34 Timehri. 
survey and none were ever anticipated. There is no special necessity fora rail-— 
way in this locality as Sprostons’ steam launches afford an excellent service 
from Rockstone to the Potaro at ordinary times. 
An officer of the Lands and Mines Department is accompanying the 
party withthe object of reporting upon the character of the country 
on both sides of the traverse. Possibly his trained eye may discover 
some timber lands which have escaped the researches of Messrs. Spros- 
ton, who own the Demerara-Essequibo railway and the adjoining 
timber grants, or may find balata reefs or gold deposits missed by the 
hordes of balata-bleeders and gold-diggers who have again and again passed 
that district through their sieve during the last fifty years. Whither the sur- 
vey will be directed after reaching the Potaro is a matter as to which the legis- 
lative mind is in some doubt. Many think that the Kaieteur Fall was the 
original objective, with the remote intention of constructing a tourist railway, 
possibly crossing the sheer escarpment of 1,000 feet by a funicular or finding a 
gradient for a cog-wheel like that at Kikuyu on the Uganda line. Others say 
it aims at the gold-dredging operations on the Conawarook, a favourite plan 
of Messrs. Braddon and E. R. Dayson, who for some time jointly advocated a 
development railway proposal, from which Mr. Davson subsequently 
withdrew, but which found some support from the late Governor, whose 
imagination recoiled from any trunk scheme. The fact is that, while 
there is a minimum of knowledge as to the whole project, there is a 
maximum of lack of popular and other interest in what is regarded as a mere 
firtavion with a serious subject and one vitalto the colony. We have no doubt 
that the officers engaged will turn out a conscientious and useful piece of work 
commensurate in value with the expenditure, which will give us reliable 
official confirmation of what is generally known, including the fact that a 
railway to Potaro Mouth would open up an easy, well-timbered, but not very 
fertile country of small mineral resources, while a railway from Potaro to 
Kaieteur Fall would cost an enormous sum, possibly £12,000 a mile, and as 
a tourist railway would realise the prophecy which the Canadian Pacifie belied 
as a trunk route and industrial line, viz., of uot earning enough to pay for 
its axle-grease. 
Tourist and mineral possibilities must be dismissed at an early stage as far 
as any serious influence on the policy of railway construction in this colony is 
concerned. They may be a useful walking-stick, if they are ever realised, 
and I see no reason to suppose that they will not contribute materially to 
the profits, but they will make a poor crutch. The gold and diamond prospects 
mentioned so hopefully in the papers und discussions of 1902 have vanished 
into die Ewigkeit. The really important mines at Omai, Peters’, and 
Barima are no longer factors in the problem of the colony. Enthusi- 
asts with zeal not according to knowledge will still talk of building a railway 
to the Conawarook, the Massaruni or some other river to open up gold or 
diamon’ country, but it must be remembered that that way madness lies, 
Many deposits have been worked out and. while we have no doubt that 
new deposits will be found as the country opens up, the deflection of the 
route of any railway because of any fresh reports should require most careful 
