Part 15

The results of scientific work of the Lick Observatory have been most interesting and remarkable. Professor Edward E. Barnard discovered, Sept. 9, 1892, the fifth satellite of Jupiter, one hundred miles in diameter. He discovered nineteen comets in ten years, and has been called the "comet-seeker." He has also, says Professor Holden, made a very large number of observations "upon the physical appearance of the planets Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn; upon the zodiacal light, etc.; upon meteors, lunar eclipses, double stars, occultations of stars, etc.; and he has discovered a considerable number of new nebulæ also." Professor Barnard resigned Oct. 1, 1895, to accept the position of professor of astronomy in the University of Chicago, and is succeeded by Professor Wm. J. Hussey of the Leland Stanford Junior University.

Sir Edwin Arnold, during his visit to the Observatory, at the suggestion of Professor Campbell, looked through the great telescope upon the nebula in Orion. "I saw," he writes, "in the well-known region of 'Beta Orionis,' the vast separate system of that universe clearly outlined,--a fleecy, irregular, mysterious, windy shape, its edges whirled and curled like those of a storm-cloud, with stars and star clusters standing forth against the milky white background of the nebula like diamonds lying upon silver cloth. The central star, which to the naked eye or to a telescope of lower power looks single and of no great brilliancy, resolved itself, under the potent command of the Lick glass, into a splendid trapezium of four glittering worlds, arranged very much like those of the Southern Cross.

"At the lower right-hand border of the beautiful cosmic mist, there opens a black abyss of darkness, which has the appearance of an inky cloud about to swallow up the silvery filigree of the nebula; but this the great glass fills up with unsuspecting worlds when the photographic apparatus is fitted to it. I understood Professor Holden's views to be that we were beholding, in that almost immeasurably remote silvery haze, an entirely separated system of worlds and clusters, apart from all others, as our own system is, but inconceivably grander, larger, and more populous with suns and planets and their starry allies."

Professor John M. Schæberle, formerly of Michigan University, has discovered two or more comets, written much on solar eclipses, the "canals" of Mars, and the sun's corona. He, with Professor S. W. Burnham, went to South America to observe the solar eclipse of Dec. 21-22, 1889; and the former took observations on the solar eclipse April 16, 1893, at Mina Bronces, Chili.

Professor Burnham catalogued over one hundred and ninety-eight new double stars, which he discovered while at Mount Hamilton. He, with Professor Holden and others, have taken remarkable photographs of the moon; and the negatives have been sent to Professor Weinek of Prague, who makes enlarged drawings and photographs of them. Astronomers in Copenhagen, Vienna, Great Britain, and other parts of Europe, are working with the Lick astronomers. Star maps, in both northern and southern hemispheres, have been made at the Lick Observatory, and photographs of the milky way, the sun and its spots, comets, nebulæ, Mars, Jupiter, etc. Professor Holden has written much in the magazines, the _Century_, _McClure's_, _The Forum_, and elsewhere, concerning these photographs, "What we really know about Mars," and kindred topics.

Professor Perrine discovered a new comet in February, 1896, which for some time travelled towards the earth at the rate of 1,600,000 miles per day. Professor David P. Todd of Amherst College was enabled to make at the Lick Observatory the finest photographs ever made of the transit of Venus, Dec. 6, 1882. As there will not be another transit of Venus till Jan. 8, 2004, so that no living astronomer will ever behold another, this transit was of special importance. The transit of Mercury was also observed in 1881 by Professor Holden and others.

The equipment at the Lick Observatory is admirable, and the sight excellent; but the income from the $90,000 endowment is too small to allow the desired work. There are but seven observers at Mount Hamilton, while at Greenwich, at Paris, and other observatories, there are from forty to fifty men. The total income for salaries and all other expenses is $22,000 at the Lick Observatory; at Paris, Greenwich, Harvard College, the United States Naval Observatory at Washington, etc., from $60,000 to $100,000 is spent yearly, and is all useful. Fellowships producing $600 a year are greatly needed, to be named after the givers, and the money to provide a larger force of astronomers. Mr. Lick's great gift has been nobly begun, but funds are necessary to carry on the work.

LELAND STANFORD

AND HIS UNIVERSITY.

"The biographer of Leland Stanford will have to tell the fascinating story of a career almost matchless in the splendor of its incidents. It was partly due to the circumstances of his time, but chiefly due to the largeness and boldness of his nature, that this plain, simple man succeeded in cutting so broad a swath. He lived at the top of his possibilities." Thus wrote Dr. Albert Shaw in the _Review of Reviews_, August, 1893.

