ROUTES FOR THE PACIFIC STATES.

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The immigrant who is attracted to Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Western or Central Montana, Idaho, Utah, Nevada, or New Mexico, Texas or Arizona does not need to make Chicago his point of departure, unless he chooses to do so. His more direct route will lie through St. Louis; and Omaha, Nebraska, Kansas City, Missouri, St. Joseph, Missouri, or Atchison, Kansas, will be his points of departure. Omaha is the eastern terminus of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railways, though recently a part of its traffic has been transferred to Kansas City. St. Joseph is the terminus of the St. Joseph and Denver branch of the Union Pacific, and is otherwise a railroad centre of some importance. Atchison is the eastern terminus of the central branch of the Union Pacific and also of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé Railway, the most enterprising and energetic railway in the Western Empire, but which is now also extended to Kansas City. The last-named place has recently become one of the greatest railway centres west of the Mississippi. It is the most easterly terminus of the Union Pacific, and commands from its position the travel and transportation of the Kansas Pacific, the Denver Pacific, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé, the Utah and Northern; the Missouri, Kansas and Texas; the Houston and Texas Central; the St. Louis and San Francisco, and the Texas Pacific. All these roads but one are now controlled by one man, or rather by a combination, of which he is the head. The immigrant leaving New York by either of the great trunk roads, Erie, New York Central, Pennsylvania Central, or Baltimore and Ohio, will do better as matters now stand, to buy his through tickets via the Wabash Railway, which connects directly at Kansas City with all these roads. By either of the other lines, Chicago and Northwestern, or Chicago and Burlington, he will be obliged to change cars and re-check his baggage at Kansas City, Omaha, Atchison or St. Joseph. He may be required to do so on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé, but probably he will not. If the emigrant's destination is to Oregon or Washington, he will still find it best to take this route going by the Union and Central Pacific, and stopping off at Kelton or at Junction, twenty miles east of Sacramento, and going thence by stage and rail to

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Oregon or Washington, or continuing on to San Francisco and taking a steamer thence to Portland, Oregon. If the emigrant's destination is to Southern California or Arizona, this route is still the best, taking the Southern Pacific Railway at Lathrop on the Central Pacific, and going by this railway to Southern California, or to any point in Arizona between Yuma and Tucson. The States and Territories on the Pacific can also be reached from New York at about the same expense by steamers to San Francisco, via Panama Railroad, and other steamer lines plying from San Francisco to Portland, Oregon, to the Columbia river and Puget Sound, and southward to Los Angeles, San Diego, and up the Gulf of California to Fort Yuma, near the mouth of the Rio Colorado. Very soon, probably within two years at the farthest, all Southern Arizona, Western Texas, and Southern California, will be reached by a much shorter and more direct route through Texas. Those emigrants whose destination is to Missouri, Southeastern Kansas, Arkansas, Indian Territory, Western Louisiana or Texas, will make St. Louis their point of departure, and can go from thence either by Mississippi river steamer to any points below, and by New Orleans steamer to any points on the Texas coast, or by Missouri river steamer to any points in Missouri, Dakota or Montana, lying on that river or on its principal navigable affluents, such as the Dakota, Yellowstone, Jefferson, Gallatin, etc., etc.

If they prefer, however, to continue their journey by rail, they can go from St. Louis by the Cairo and St. Louis, the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and Southern; the Atlantic and Pacific, or the Missouri Pacific with its continuation in the Missouri, Kansas and Texas, and some of its branches, and the Texas Pacific. Or they may take the New Orleans or Galveston steamers from New York and go direct to Louisiana or Texas.

On the railroads the emigrant trains move slowly, being under the necessity of switching off frequently, as the faster trains have the right of way. The emigrant train from Kansas City or Omaha to the Pacific coast, on the Union and Central Pacific Railways, is usually nine or ten days on its journey. The emigrant cars are fairly comfortable, about equal to the third-class cars in Europe. They have no cushions, are warmed by flat

topped stoves, on which the passengers can heat any food or drinks they need for young children or invalids; have an arrangement by which, by the use of boards furnished by the company, bunks can be made in which, with the aid of coats, blankets and shawls, the passengers can sleep as well as in the steerage of a steamship. The following table, compiled with great care, gives the railroad fares which prevailed in the autumn of 1879:

In March, 1880, the Utah and Northern R. R. was completed to Helena, Montana, and the fares to that town and to Fort Benton, have consequently been reduced somewhat on this route.

