Around the World in Eighty Days

by Jules Verne

  Chapter XXVI

  IN WHICH PHILEAS FOGG AND PARTY TRAVEL BY THE PACIFIC RAILROAD

  "From ocean to ocean"--so say the Americans; and these four wordscompose the general designation of the "great trunk line" which crossesthe entire width of the United States. The Pacific Railroad is,however, really divided into two distinct lines: the Central Pacific,between San Francisco and Ogden, and the Union Pacific, between Ogdenand Omaha. Five main lines connect Omaha with New York.

  New York and San Francisco are thus united by an uninterrupted metalribbon, which measures no less than three thousand seven hundred andeighty-six miles. Between Omaha and the Pacific the railway crosses aterritory which is still infested by Indians and wild beasts, and alarge tract which the Mormons, after they were driven from Illinois in1845, began to colonise.

  The journey from New York to San Francisco consumed, formerly, underthe most favourable conditions, at least six months. It is nowaccomplished in seven days.

  It was in 1862 that, in spite of the Southern Members of Congress, whowished a more southerly route, it was decided to lay the road betweenthe forty-first and forty-second parallels. President Lincoln himselffixed the end of the line at Omaha, in Nebraska. The work was at oncecommenced, and pursued with true American energy; nor did the rapiditywith which it went on injuriously affect its good execution. The roadgrew, on the prairies, a mile and a half a day. A locomotive, runningon the rails laid down the evening before, brought the rails to be laidon the morrow, and advanced upon them as fast as they were put inposition.

  The Pacific Railroad is joined by several branches in Iowa, Kansas,Colorado, and Oregon. On leaving Omaha, it passes along the left bankof the Platte River as far as the junction of its northern branch,follows its southern branch, crosses the Laramie territory and theWahsatch Mountains, turns the Great Salt Lake, and reaches Salt LakeCity, the Mormon capital, plunges into the Tuilla Valley, across theAmerican Desert, Cedar and Humboldt Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, anddescends, via Sacramento, to the Pacific--its grade, even on the RockyMountains, never exceeding one hundred and twelve feet to the mile.

  Such was the road to be traversed in seven days, which would enablePhileas Fogg--at least, so he hoped--to take the Atlantic steamer atNew York on the 11th for Liverpool.

  The car which he occupied was a sort of long omnibus on eight wheels,and with no compartments in the interior. It was supplied with tworows of seats, perpendicular to the direction of the train on eitherside of an aisle which conducted to the front and rear platforms.These platforms were found throughout the train, and the passengerswere able to pass from one end of the train to the other. It wassupplied with saloon cars, balcony cars, restaurants, and smoking-cars;theatre cars alone were wanting, and they will have these some day.

  Book and news dealers, sellers of edibles, drinkables, and cigars, whoseemed to have plenty of customers, were continually circulating in theaisles.

  The train left Oakland station at six o'clock. It was already night,cold and cheerless, the heavens being overcast with clouds which seemedto threaten snow. The train did not proceed rapidly; counting thestoppages, it did not run more than twenty miles an hour, which was asufficient speed, however, to enable it to reach Omaha within itsdesignated time.

  There was but little conversation in the car, and soon many of thepassengers were overcome with sleep. Passepartout found himself besidethe detective; but he did not talk to him. After recent events, theirrelations with each other had grown somewhat cold; there could nolonger be mutual sympathy or intimacy between them. Fix's manner hadnot changed; but Passepartout was very reserved, and ready to stranglehis former friend on the slightest provocation.

  Snow began to fall an hour after they started, a fine snow, however,which happily could not obstruct the train; nothing could be seen fromthe windows but a vast, white sheet, against which the smoke of thelocomotive had a greyish aspect.

  At eight o'clock a steward entered the car and announced that the timefor going to bed had arrived; and in a few minutes the car wastransformed into a dormitory. The backs of the seats were thrown back,bedsteads carefully packed were rolled out by an ingenious system,berths were suddenly improvised, and each traveller had soon at hisdisposition a comfortable bed, protected from curious eyes by thickcurtains. The sheets were clean and the pillows soft. It onlyremained to go to bed and sleep which everybody did--while the trainsped on across the State of California.

