Society, Manners, and Politics in the United States
First Centre. Boston.
19th Century Michel Chevalier EnglishThree railroads extend from Boston in different directions; the first, 26 miles in length, to the manufacturing city of Lowell, which is thus become a suburb of Boston, and the second, 44 miles in length, to Worcester, the centre of an important agricultural district. The former cost 60,000 dollars a miles, the latter 32,000. The third road is the Providence railroad, already mentioned above as one of the links in the great chain from north to south. The Lowell railroad enters into competition with the Middlesex canal; the Worcester road is to be continued to the River Hudson, where it will terminate opposite Albany. It will also be connected with the city of Hudson, 30 miles below Albany, by a railroad extending from West Stockbridge. It will thus become to Boston a Western Railroad, which name it has in fact received. A company has been authorised to execute the portion between Worcester and Springfield, a distance of 54 miles, the whole distance from Boston to Albany being 160 miles. The Eastern railroad, a fourth work is about to be undertaken, passing through Lynn, famous for its boots and shoes, Salem, a little city which carries on an extensive trade with China, Ipswich, Beverly, and Newburyport towards Portland, the principal town in the northern extremity of the Union.