The completion of the railroad to Leadville, Alamosa and Santa Fé, has reduced these fares somewhat.
The Southern Pacific is now completed to Tucson, and fares are lower.

CHAPTER III.

HOW TO OBTAIN LAND-GOVERNMENT LANDS-PRICES of Arable OR FARMING LANDS-PURCHASE AT AUCTION OR PRIVATE ENTRY-PRE-EMPTION-THE HOMESTEAD SALES-LAND-WARRANTS-THE TIMBER-CULTURE ACT-TERMS AND MODE OF PURCHASE OF TIMBER LANDS-GRAZING LANDS: HOW SECURED.

1

HAVING arrived at his destination, the immigrant, if a farmer, or if disposed to invest in arable lands, looks about him, to see how he can best secure a farm. If he is a member of a colony formed in Europe, or in our own Eastern States, or if he comes out under the management of an emigration company, he is spared that trouble. He takes what is allotted to him, whatever its quality, and without any privilege of change; or if he is allowed a voice in the allotment, it must still be in the same tract of land. Not all the immigrants, however, are disposed to come into such an arrangement as this. It is very well in a small colony, where all the colonists are friends and acquaintances, and where the town lots and farming lands are about equally eligible, to unite together in this way, but to be only one of several thousands to whom land is allotted without choice of the party who is to cultivate it, and without the stimulus of individual enterprise, though it may suit foreign colonists, is not much to the taste of our independent and self-reliant American emigrants.

We will suppose, then, that our immigrant, having decided where he desires to locate his farm, proceeds to secure it. There are many ways in which he may do this; some of them depending upon the amount of money he has at command, others upon the locality itself, and the amount and desirableness of the government land in the market. If he has a sufficient capital and proposes to farm his own land, he will perhaps find it advisable to purchase a partially improved farm from some settler who desires to pay off the debts he has incurred and start anew on government land farther west. There are very often such opportunies by which an immigrant, who has some capital, may, for less money than he would have to expend on new and unbroken lands, procure a good farm, with such improvements as may enable him

HOW TO SECURE A FARM.

to enter upon it at once.

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In all these cases, however, he should carefully examine his title, and see that there are no clouds on it. If, however, there is no such opportunity where he wishes to locate, he will do well to purchase, if he can find it, government land of the best quality, either at auction or by private entry, being careful to select a farm with either a spring or running water on it, and, if it is to be had, one of the alternate sections on or near a railway line, present or immediately prospective. The land, if not near a railway, will be held by the government at $1.25 per acre and the fees, which may bring the price up to $1.33 or $1.35 per acre. If it is within the railroad limit the price will be $2.50 per acre, with the fees, which may bring it up to $2.60. In either case, he will do well if he can afford it to take a quarter-section (160 acres) in this way. If he needs more hereafter he can probably secure it at a less cost.

But it may happen that there has been such active emigration to that neighborhood, that there are no desirable quarter-sections to be had, among these alternate sections along the railroad, and that the remoter lands are, for some reason, not desirable. Or, it may be that there is no railroad in the immediate vicinity, or that the lands have not been surveyed, and so put upon the market. In the first case, he can probably buy the railroad land, paying a little more for it, usually $5 per acre, but receiving a liberal discount for cash payment. In the second case, he may be obliged to pre-empt his land, in which case he will have thirtythree months to pay for it, and a longer time if it is not surveyed, but meantime does not receive a full title; or he can enter it provisionally under the Homestead or the Timber-Culture Act, receiving his full title in five or eight years. Or, he may find some school lands or other State lands in the vicinity, which he may be able to purchase on fair terms; or, at the very worst, if there is no survey, no railroad near, no State or Territorial lands ready for purchase, nothing but a mining settlement just sprung into existence, which will afford him a good market for whatever he can raise, he can "squat" on the land, taking his chance of dispossession, but with pay for his improvements, if the land should prove to be mining land, and filing a pre-emption claim as soon as possible.