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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 16, 1889)
1 WEST SHORE. ntubborn bull will turn his head to the onrushing loco motive and dispute the right of way, but always to his sad discomfiture. One of these familiar scenes is de picted on the double page in the center of this number of the Wert Shore. Hundreds of cattle are annually killed in this way, and the railroad companies pay out large sums of money for damages to the clamorous owners. None but the finest beef cattle or the best dairy animals or the primeBt horses are ever killed by the engines, if the claimants' statements in their applications for damages can be relied upon. This is a little peculiar, but it is equally odd that, on the part of the railroad, there is never any carelessness by its employees. To take the statements of both sides, it seems that the choicest an imals of the country deliberately walk upon the track and commit suicide. But the amount paid to tho own ers of stock is not all tho loss suffered by the compan ies, for often an engine is derailed and thousands of dollars of damage done. It is a question whether the entire right of way of the railroads cannot bo fenced for a less cost than the amount of damage caused by tho want of fences during the time a fence would re main in good condition. There is something more than mere damage to property involved in this question of protecting railroad tracks from invasion by cattle, and that is the safety of passengers on tho trains. It is the duty of tho companies to throw around them all tho safeguards possible, and if this duty is neglected the state legislatures should provide for ite attention by proper legislation. If railroad companies in a spirit of false economy imperil the lives of their passengers by neglecting to fence their tracks, they should le com pelled to construct these necessary safeguards by tho hand of the law. FERRY ACROSS SNAKE RIVER. ON the back page is given a sketch of a scene that has been a common one in the west ever since the white-topped wagon of tho emigrant first crossed the plains and penetrated tho mountain pannes and valleys of tho Pacific coast. Here and there in the more populous settlements, or where tho railroads have been compelled to cross streams, bridg es may l seen, but even to this day the almost uni versal method of crossing unfordable streams in the west is by means of the flat-bottomed ferry. Karly in tho history of California and Oregon, and, a few years later, in Washington, Idaho and Montana, the neccs sity of providing the necessary roads, bridges and ferries required for passing from place to place, and the utter inability of tho various counties to construct them at the public expense, led to the granting of in numerable franchises, many of which continue till the present day, existing by authority of acts of the legis latures of tho various states. Some of these franchises have made their owners rich, and still pour a constant stream of money into tho pockets of their proprietor. On the larger streams, where there is constant trav el, and boats make regular and frequent trips, steam power is used, sometimes tho Ismt Mug attached by wheels to a heavy wire cable in tho water, and some times being entirely independent, but tho almost uni versal stylo is the overhead cable and current motor principle, similar to tho one shown in the sketch. Sus pended from a high ost on either bank of the river, a wiro rope, or cable, crosses the stream at a height of about twenty feet above tho water in the center, and thirty or more at tho ends. The cable is kept taut by being firmly anchored in the ground or to largo trees at either end. lTpon this cable run several wheels, sometimes attached together and sometimes singly, and to these wheels tho boat is attached by mm from both ends. By pulling in upon tho forward one of these ropes, the bow of tho mi is turned slightly up tho stream, and tho pressure of the current forces the boat along, the guiding wheels running smoothly on tho supKrting cablo. As both ends of tlo boat are alike, all that is necessary to be done to recross tho stream is to Blacken tho short rope and shorten tho long one, thus turning the other end up stream, and tho craft moves off easily in tho opposite direction. Tho writer well remembers tho first time ho saw one of these jm ruliar boats. It was a dark night in the month of Oe toWr, and he sat with tho driver of a four horse stage, his first trip by night in one of those now almost ex tinct conveyances, when tho vehicle reached the cross ingof the I'pper Sacramento river. After tho singe was safely stationed on the Ismt, which was just large enough to hold it, he heard a creaking of a windlass ond observed a man pulling the spokes of a wheel near tho Im.w. Soon the craft Is-gan to move off Into the darkness without any apparent propulsive force. Ho was ns much astonished as the Chinaman in San Francisco, who exclaii 1 when he first saw one of the cibl.. cars climb a iteep hill, " no pushee, no pull., bIIoo same debbil." The next morning, when another ferry was crossed, it was light enough for him to loves tigate and solve the mystery, also to learn what caused R Htrilngo noise he had heard over his head, which nrovwl to bo the wheels running on the cable. In the scene depleted by the artist one recognises nome of the characteristics of Idaho. The steep r-s ky hluffs so familiar for hundreds of miles along Snake river, with the fringe of cottenwood trees on the nar row margin of level land along tho river bank, will I recognized by every one who has wen that greatest tributary of the Columbia. Kqually familiar are the emigrant wagon and tho cow boy and his hardy steed.