Leland Stanford, farmer-boy, lawyer, railroad builder, governor, United States Senator, and munificent giver, was born at Watervliet, N.Y., eight miles from Albany, March 9, 1824. He was the fourth son in a family of seven sons and one daughter, the latter dying in infancy.

His father, Josiah Stanford, was a native of Massachusetts, but moved with his parents to the State of New York when he was a boy. He became a successful farmer, calling his farm by the attractive name of Elm Grove. He had the energy and industry which it seems Leland inherited. He built roads and bridges in the neighborhood, and was an earnest advocate of DeWitt Clinton's scheme of the Erie Canal, connecting the great lakes with New York City by way of the Hudson River.

"Gouverneur Morris had first suggested the Erie Canal in 1777," says T. W. Higginson, "and Washington had indeed proposed a system of such waterways in 1774. But the first actual work of this kind in the United States was that dug around Turner's Falls in Massachusetts soon after 1792. In 1803 DeWitt Clinton again proposed the Erie Canal. It was begun in 1817, and opened July 4, 1825, being cut mainly through a wilderness. The effect produced on public opinion was absolutely startling. When men found that the time from Albany to Buffalo was reduced one-half, and that the freight on a ton of merchandise was cut down from $100 to $10, and ultimately to $3, similar enterprises sprang into being everywhere."

[Illustration: LELAND STANFORD.]

People were not excited over canals only; everybody was interested about the coming railroads. George Stephenson, in the midst of the greatest opposition, landowners even driving the surveyors off their grounds, had built a road from Liverpool to Manchester, England, which was opened Sept. 15, 1830. The previous month, August, the Mohawk and Hudson River Railroad from Albany to Schenectady, sixteen miles, was commenced, a charter having been granted sometime before this. Josiah Stanford was greatly interested in this enterprise, and took large contracts for grading. Men at the Stanford home talked of the great future of railroads in America, and even prophesied a road to Oregon. "Young as he was when the question of a railroad to Oregon was first agitated," says a writer, "Leland Stanford took a lively interest in the measure. Among its chief advocates at that early day was Mr. Whitney, one of the engineers in the construction of the Mohawk and Hudson River Railway. On one occasion, when Whitney passed the night at Elm Grove, Leland being then thirteen years of age, the conversation ran largely on this overland railway project; and the effect upon the mind of such a boy may be readily imagined. The remembrance of that night's discussion between Whitney and his father never left him, but bore the grandest fruits."

The cheerful, big-hearted boy worked on his father's farm with his brothers, rising at five o'clock, even on cold winter mornings, that he might get his work done before school hours. He himself tells how he earned his first dollar. "I was about six years old," he said. "Two of my brothers and I gathered a lot of horseradish from the garden, washed it clean, took it to Schenectady, and sold it. I got two of the six shillings received. I was very proud of my money. My next financial venture was two years later. Our hired man came from Albany, and told us chestnuts were high. The boys had a lot of them on hand which we had gathered in the fall. We hurried off to market with them, and sold them for twenty-five dollars. That was a good deal of money when grown men were getting only two shillings a day."

Perhaps the boy felt that he should not always like to work on the farm, for he had made up his mind to get an education if possible. When he was eighteen his father bought a piece of woodland, and told him if he would cut off the timber he might have the money received for it. He immediately hired several persons to help him, and together they cut and piled 2,600 cords of wood, which Leland sold to the Mohawk and Hudson River Railroad at a profit of $2,600.

After using some of this money to pay for his schooling at an academy at Clinton, N.Y., he went to Albany, and for three years studied law with the firm of Wheaton, Doolittle, & Hadley. He disliked Greek and Latin, but was fond of science, particularly geology and chemistry, and was a great reader, especially of the newspapers. He attended all the lectures attainable, and was fond of discussion upon all progressive topics. Later in life he studied sociological matters, and read John Stuart Mill and Herbert Spencer.

Young Stanford determined to try his fortune in the West. He went as far as Chicago, and found it low, marshy, and unattractive. This was in 1848, when he was twenty-four years old. The town had been organized but fifteen years, and did not have much to boast of. There were only twenty-eight voters in Chicago in 1833. In 1837 the entire population was 4,470. Chicago had grown rapidly by 1848; but mosquitoes were abundant, and towns farther up Lake Michigan gave better promise for the future. Mr. Stanford finally settled at Port Washington, Wis., above Milwaukee, which place it was thought would prove a rival of Chicago. Forty years later, in 1890, Port Washington had a population of 1,659, while Chicago had increased to 1,099,850.

Mr. Stanford did well the first year at Port Washington, earning $1,260. He remained another year, and then, at twenty-six, went back to Albany to marry Miss Jane Lathrop, daughter of Mr. Dyer Lathrop, a respected merchant. They returned to Port Washington, but Mr. Stanford did not find the work of a country lawyer congenial. He had chosen his profession, however, and would have gone on to a measure of success in it, probably, had not an accident opened up a new field.

