1<><| Timehri. 



State wedged in between the Argentine and vast Brazil, has a population 

 of one million, 1.700 miles of railway and a capital, Monte Video, with 

 325,000 people. Paraguay, a purely inland State, also wedged between 

 Argentina and Brazil, has a population of 800,000. Bolivia, due north of 

 the Argentine and west of Brazil, another purely inland State, has a 

 population of 2] millions ; and Brazil itself, stretching over half the total 

 Continent, a population of 21 \ millions, 16,000 miles of railways, with 

 its capital, Rio de Janeiro, containing one million inhabitants — and many 

 other large rapidly growing towns dotted along its seaboard the popu- 

 lations of which would travel by a trans-continental railway. Now the 

 population of Argentina, Uruguay. Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil 

 combined is over 33.000,000. and is increasing at the rate of not less 

 than three-quarters of a million yearly. 



Of the Brazilian railways the Federal Government owns 7,000 miles 

 and is pursuing a policy of developing intercommunication between its 

 various States. 



The direct route from Georgetown via Manaos to Buenos Ayres, the 

 capital of the Argentine Republic, is practically due North and South. 

 You must realise what an enormous traffic such a railway line is certain 

 to develop if it is ever constructed. The total distance over 40 degrees 

 of latitude, from (i! degrees North to 34 degrees South, and allowing, 

 say 20 per cent, for deviations from the straight line, would be approxi- 

 mately 3,000 miles. At 30 miles an hour a little over four days, one- 

 third of the time it now takes to reach Jamaica from Georgetown ; at 

 only 20 miles an hour, 6 j days. The saving in actual distance from any 

 of the large cities of the South East Coast of our Continent to any part 

 of North or Central America, or to any place West of Georgetown on 

 the Northern coast of South America, would be nearly 1,000 miles, but 

 the saving in time would be much greater than proportional to the 

 shortening of the distance traversed. A substitution of 3,000 miles of 

 travel by land in place of. say, 3,900 miles in a steamship on a turbulent 

 ocean would attract people travelling for pleasure as well as those 

 travelling on business, to whom time is money. 



The Connecting Link. 



Taking the whole main line. 1 regret I have not the latest maps, but 

 railways already exist stretching from Buenos Ayres to Rio de Janeiro, 

 over a thousand miles, and as far as 1 can ascertain, from Rio, Nortl - 

 westward, in the direction of Manaos. for rather less than 1,000 miles. 

 From where the iron road now terminates to Manaos is approximately 

 only some 900 miles, and we know that Manaos to Georgetown is about 

 800 of which our section in British Guiana would be 340. The difference 

 in time and distance would, of course, be increasingly in favour of a rail- 

 way from or to places in the interior of Brazil or the other countries. 

 Unfortunately, at the present time the recent rapid and very great 

 depreciation in the value of the main product of the Amazon, Para 

 rubber— and you must remember that to the States of Brazil in the 