  The country between San Francisco and Sacramento is not very hilly.The Central Pacific, taking Sacramento for its starting-point, extendseastward to meet the road from Omaha. The line from San Francisco toSacramento runs in a north-easterly direction, along the AmericanRiver, which empties into San Pablo Bay. The one hundred and twentymiles between these cities were accomplished in six hours, and towardsmidnight, while fast asleep, the travellers passed through Sacramento;so that they saw nothing of that important place, the seat of the Stategovernment, with its fine quays, its broad streets, its noble hotels,squares, and churches.

  The train, on leaving Sacramento, and passing the junction, Roclin,Auburn, and Colfax, entered the range of the Sierra Nevada. 'Cisco wasreached at seven in the morning; and an hour later the dormitory wastransformed into an ordinary car, and the travellers could observe thepicturesque beauties of the mountain region through which they weresteaming. The railway track wound in and out among the passes, nowapproaching the mountain-sides, now suspended over precipices, avoidingabrupt angles by bold curves, plunging into narrow defiles, whichseemed to have no outlet. The locomotive, its great funnel emitting aweird light, with its sharp bell, and its cow-catcher extended like aspur, mingled its shrieks and bellowings with the noise of torrents andcascades, and twined its smoke among the branches of the gigantic pines.

  There were few or no bridges or tunnels on the route. The railwayturned around the sides of the mountains, and did not attempt toviolate nature by taking the shortest cut from one point to another.

  The train entered the State of Nevada through the Carson Valley aboutnine o'clock, going always northeasterly; and at midday reached Reno,where there was a delay of twenty minutes for breakfast.

  From this point the road, running along Humboldt River, passednorthward for several miles by its banks; then it turned eastward, andkept by the river until it reached the Humboldt Range, nearly at theextreme eastern limit of Nevada.

  Having breakfasted, Mr. Fogg and his companions resumed their places inthe car, and observed the varied landscape which unfolded itself asthey passed along the vast prairies, the mountains lining the horizon,and the creeks, with their frothy, foaming streams. Sometimes a greatherd of buffaloes, massing together in the distance, seemed like amoveable dam. These innumerable multitudes of ruminating beasts oftenform an insurmountable obstacle to the passage of the trains; thousandsof them have been seen passing over the track for hours together, incompact ranks. The locomotive is then forced to stop and wait till theroad is once more clear.

  This happened, indeed, to the train in which Mr. Fogg was travelling.About twelve o'clock a troop of ten or twelve thousand head of buffaloencumbered the track. The locomotive, slackening its speed, tried toclear the way with its cow-catcher; but the mass of animals was toogreat. The buffaloes marched along with a tranquil gait, uttering nowand then deafening bellowings. There was no use of interrupting them,for, having taken a particular direction, nothing can moderate andchange their course; it is a torrent of living flesh which no dam couldcontain.

  The travellers gazed on this curious spectacle from the platforms; butPhileas Fogg, who had the most reason of all to be in a hurry, remainedin his seat, and waited philosophically until it should please thebuffaloes to get out of the way.

  Passepartout was furious at the delay they occasioned, and longed todischarge his arsenal of revolvers upon them.

  "What a country!" cried he. "Mere cattle stop the trains, and go by ina procession, just as if they were not impeding travel! Parbleu! Ishould li
ke to know if Mr. Fogg foresaw this mishap in his programme!And here's an engineer who doesn't dare to run the locomotive into thisherd of beasts!"

  The engineer did not try to overcome the obstacle, and he was wise. Hewould have crushed the first buffaloes, no doubt, with the cow-catcher;but the locomotive, however powerful, would soon have been checked, thetrain would inevitably have been thrown off the track, and would thenhave been helpless.

  The best course was to wait patiently, and regain the lost time bygreater speed when the obstacle was removed. The procession ofbuffaloes lasted three full hours, and it was night before the trackwas clear. The last ranks of the herd were now passing over the rails,while the first had already disappeared below the southern horizon.

  It was eight o'clock when the train passed through the defiles of theHumboldt Range, and half-past nine when it penetrated Utah, the regionof the Great Salt Lake, the singular colony of the Mormons.