He had been back from his wedding journey but a year or more, when a fire swept away all his possessions, including a quite valuable law library. The young couple were really bankrupt, but they determined not to return to Albany for a home.

Several of Mr. Stanford's brothers had gone to California in 1849, after the gold-fields were discovered, and had opened stores near the mining-camps. If Leland were to join them, it would give him at least more variety than the quiet life at Port Washington. The young wife went back to Albany to care for three years for her invalid father, who died in April, 1855. The husband sailed from New York, spending twelve days in crossing the isthmus, and in thirty-eight days reached San Francisco, July 12, 1852. For four years he had charge of a branch store at Michigan Bluffs, Placer County, among the miners.

He engaged also in mining, and was not afraid of the labor and privations of the camp. He said some years later, "The true history of the Argonauts of the nineteenth century has to be written. They had no Jason to lead them, no oracles to prophesy success nor enchantments to avert dangers; but, like self-reliant Americans, they pressed forward to the land of promise, and travelled thousands of miles, when the Greek heroes travelled hundreds. They went by ship and by wagon, on horseback and on foot; a mighty army, passing over mountains and deserts, enduring privations and sickness; they were the creators of a commonwealth, the builders of states."

Mr. Stanford had the energy of his father; he had learned how to work while on the farm, and he had a pleasant and kindly manner to all. Said a friend of his, after Mr. Stanford had become the governor of a great State, and the possessor of many millions, "The man who held the throttle of the locomotive, he who handled the train, worked the brake, laid the rail, or shovelled the sand, was his comrade, friend, and equal. His life was one of tender, thoughtful compassion for the man less fortunate in life than himself."

The young lawyer was making money, and a good reputation as well, in the mining-camps. Says an old associate, "Mr. Stanford in an unusual degree commanded the respect of the heterogeneous lot of men who composed the mining classes, and was frequently referred to by them as a sort of arbitrator in settling their disputes for them. While at Michigan Bluffs he was elected a justice of the peace, which office was the court before which all disputes and contentions of the miners and their claims were settled. It is a singular fact, with all the questions that came before him for settlement, not one of them was appealed to a higher court.

"Leland Stanford was at this time just as gentle in his manner and as cordial and respectful to all as in his later years. Yet he was possessed of a courage which, when tested, as occasion sometimes required, satisfied the rough element that he was not a man who could be imposed upon. His principle seemed to be to stand up for the right at all times. He never indulged in profanity or coarse words of any kind, and was as considerate in his conduct when holding intercourse with the rough element as though in the midst of the highest refinement."

Mr. Stanford had prospered so well that in 1855 he purchased the business of his brothers in Sacramento, and went East to bring his wife to the Pacific Coast. He studied his business carefully. He made himself conversant with the statistics of trade, the tariff laws, the best markets and means of transportation. He read and thought, while some others idled away their hours. He was deeply interested in the new Republican party, which was then in the minority in California. He believed in it, and worked earnestly for it. When the party was organized in the State in 1856, he was one of the founders of it. He became a candidate for State treasurer, and was defeated. Three years later he was nominated for governor; "but the party was too small to have any chance, and the contest lay between opposing Democratic factions." Mr. Stanford was to learn how to win success against fires and political defeats.

A year later he was a delegate at large to the Republican National Convention; and instead of supporting Mr. Seward, who was from his own State of New York, he worked earnestly for Abraham Lincoln, with whom he formed a lasting friendship. After Mr. Lincoln was inaugurated, Mr. Stanford remained in Washington several weeks, at the request of the president and Secretary Seward, to confer with them about the surest means of keeping California loyal to the Union.

Mr. Blaine says of California and Oregon at this time: "Jefferson Davis had expected, with a confidence amounting to certainty, and based, it is believed, on personal pledges, that the Pacific Coast, if it did not actually join the South, would be disloyal to the Union, and would, from its remoteness and its superlative importance, require a large contingent of the national forces to hold it in subjection.

"It was expected by the South that California and Oregon would give at least as much trouble as Kentucky and Missouri, and would thus indirectly, but powerfully, aid the Southern cause."

In the spring of 1861 Mr. Stanford was again nominated by the Republicans for governor. Though he declined at first, after he had consented, with his usual vigor, earnestness, and perseverance, with faith in himself and his fellow-men as well, he and his friends made a thorough and spirited canvass; and Mr. Stanford received 56,036 votes, about six times as many as were given him two years before.

