NYASALAND AND LOWER ZAMBESI 135 



in reloading and transhipment in barges, house- 

 boats, small and large stern-wheelers, puts a 

 heavy tax on the industry of the country. 

 Nyasaland nowhere touches the coast, but until 

 there is direct railway communication between 

 the south end of Lake Nyasa and Villa Bocage, 

 or, better still, with the Indian Ocean, the 

 Protectorate cannot be expected to give evidence 

 of her real wealth. Chinde, too, is an unsatis- 

 factory port — it is rapidly being swallowed up 

 by the sea — and Quilimane, or some other place 

 on the coast, will probably have to, some day 

 in the near future, take upon itself the responsi- 

 bilities of the commerce of much of South Central 

 and East Africa. By the Anglo-Portuguese Con- 

 vention of 1891 the Zambesi was proclaimed a 

 neutral waterway, but Port Herald is the most 

 southerly station of the Protectorate, and, as 

 things are constituted in Africa at present, 

 extension of the Shire Highlands railway to the 

 coast will have to be performed in the territory 

 of a foreigner. Recently construction of a line 

 from Beira to tap the Protectorate has been 

 agreed on, so that improved transport conditions 

 may be looked for in the near future. 



The Shire Highlands Railway is 114 miles long 

 and has cost over a million sterling, or close on 

 £10,000 per mile, a price approximating closely 

 to that of the Uganda Railway, which is between 

 500 and 600 miles in length and took six mil- 

 lions sterling out of the pockets of British tax- 

 payers. But the Shire Highlands Railway was 

 an even more difficult line to build than that 

 which runs from Mombasa to Victoria Nyanza. 

 All materials had to be conveyed up the rivers 

 from the coast, and Port Herald is 210 miles 

 from fast-disappearing Chinde. This line was 



