and very probably will, in a few years more, convert 60 per cent. into
useful work. The conclusion, then, is irresistible that, when engineers
have gained greater experience with gas engines and gas producers, they
will displace steam engines entirely for every use--mills, locomotives,
and ships.

* * * * *




RAPID CONSTRUCTION OF THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY.

By E.T. ABBOTT, Member of the Engineers' Club of Minnesota. Read December
12, 1884.


During the winter of 1881 and 1882, the contract was let to Messrs.
Langdon, Sheppard & Co., of Minneapolis, to construct during the working
season of the latter year, or prior to January 1, 1883, 500 miles of
railroad on the western extension of the above company; the contract being
for the grading, bridging, track-laying, and surfacing, also including the
laying of the necessary depot sidings and their grading. The idea that any
such amount of road could be built in that country in that time was looked
upon by the writer hereof, as well as by railroad men generally, as a huge
joke, perpetrated to gull the Canadians. At the time the contract was let,
the Canadian Pacific Railway was in operation to Brandon, the crossing of
the Assiniboine River, 132 miles west of Winnipeg. The track was laid,
however, to a point about 50 miles west of this, and the grading done
generally in an unfinished state for thirty miles further. This was the