A COLOSSAL PROJECT.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1312, 15 December 1911, Page 4

A COLOSSAL PROJECT.

'Longest railway in the world. . ; There has originated'in France a great scheme, which will rival those other colossal. undertakings, the Suez and Panama Canals, This. scheme, which is put forward by H. Andre Berthelot, proposes the construction.-of a grqat' French railway right across the centre of Africa from Algeria, nnt.il it jeins'-'up with the Capc-to-Cairo line in the Belgian Congo. M Berthelot points ont that Africa, like ■Asia and Amcriea, can only bo properly exploited by means of railways. Along the whole const, what ports there are seem to bo often either inadequate or dangerous to health. And then the rivers,' how little adapted they ar6 to commerce compared with' tlio Mississippi, the Yangthe Ganges!. It is only by transporting steamers piecemeal up the railway that they can be of any use in navigating the inner waterways. The lie of tho land, too, is all in favour of a railway from the north to the south, for tho mountains are either in the extreme north-east—tho Atlas Mountains— or in tho oast, whero Renvcnzoi towers up above the groat rift in tho continent. A lino running from Algeria across tho Sahara, down through tho French Congo, and on through tho Congo to the railhead of tho Capo to Cairo line at Katanga, would not have tri olimb any hill or plateau more than 2300 feet high. Hien there is tho practical and financial side to tho project. Deducting the portions already constructed, the Algerian and Cape-to-Cairo and somo bits in the Congo, thcro remains somo 3700 miles to cover. Tho Siberian railtsay is that length, and it was carried across marsh and lake, through trackless foTost, and over frozen steppe in nine yeaTs, at tho rate of seven miles a day. The writer usserts that the carriage of from forty to fifty passeneers per diem over tho system would cover all expenses. Practicable or not. it is a fascinating project. It would lie tho longest railway in the world. The Bedouins of tho desert the pigmies of the tropical forest, the "gentle Masai," and the bollicrerent Kikuyu might soon taste the delights nf travel. The groat unknown land would become the known.