By 1854 distinct progress had been made. At a meeting held on February 4th of that year, Messrs. Cooper, Brainard and Holcomb, of the Directorate, were authorized as a committee to enter into negotiations for the purchase of iron rails for the road, and to complete the purchase of 2500 tons of these, by sale of the bonds of the company, "or otherwise." The financial end of the transaction was apt always to be the most difficult part of it. Yet somehow these were almost always solved. The Watertown & Rome road guaranteed some of the bonds of the Potsdam & Watertown and Erastus Corning, of Albany, and John H. Wolfe, of New York, loaned it considerable sums of money. Construction proceeded, and on May 4, 1854, the Directors decided to send 650 tons of the new iron to the easterly terminus of the road; the remainder to the westerly building forces. In the fall of that year, a considerable amount of track having been laid down, the Directors looked toward the purchase of rolling stock. At their November meeting they decided to buy the engine _Montreal_, and its tender, from the Watertown & Rome, at a cost of $4,500; also two baggage and "post-office" cars, at $750 each. Which provided for the beginning of operation at the west end of the road. [Illustration: EARLY RAILROAD TICKETS Including an Annual Pass Issued by President Marcellus Massey, of the R. W. & O.] But the east end needed rolling-stock as well--a considerable gap still intervened between the rail-heads of each incomplete section. So toward the East, the Directors of the Potsdam & Watertown turned their attention. They found some rolling stock in the hands of a man in Plattsburgh; "Vilas, of Plattsburgh" is his sole designation in their minutes. This Vilas, it would appear, was a hard-headed Clinton County business man who seemed to have but little confidence in the financial soundness of the Potsdam & Watertown. Nothing of the gambler appears in Vilas. He did not believe in taking chances. He had a locomotive and two cars that he would sell--for cash. Eventually, he sold them--for cash. Some of the Directors of the P. & W. bought them, themselves, paying out their own hard-earned cash for them; and recouping themselves by accepting pay in installments from the company.