DIRECTORS' TWENTY-THIRD ANNUAL REPORT. To the Stockholders of The Chicago & Alton Railroad Company: The Board of Directors submit the following Report for the year ending December 31, A. D. 1885: First Mortgage Chicago & Alton 7 per cent. Bonds, due January 1, 1893... St. Louis, Jacksonville & Chicago Railroad First Mortgage 7 per cent. Bonds, maturing April 1, 1894, assumed by this Company. St. Louis, Jacksonville & Chicago Railroad Second St. Louis, Jacksonville & Chicago Railroad Second Chicago & Alton Sinking Fund 6 per cent. Gold Bonds, Total amount of Bonds... $2,383,000 00 V 2,929,000 00 188,000 00 47,000 00 439,100 00 v 2,573,000 00 $4,379,850 00 675,000 00 Joliet and Chicago Stock, on which perpetual dividends Kansas City, St. Louis & Chicago Railroad Stock, on Total.... 300,000 00 $13,613,950 00 1,750,000 00\ 271,700 00 3,821,700 00 $35,022,950 00 The Louisiana & Missouri River Railroad is operated by our Company under a lease, which, by its terms, is to continue one thousand years from the first day of August, A. D. 1870. The lease provides that each year all taxes and assessments shall be deducted from the gross earnings of the road, and 35 per cent. of the remainder shall be the amount of rent for that year. All other lines of railway operated by our Company, its bridges over the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, and other property pertaining to such lines, are owned by it subject to the several mortgages and fixed annual charges above stated. Seven hundred and thirty-one shares of the common stock of this Company have been issued during the last year, in exchange for an equal number of shares of the common stock of the St. Louis, Jacksonville & Chicago Railroad Company, pursuant to the agreement between that Company and the Chicago & Alton Railroad Company, dated April 14, 1884. All of the preferred shares of that Company, and all of its shares of common stock, except thirty-seven, have been exchanged at the date of this Report. Eighty-two Thousand Dollars of the 6 per cent. Sinking Fund Gold Bonds of our Company, and Nine Thousand Dollars of the Bonds of the Mississippi River Bridge Company, have been redeemed and canceled on account of Sinking Funds during the year. The Gross Earnings from Traffic in 1885, compared with those of 1884, were as follows: 27.613 67,966 01,985 01,716 00-886 1000 1000 1000 1000 691 Decrease in Gross Earnings in 1885, compared with those of the preceding year, $716,104.89, or 8222 per cent. The expenditures for operating and maintaining our railroad, com- The decrease in Net Earnings in 1885 compared with the Net Earn- |