Alabama Railroad Projections [pp. 196-205]

ALABAMA RAILROAD PROJECTIONS.
more highly favored with commercial facilities rose as high as thirty
or forty to the square mile. Again, the wealth in the counties now
under consideration, taking Jefferson as the sample, amounts to only
$94 for each white person, while in Greene it is as high as $428 for
each.
This state of things does not arise from any want of a capacity of
production inherent in the soil and climate of these counties For, in
point of fact, few portions of the State are more highly favored in
these respects. The mountains and ridges run parallel to each other,
forming valleys of great length, and in many cases of considerable
breadth; possessing, in salubrity of air, abundance and purity of
water, and fertility of soil, advantages not inferior to any found elsewhere in the State. The true cause of the sparsity and comparative
poverty of the inhabitants is, the necessity of cultivating a plant
which is not adapted to their locality, and the enormous expense that
attends the ordinary exchanges of commerce. But emancipate them
from this condition of things, by the construction of a railroad-enable them to change a system of agriculture which is rapidly exhausting their soil, without remunerating their labor-and to direct their
industry to its proper objects, the cultivation of grains and the raising of live stock; and this portion of territory will soon become the
most valuable and interesting in the State. In this connection, the
tide of emigration which has for some years been strongly setting in
from these counties to Texas and Arkansas, ought to arrest the serious
attention of the enlightened statesman. If things are to continue in
their present condition, another twenty years will result in an almost
total abandonment of this part of the country. And if for the past
two years this tide of emigration has been partially stayed, it has
been from the hope of disenthralment through the construction of
the Northeast and Southwest road. Nor are the other counties
on the line of this road bordering upon the Bigbee and Warrior
rivers, less interested in the completion of this work. The navigation
of these rivers is imperfect and costly at best; but it is becoming
more precarious every day, and is occasionally wholly inadequate to
the transportation of agricultural products and general merchandise.
Our seasons are sometimes abnormal, and there is reason to believe
that the navigation of a stream must be impaired by the clearing up
and cultivation of the country through which it flows. Of the rain
that actually falls, a large portion is lost by evaporation from exposure to the sun and air, and a much larger portion is absorbed by
the upturned and unloosened soil; so that comparatively but a
small portion reaches the channels of the water-courses at all, and
that which does, carries down such an excess of soil that it continually tends to fill up the bed of the streams.
It appears, therefore, that no portion of Alabama stands in so
great need of improved facilities for effecting exchanges, as that proposed to be traversed by the Northeast and Southwest road.
We have considered the advantages of this work to the upper
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