MOVING A MOUNTAIN.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3131, 21 August 1922, Page 7

MOVING A MOUNTAIN.

Moving a. mountain is to be a literal feat undertaken by Brazil. On the water front of Rio de .Janeiro, capital of that country, stands the .Mono de Castello. a. hill which interferes with the ventilation of the inland city by blocking the ocean breezes. It contains 7.000,000 cubic meters of soil and rock, but the municipality has decided to raze and remove it seaward. An American firm will do the work. There i.s no record of any municipal improvement f its kind that ever has been attempted ora such a scale. The people of Rio de Janeiro and of Brazil are intensely proud of this piece of admirable enterprise, as they have a right to be. ft will cost them about £1.000,000 to do the job. It will be the. most notable engineering feat of its kind on record. At the same time it will constitute one of the most radical measures of building the city beautiful that ever has been tried. In a, real sense the removal of Morro dc Castello is an act of faith— faith in the future of the republic, faith in the growth of the city of Rio de Janeiro, faith in the stability of the institutions that have made 1 ' Brazil prosperous and its people happy. True, Morro do Castello is a historic spot of Brazil. On it the first Portuguese Governor built his residence and his fortifications. Behind these fortifications the Portuguese pioneers—the Pilgrim Fathers of Brazil -fought manfully to repel French buccaneers ami repulsed them. Brazil honors its heroes, some of whom sleep in the soil of Morro de Castello. It venerates its past. But it regards its future more. Hence the ancient settlement must go, because Brazil does not intend to have its life hampered and its progress thwarted by the past.