BRANCH ROADS. 79

Railway of the Kansas — or, as it might be more briefly and definitely
designated, The Kansas Pacific Railway —shall be completed to its
ultimate destination, numerous important branch roads will almost
simultaneously be made through many parts of the extensive and
magnificent region which stretches all along the southern and south-
eastern side of the main line. Three of these branches will reach tidé
water,—one at Galveston, Texas, on the Gulf of Mexico ; one at Guay-
mas, in Sonora, on the Gulf of California; and one at San Diego, on
the main coast of the Pacific ocean, nearly five hundred miles south-
east of San Francisco.

I appeal to the map again to show how admirably this main line is
calculated to put all of the Eastern, Middle, and Northwestern States
of the Union, east of the Missouri, into social and commercial connec-
tion with all that rich and productive portion of this continent, along
the northern border of which it runs. The trade of a million of square
miles can be drawn into it without going much beyond our own bor
ders. But when to this is added the fact that it will reach the Pacific
ocean at three several, far separated and important points — Guaymas,
San Diego, and San Francisco —it requires no further argument to
prove that it will be the greatest thoroughfare in the world.

This is a road that will develop the country through which it and
its branches will pass and create its own business. We excursionists
saw how it was doing that already in Kansas; and a few days ago,
while in Philadelphia, I saw how the officers of the Company there
were hurrying forward hundreds of cars and a corresponding number
of locomotives, to keep pace with the rapidly increasing trade.

I propose now to notice briefly some of these branches, either
actually commenced or in contemplation.

The first is that whereof the main line commences at Lawrence and
rans almost directly south through Kansas, through the Indian Territory
and through Texas, until it meets the Central Texas road, which runs
almost due north from Galveston. The entire distance from Lawrence
to Galveston is about six hundred miles, and the route is through a
country of unsurpassed fertility and beauty from one end to the other.
When I was at Lawrence in June, they were vigorously at work on
this road, and expected to have twenty-four miles of it finished and in
operation by January, 1868. The people of Kansas City are to have
a branch of this road from their town, which will probably unite with
the Lawrence branch in the valley of: the Neosho, near the southern
border of the State. This branch, which also runs through a splendid
country, will almost.certainly be completed at an earlyday. Another
branch of this road is projected from Junction City southward to the