold and silver worth one hundred millions of
dollars. But California's agricultural resources are almost untouched;
while the best "leads" of the vast mineral region are not worked, from
the fear of a savage race. Missouri extends over thirty-five millions of
acres of arable land, two millions of which are the alluvial margins of
rivers, and twenty thousand high rolling prairie; but five sevenths of
the soil is yet fallow. We see Denver and other cities of the Far West
spring up in a day; but their growth, marvellous as it is, arises from
the circumstance that they are great mineral centres, and is cramped and
partial, depending upon a wearisome and insecure overland route,
extending over hundreds of miles, via Salt Lake, to Atchison. The
Pacific Railroad will quicken this development to its full
possibilities; it will populate the West in a few years; and along its
lines will spring up a hundred cities, which will advance in the swift
march of national progress just in proportion to their opportunities for
rapid communication with the older centres of opulence and culture.

The Indians also, whose sad plaint against the inevitable civilization
of the locomotive is still ringing in all ears, must succumb before the
presence of this new power. When we reflect that a single regiment of
soldiers costs a million a year, we must see that the railroad as a
peace instrument will render more than an equivalent for all government
assistance given to it. Moreover, our frontier posts must soon be
rendered unnecessary by the operation of commerce. The same influence
will also dissipate the power which the Mormons have gai