"SAN FRANCISCO TO CHICAGO.

"Left San Francisco on 29th September, 1886, at 7.30, by steam ferry to
Oakland, 4 miles across the harbour; left Oakland by train at 8.10
a.m.; 32 miles from Oakland we reached Port Costa, where the train was
ferried across an estuary of the sea to Benicia; for 20 miles from
there the line (the Central Pacific division of the Southern Pacific
Railway Company) runs, across a flat, marshy country, then into a
cultivated country with the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada
rising around it, the country being very dry and parched, having had no
rain since March: the farm-houses have the Eucalyptus, or Australian
blue gum, planted around them; and about 75 miles from San Francisco we
entered the vineyard country, which continues to and past Sacramento.
Reached Sacramento, which is 90 miles from San Francisco, and only 30
feet above the level of the sea, at 12 o'clock; the schedule time from
Oakland, including the ferry at Port Costa, being 25 miles an hour. At
Sacramento we crossed the Sacramento and American Rivers, the former by
a Howe truss bridge, one of the spans being a swing-bridge, and having
a total length of 700 or 800 feet; the latter by a Howe truss bridge,
and fully a mile of trestle work.

"From Sacramento the line begins to rise so as to cross the Sierra
Nevada Range; the country is rolling, and with the 'live oak' trees
scattered over it among the grass presents quite a park-like
appearance. The grades as we ascend are very steep, 116 feet to the
mile, this line being well ballasted. In the valleys the line was laid
originally with steel rails of 50 lbs. weight, and 3,080 ties to the
mile, in the mountains with 60 lbs. rails, but no renewals are made
with less than a 60 lbs. rail. From Rocklin to Newcastle the vineyards