Previous to describing the Mont Cenis Railway, we will ask the reader to place himself mentally with us in the train belonging to one or other of the two railway companies which, leaving the great British metropolis at four different points, Charing Cross or Cannon Street (South Eastern), Victoria or Ludgate Hill (London, Chatham and Dover), arrives by either route at a point common to both—the Admiralty Pier, Dover, in two hours and five minutes from the time of its departure. The South Eastern Company carries the land mails, both ordinary and extraordinary, as well as the bulk of the passengers; on the other hand, its rival carrying fewer passengers, and the distance being ten miles less, almost invariably arrives first at the Admiralty Pier, and thus enables those whom _she_ (ships, trains, and locomotives are of the feminine gender) conveys, to secure some of the sofas, reclined upon which, the ceremony of seasickness can (as we know well, by great and varied experience) be performed with far greater ease, grace, precision, and satisfaction, than by him or her who is destined to perform it sitting or standing. At the time that the traveller touches _terra firma_ at Calais, he has completed 110 miles of journeying, if he have travelled by the South Eastern Line, ten miles less, if he have committed himself to the London, Chatham and Dover. The original railway distance from Calais to Paris was 236 English miles, but thanks to two shortenings, the first between Creil and Paris, the second between Hazebrouch and Arras, by which latter the detour to the neighbourhood of Lille was avoided, the length was diminished to 203 miles; and now, since the opening of the line between Calais and Boulogne, in April of the present year, the mail trains take this route to and from Paris, by which a further saving of seventeen miles is obtained, making the present distance between Calais and Paris 186 miles. Our mental traveller having arrived at Paris, will need a pause, and whilst he is supposed to be refreshing himself, with a good dinner, at one of the innumerable restaurants to be met with at every corner, we will ask permission to occupy the time by giving, in the first instance, an epitome of the story of four great giants of modern times—the four longest and most important railways that science, practical skill, and money have as yet created on the European side of the Atlantic; and then we propose to show, by a general reference, how wonderfully and rapidly the railway system has already extended, and still continues to extend, in various parts of the globe. Eventually, most railways will have to yield the palm—at all events, as regards wonderful accomplishment—to the Great Pacific Railway, to which, therefore, we beg leave to accord precedence in our descriptions. [Illustration: MAP OF THE UNITED STATES SHEWING THE CENTRAL PACIFIC RAILROAD. 1867] CHAPTER II.