In fact, Tampa Town was enormously benefited by this enterprise of the Gun Club, not by the number of workmen who were immediately drafted to Stony Hill, but by the influx of curious idlers who converged by degrees from all points of the globe towards the Floridian peninsula.
During the first few days they were occupied in unloading the flotilla of the tools, machines, provisions, and a large number of plate iron houses made in pieces separately pieced and numbered.

At the same time Barbicane laid the first sleepers of a railway fifteen miles long that was destined to unite Stony Hill and Tampa Town.
It is known how American railways are constructed, with capricious bends, bold slopes, steep hills, and deep valleys.

They do not cost much and are not much in their way, only their trains run off or jump off as they please.

The railway from Tampa Town to Stony Hill was but a trifle, and wanted neither much time nor much money for its construction.
Barbicane was the soul of this army of workmen who had come at his call.
He animated them, communicated to them his ardour, enthusiasm, and conviction.

He was everywhere at once, as if endowed with the gift of ubiquity, and always followed by J.T.Maston, his bluebottle fly.