Appendix II. 183 



It would replace the labour attracted to the railway and supplement 

 the present indenture. The 4,000 families brought in during the tilth 

 year would have indentures running to end of seventh year. The sugar 

 and other plantations and industrial interests on the sea coastlands would 

 be substantially protected from loss during the years of construction, 

 extension and the excitement of any gold discoveries. The coastlands 

 would be developed by the settlement of the imported labour when free. 



£150,000 should be set aside to provide suitable lands for settlement 

 at the end of the period of indenture. Of this £50,000 might be spent 

 on any urgent sea defences necessary for the purpose of empoldering the 

 lands required for development. This empoldering scheme would benefit 

 the coast population in general. 



It should be noted that under this scheme there would be 40,000 

 adults, mostly married couples, not reckoning children in the fifth year 

 and that each person would be paying directly or indirectly nine or ten 

 dollars to the public revenue or S360,000 per annum or more than double 

 the amount of the annual interest and Sinking Fund on this head. 

 Present colony revenue is about S9 per head, paid chiefly in indirect 

 taxation. With prosperity, consumption of taxable commodities would 

 increase, also taxable capacity. 



At the beginning of the fourth year we should have 16,000 families 

 (4,000 time-served; paying nearly $300,000 to the revenue or more than 

 enough to pay the interest, deferred interest and Sinking Fund on this 

 Development Loan. 



PRIVATE RAILWAY SCHEME. 



There is another question to consider and that is the possible refusal 

 of the Secretary of State to consider a Government Railway on the 

 ground that we cannot afford the expense and the risk. 



In that case we should ask the Secretary of State to help ua to 

 secure the construction of a leased Government railway* or of a private 

 railway by a reliable firm of contractors on the most advantageous terms 

 possible to the Colony based upon land grants and a limited number of 

 years' subsidy. The terms asked by Colonel Link's supportors were 10 

 years at 3£ per cent. These terms are hopeless to expect now. In Brazil 

 the railways are built on a 25 years' subsidy of 5 per cent. But we 

 could do better than that on a British Imperial guarantee. I think 15 

 to 20 years at 4 per cent, would secure what we require. On Mr. Bland's 

 figures of 1 J millions, interest (spread by amortization over fifty 3 T ears) 

 would amount to roughly £40,000 a year, but I have not worked out 

 this last figure by tables. 



* Note. — The construction of a railway by the Government and its subsequent transfer 

 to a private Company for working: purposes in an expedient that has been successfully tried 

 in other places. The proposal of the Editor as Chairman of the Demerara Railway Committee 

 published in another appendix is based on the same principle. 



