The Traffic In These Lands Has Been The Great
Speculating Business Of Western Men.
Five or six years ago, when
the rage for such purchases was at its height, land was becoming a
scarce article in the market.
Individuals or companies bought it
up with the object of reselling it at a profit; and many, no doubt,
did make money. Railway companies were, in fact, companies
combined for the purchase of land. They purchased land, looking to
increase the value of it fivefold by the opening of a railroad. It
may easily be understood that a railway, which could not be in
itself remunerative, might in this way become a lucrative
speculation. No settler could dare to place himself absolutely at
a distance from any thoroughfare. At first the margins of nature's
highways, the navigable rivers and lakes, were cleared. But as the
railway system grew and expanded itself, it became manifest that
lands might be rendered quickly available which were not so
circumstanced by nature. A company which had purchased an enormous
territory from the United States government at five shillings an
acre might well repay itself all the cost of a railway through that
territory, even though the receipts of the railway should do no
more than maintain the current expenses. It is in this way that
the thousands of miles of American railroads have been opened; and
here again must be seen the immense advantages which the States as
a new country have enjoyed. With us the purchase of valuable land
for railways, together with the legal expenses which those
compulsory purchases entailed, have been so great that with all our
traffic railways are not remunerative.
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