| From the New Orleans Daily Crescent |
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| April 3, 1861 |
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| The Southern Pacific Railroad |
| The friends of this enterprise
ought to be up and doing. It is all important that the debts of the
Company in Texas should be promptly met, and that iron, supplies and
every necessary to ensure a vigorous prosecution of the work, should
be shipped as early as possible. The navigation in Red river and Lake
Caddo is now good and freights are cheap, cheaper than they have been
for years; but who can tell how long the navigation will last? If it
declines, nothing can be shipped before late in the fall or winter. It
is vitally important, and we would enforce this idea upon
stockholders, that fifty additional miles of this road should be
completed to take off the growing crop, which promises to be
universally large and to command good prices. For when this is done, a
revenue will be afforded fully adequate to meet any ordinary demand
that may be made upon the Company. There will then be one hundred and
two miles completed, eighty-two of which will belong to the Southern
Pacific Company, extending into the heart of a cotton country of
unequaled wealth and fertility. There is not, in all this section, a
navigable stream, except Red river, worthy of the name, and
consequently business will come to it from hundreds of miles in every
direction. |
| The line of road, when
completed, will be worth, with the other assets of the Company, not
less than $2,500,000. The Company is entitled to a land bonus of
10,200 acres of land to the mile, which upon 82 miles of road amounts
to 836,400. Is it not extremely moderate to value this land at
$2,500,000? Then, with fifty more miles of railroad, and a connection
with Shreveport, the stockholders will possess a property worth, in
round numbers, five millions of dollars. |
| Now let us look what it will
have cost them. The existing stock, recognized by the Company, may be
estimated at about $2,200,000; that is 440,000 shares, upon which the
stockholders are requested to make an advance of one dollar, and to
take it in new stock. |
| As an arithmetical proposition
it is easy of comprehension. The Company will have property in its
possession worth, at the least calculation, five millions of dollars,
which will have cost them but $2,600,000. |
| Nor is this all. The Company
will be entitled to a loan from the State of Texas, of $6000 per mile,
upon this 82 miles of finished road. That is $432,000. It can then
proceed and construct fifty miles more, and obtain a further loan of
$300,000 for these fifty miles; in all, $700,000; a sum amply
sufficient to pay for the work. |
| What will be the condition of
the Company then? It will have 132 miles of road completed, worth
$3,950,000, and lands in fee simple amounting to 1,346,400 acres. Now,
it must be recollected that with 132 miles of railroad completed, and
a promise of rapid progress of the work, these lands will possess a
marketable value. Any one who has any experience of the effect of
railroads upon the value of lands, and of the immense immigration into
Texas of late years, will not question that these lands of the Company
can be readily sold, if the Company should conclude to sacrifice them
at that price to raise money, at over five dollars an acre. Then,
these stockholders will be worth over nine millions of dollars, upon
an investment of $2,600,000. |
| All that is necessary to
achieve these results, is for the stockholders to step forward and
protect their own interests by the insignificant subscription of one
dollar upon each share of their stock. This will give the Company
$400,000, which, with the State aid, will finish and equip the fifty
additional miles of road and leave a surplus. Surely the stockholders,
thinking, practical men, as we presume them to be, will not suffer
their property, worth at the present time not less than two millions
of dollars, sacrificed for debts which amount in the aggregate to not
over $75,000. They will not permit this work to languish for aid, in
view of such prospects of munificent results? |
| Here is a railroad Company
such as we have represented, with a gentleman at the head of it of
unquestioned integrity, ability, and experience, second in fact to no
railroad man in the country -- one who has the character of never
having failed at anything he undertook. We would hazard his
reputation, sacrifice his time, and invest his money in a delusive
scheme? And hence it is astonishing to us why it is that any
stockholder should hesitate a moment as to what his interest demands
of him in this emergency. It is acquisition on one side and total loss
of investments on the other. While they are hesitating and doubting
the road may, and quite likely will, be sold out unless they come to
its relief. Delays are dangerous, and if they do not loose the road
they may, by their supineness, defeat the purpose of constructing
fifty additional miles this year, which, as we said in the beginning,
must be regarded as all important. If the stockholders are blind to
their own interests, they may rest assured there will be found others
to take their places. They may fail, but the enterprise will not. It
has attracted the attention of the leading, thinking men, in both
hemispheres. If sold, they may rest assured there will be a company
formed to purchase it, able and willing to carry out the work. And
while we should like to see those who have invested their means in
this enterprise realize the golden harvest connected with its
successful prosecution, we may not regret, as we otherwise should, if
the stockholders fail to come forward promptly in the present
emergency, to see it change hands and a new company formed of men
possessing more enlarged views, liberality, and practical knowledge.
With this plain, blunt statement, we take leave of the subject for the
present. |
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