"The period," says the San Francisco _Chronicle_, "was one of unexampled difficulty of administration; and to add to the embarrassments occasioned by the Civil War, the city of Sacramento and a vast area of the valley were inundated. On the day appointed for the inauguration the streets of Sacramento were swept by a flood, and Mr. Stanford and his friends were compelled to go and return to the Capitol in boats. The messages of Governor Stanford, and indeed all his state papers, indicated wide information, great common-sense, and a comprehensive grasp of State and national affairs, remarkable in one who had never before held office under either the State or national government. During his administration he kept up constant and cordial intercourse with Washington, and had the satisfaction of leaving the chair of state at the close of his term of office feeling that no State in the Union was more thoroughly loyal."

There was much disloyalty in California at first, but Mr. Stanford was firm as well as conciliatory. The militia was organized, a State normal school was established, and the indebtedness of the State reduced one-half under his leadership as governor.

After the war was over, Governor Stanford cherished no animosities. When Mr. Lamar's name was sent to the Senate as associate justice of the Supreme Court, and many were opposed, Mr. Stanford said, "No man sympathized more sincerely than myself with the cause of the Union, or deprecated more the cause of the South. I would have given fortune and life to have defeated that cause. But the war has terminated, and what this country needs now is absolute and profound peace. Lamar was a representative Southern man, and adhered to the convictions of his boyhood and manhood. There never can be pacification in this country until these war memories are obliterated by the action of the Executive and of Congress."

Mr. Stanford declined a re-election to the governorship, because he wished to give his time to the building of a railroad across the continent. He had never forgotten the conversation in his father's home about a railroad to Oregon. When he went back to Albany for Mrs. Stanford, after being a storekeeper among the mines, and she was ill from the tiresome journey, he cheered her with the promise, "Never mind; a time will come when I will build a railroad for you to go home on."

Every one knew that a railroad was needed. Vessels had to go around Cape Horn, and troops and produce had to be transported over the mountains and across the plains at great expense and much hardship. Some persons believed the building of a road over the snow-capped Sierra Nevada Mountains was possible; but most laughed the project to scorn, and denounced it as "a wild scheme of visionary cranks."

"The huge snow-clad chain of the Sierra Nevadas," says Mr. Perkins, the senator from California who succeeded Mr. Stanford, "whose towering steeps nowhere permitted a thoroughfare at an elevation less than seven thousand feet above the sea, must be crossed; great deserts, waterless, and roamed by savage tribes, must be made accessible; vast sums of money must be raised, and national aid secured at a time in which the credit of the central government had fallen so low that its bonds of guaranty to the undertaking sold for barely one-third their face value."

In the presence of such obstacles no one seemed ready to undertake the work of building the railroad. One of the persistent advocates of the plan was Theodore J. Judah, the engineer of the Sacramento Valley and other local railroads. He had convinced Mr. Stanford that the thing was possible. The latter first talked with C. P. Huntington, a hardware merchant of Sacramento; then with Mark Hopkins, Mr. Huntington's partner, and later with Charles Crocker and others. A fund was raised to enable Mr. Judah and his associates to perfect their surveys; and the Central Pacific Railroad Company was formed, June 28, 1861, with Mr. Stanford as president.

In Mr. Stanford's inaugural address as governor he had dwelt upon the necessity of this railroad to unite the East and the West; and now that he had retired from the gubernatorial office, he determined to push the enterprise with all his power. Neither he nor his associates had any great wealth at their command, but they had faith and force of character. The aid of Congress was sought and obtained by a strictly party vote, Republicans being in the majority; and the bill was signed by President Lincoln, July 1, 1862.

The government agreed to give the company the alternate sections of 640 acres in a belt of land ten miles wide on each side of the railroad, and $16,000 per mile in bonds for the easily constructed portion of the road, and $32,000 and $48,000 per mile for the mountainous portions. The company was to build forty miles before it received government aid.

It was so difficult to raise money during the Civil War that Congress made a more liberal grant July 2, 1864, whereby the company received alternate sections of land within a belt twenty miles on each side of the road, or the large amount of 12,800 acres per mile, making for the company nearly 9,000,000 acres of land. The government was to retain, to apply on its debt, only half the money it owed the company for transportation instead of the whole. The most important provision of the new Act was the authority of the company to issue its own first-mortgage bonds to an amount not exceeding those of the United States, and making the latter take a second mortgage.

There is no question but the United States has given lavishly to railroads, as the cities have given their streets free to street railroads; but during the Civil War the need of communication between East and West seemed to make it wise to build the road at almost any sacrifice. Mr. Blaine says, "Many capitalists who afterwards indulged in denunciations of Congress for the extravagance of the grants, were urged at the time to take a share in the scheme, but declined because of the great risk involved."