could be bonded mile for mile under a separate charter. Ford modestly
disclaimed any intention of dictating the financial policy; this was not
in his line. But again he would submit facts. The grain crop in the West
was phenomenally large in prospect. With its own eastern terminal in
Chicago, the Pacific Southwestern could control the grain shipments in
its own territory. With the moving of the grain, the depressed P. S-W.
stock would inevitably recover, and on a rising market the new issue of
bonds could doubtless be floated.

The enthusiast closed his argument with a hasty summing-up of the
benefits which must, in the nature of things, accrue. From being an
alien link in the great transcontinental chain, the Pacific Southwestern
would rise at a bound to the dignity of a great railway system; a power
to be reckoned with among the other great systems gridironing the West.
Its earnings would be enhanced at every point; cross lines which now fed
its competitors would become its allies; the local lines to be welded
into the eastern end of the system would share at once in the prosperity
of a strong through line.

For the western extension he could speak from personal knowledge of the
region to be penetrated. Apart from the new line's prime object--that of
providing an outlet for the system--there was a goodly heritage of local
business awaiting the first railroad to reach the untapped territory.
Mines, valueless now for the lack of transportation facilities, would
become abundant producers; and there were many fertile valleys and mesas
to attract the ranchman, who would find on the western slopes of the
mountains an unfailing water supply for his reservoirs and ditches. Ford
did not hesitate to predict that within a short time the extension would
earn more, mile for mile, than the grain-belt portion of the system.