of the main line in 25-mile sections of road. In the second place, there was serious trouble owing to the lingering illness of President Garfield and the refusal of his successor, President Arthur, to appoint commissioners to inspect completed sections because bills forfeiting the company's land grant were pending in Congress. Although Mr. Villard induced one Republican leader after another to appeal to the Executive on behalf of the company for the appointment of commissioners, President Arthur remained immovable until September, when he yielded to the arguments of Roscoe Conkling. For more than a year, the company had been obliged to meet requirements for construction and equipment at the average rate of over $2,000,000 a month without reimbursement from the proceeds of the bonds. It was a period of most harassing anxiety for Mr. Villard. More than once the situation seemed desperate, and he prevented a breakdown only by the unhesitating use of his personal credit and by assistance from the Oregon & Transcontinental Company, the availability of which fully demonstrated the practical value of its creation. Notwithstanding these financial hindrances, the progress of construction was not delayed an hour.
During the whole of 1882, and up to midsummer of 1883, Mr. Villard devoted himself unceasingly to the double duty of meeting the money requirements for construction and equipment and of accelerating the grading, bridging, tunnelling, and track-laying by the several companies under his presidency. He sought to inspire the engineers in charge and the contractors with determination to do their utmost to complete the main line of the Northern Pacific and the river road of the Oregon Railway & Navigation by the end of the summer of 1883. Construction was also proceeding on the Oregon & California. Moreover, Mr. Villard, through the Oregon & Transcontinental, in accordance with its programme, had taken in hand in 1883 the building of nearly five hundred miles of Northern Pacific branches in Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, and west-
