Not far to the east a small stream runs parallel to the main river, and the larger part of Harrisburg is on higher ground between the two. On the highest part of this ridge is the state capitol, a great building but recently finished. Harrisburg is at the right point for the state government. It is not in the center of the state, to be sure, but it is at the rear of the lowlands which reach in from the sea, and is just outside the great gateway where roads from all the northern, western, and central uplands come out on the plain. It is a convenient center for coal and iron, and hence one sees along the river below the city many blast furnaces, rolling mills, and factories. To the northeast rich, open lands stretch along the base of Blue mountain, and railroads join Harrisburg to Reading, Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton. To the southwest bridges cross the Susquehanna, and roads run to Carlisle, Hagerstown, and other cities of the Great Valley (Chapter XI). Thus the Pennsylvania Railroad, running northwest from Philadelphia, crosses at Harrisburg other roads that run to the southwest. As hamlets often gather about “four corners” in the country, so cities grow up where the great roads of the world cross each other. [Illustration: FIG. 30. PENNSYLVANIA RAILROAD SHOPS, ALTOONA] Leaving Harrisburg behind, we pass the splendid new bridge of the Pennsylvania Railroad, across the Susquehanna (Fig. 29), and go through the gap in Blue mountain. Soon we turn away from the main river and enter the winding valley of the Juniata. The grades are easy, the roadbed is smooth, and by deep cuts through the rocks the curves have been made less abrupt. It is only when one looks out of the car window that the land is found to be rugged and mountainous. All the greater valleys and ridges of the mountain belt of Pennsylvania run northeast and southwest. The last of these to be crossed on our journey is Bald Eagle valley, from which the Allegheny Front rises to the northwest. In this valley, near the place where the Portage Railway began to scale the heights, and a little more than a hundred miles from Pittsburg, the Pennsylvania Railroad Company in 1850 founded a town and called it Altoona. Here they started shops, which have now grown to notable importance. The town became a city eighteen years after it was begun, and has to-day about forty thousand inhabitants. In the railway shops alone may be found nine thousand men repairing and building locomotives, passenger coaches, and freight cars. The Pennsylvania Railroad Company is now founding a great school in Altoona, where young men may be taught to become skillful and efficient in railway service. [Illustration: FIG. 31. HORSESHOE CURVE, PENNSYLVANIA RAILROAD] Altoona looks new, and with its endless freight yards, its noisy shops, and its sooty cover of smoke from burning soft coal, it is very different from quiet Lancaster, which was old when forests covered the site of Altoona.