The combination was based on the theory that the three transportation interests could, by working together, by increasing their earning capacity by new outlays of capital for improvements and extensions, and gradually coming under the single ownership of Mr. Villard's employers, be so developed as to make good the greater part of their losses. The ways which he proposed to follow in order to reach this result were to attract immigration to Oregon, to extend the Oregon & California to a connection with the Central Pacific system, to add to the mileage of the Oregon Central sufficiently to make it a paying investment, and to equip the steamer line with larger, faster, and more economical vessels.
His faith in the future of western Oregon was so great—greater, as it turned out, than its resources warranted—that he fully believed in the possibility of the satisfactory solution of the difficult problem he had set for himself. In pushing his scheme, he found a general disposition, both in England and in Germany, to condition its acceptance upon his consent to make himself responsible for its execution by assuming the management of the companies. There was no escape for him from this, and he expected to have to remove to Portland with his family and to reside there for a number of years; but it happened otherwise. He was back in New York by November, 1875, and immediately began to carry out the new programme. Having already opened an Eastern immigration bureau for the Oregon & California in the preceding spring, and from it carried on a vigorous agitation for immigration to Oregon by advertisements in the press and the wide circulation of pamphlets descriptive of the State, written by himself, he began to look about for the purchase of a new steamer, and, early in the spring, bought the George W. Elder from the Old Dominion Steamship Company, and started her for San Francisco. Holladay had come East again to close the deal with him, but various informalities caused delays, so that Mr. Villard could not leave for the Pacific coast
