Page:Columbia - America's Great Highway.djvu/9



Who loves this country and brought me to it. Who showed me the German Rhine and Continental Europe. Whose kindness made it possible for me to have a part in planning and constructing this great highway.

There is a time and place for every man to act his part in life's drama and to build according to his ideas.

God shaped these great mountains round about us, and lifted up those mighty domes into a region of perpetual snow.

He fashioned the Gorge of the Columbia, fixed the course of the broad river, and caused the crystal streams both small and great to leap down from the crags and sing their never ending songs of joy.

Then He planted a garden, men came and built a beautiful city close by this wonderland. To some He gave great wealth — to every man his talent — and when the time had come for men to break down mountain barriers, construct a great highway of commerce and utilize the beautiful, which is "as useful as the useful", He set them to the task and gave to each his place.

I am thankful to God for His goodness in permitting me to have a part in building this broad thoroughfare as a frame to the beautiful picture which He created.

Samuel Christopher Lancaster

Highway Engineer

1915