Transcriber's Notes The fractions one half and three quarters were shown respectively as 1-2 and 3-4 which was retained herein. +=========================+ | | | FACTS AND FIGURES | | | | | | | | CONCERNING | | | | | | | | THE HOOSAC TUNNEL. | | | | | | ----------- | | By JOHN J. PIPER. | | ----------- | | | | | | FITCHBURG: | | | | JOHN J. PIPER, PRINTER. | | | | 1866. | | | +=========================+ FACTS AND FIGURES CONCERNING THE HOOSAC TUNNEL. By JOHN J. PIPER. FITCHBURG: JOHN J. PIPER, PRINTER. 1866. THE HOOSAC TUNNEL. In his inaugural address to the Legislature, Governor Bullock says, "There can be no doubt that _new facilities_ and new avenues for transportation between the West and the East are now absolutely needed. Our lines of prosperity and growth are the parallels of latitude which connect us with the young, rich empire of men, and stock, and produce lying around the lakes and still beyond. The people of Massachusetts, compact, manufacturing and commercial, must have more thoroughfares through which the currents of trade and life may pass to and fro, unobstructed and ceaseless, between the Atlantic and the national granaries, or decay will at no distant period touch alike her wharves and her workshops. Let us avert the day in which our Commonwealth shall become chiefly a school-house for the West, and a homestead over which time shall have drawn silently and too soon the marks of dilapidation. Any policy which is not broad enough to secure to us a New England, having a proper share in the benefits of this new opening era of the West, be assured, will not receive the approval of the next generation." This important recommendation is what the public had reason to expect from a man so keenly alive to the interests and welfare of the Commonwealth as Governor Bullock, whose close observation and discernment had long since discovered the danger, and disposed him to take a deep interest in any adequate enterprise by means of which it could be averted. The reasons which have induced His Excellency's convictions on this subject, and caused the apprehensions he has expressed, are very clearly set forth in the following articles from the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser of November 25th and 28th, 1865:--