June i, 1K95.J 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
*55 
such undertaking, even to the extent of recog- 
nising an Agent, but much more in guaranteeing a 
commission. We think the common sense of the 
large majority [ will see that the matter is not 
one for the Association at all ; and as to Mr. 
Martin's proposal, we have no doubt that the 
Tuticorin Firm are quite prepared to do as much 
under the same conditions. The simple plan 
would be for any number of proprietors or man- 
agers inclined to experiment through an Agency 
to meet independently of the Association and to 
agree to give Mr. Mai tin, or any one else con- 
sidered suitable, a trial ; making it known, say 
that between them, they arc prepared to take 
1,000 coolies and to pay commission on same. Let 
the terms be lixedanda trial made of the Agency ; 
but let care be taken both in District Associations 
and the parent body not to involve the represen- 
tative Institution in any responsibility for such 
an experiment. 
CHEAP TRANSPORT AND HOW TO 
GET IT. NO. II. 
BY J. DAVIS-ALLEN. 
WORKING EXPENSES. 
The time is not far off when the competition of 
other countries in her own products, and first in 
tea. will compel Ceylon to tackle the problem 
which all the world over is occupying the best 
brains, how to cheapen land carriage, how to do 
for it what, under the compulsion of free, often 
fierce competition, has already been done for 
ocean carriage. In the latter respect all sea 
washed countries, except a few like Cape Colony 
in the grip of a shipping ring, stand now on an 
equal footing. What differences them is interio 
transport ; and that country has the advantage 
which can deliver her products most cheaply 
to the sea-board. In tins connection few recent 
publications have a higher value than the 
report of the Railway Commission of New 
South Wales, exhaustively reviewing the 
six years' work of that master of railway 
craft', Mr. E. M. G. Eddy, and the Report, less 
technical and more polemical, of a Select Com- 
mittee on Railway management appointed last 
year by the Cape Parliament, ' smarting/ as one 
speaker put it, ' under 2,253 miles of Stale mis- 
management. 1 
But with a clean profit on its lea of IJd. ;i 
pound, and a Government confessing to a profit 
on its railways which would be stitrmatised as 
"bloated" it made by joint stock enterprise', 
Ceylon may say she has herein n lighting reserve 
so ample thai the thorny problems which arise 
in connection with the working expenses of rail- 
ways have no immediate interest for her. 
And since it i> injudicious to agitate for re 
form until you can confroni the powers with a 
grievance specific, incontestable, and pressing, this 
attitude may be wise. It seldom pays l" be 
pi'evio us. 
But W orkiny Expenses come up for discussion 
not only in the case of existing railways but of 
projected railways also. They are among the 
facts which must be kept in view in the Inquiry 
we are now engaged in, to wit, the capital out 
lay which may be incurred on any proposed line. 
And what we have first to learn is how most 
accurately to prefigure them. A very common 
method is to estimate them in percentage of gross 
receipts, some figure approximating to the average 
of the English rail ways being selected at discretion. 
Mr. Black, to take the latest instance, estimates 
Vlw working expense^ of hi* lado-Mediterranean 
railway at 40 per cent of gross receipts (surely a 
roseate forecast !) but a more usual figure is 
50 per cent. There are, however, grave objections 
to this method. An obvious one is that in 
place of three independent data from which to 
calculate Capital Outlay: — Traffic, Expenses, 
and Tariffs, it leaves us with two only, since 
it makes the second a function of the first. 
But the main defect of the method is that 
its figures are barren. Statistics are valuable 
in proportion to their implications; but the 
figuration of expenses in percentage of receipts 
has no implications at all ; you can never safely 
infer anything from it, either as to management, 
state of business, or anything else. Moreover a 
low percentage can always be attained, and of- 
tenest is attained, by starving the service and in- 
commoding the public. Every railway, be its ac- 
commodation never so dear and indifferent, is se- 
cured in a certain irreducible quantum of traffic, all 
that, namely, which, to quote our first article, tra- 
vels because it must. Administrations that content 
themselves with this compelled traffic, giving it the 
minimum of accommodation, can always boast 
a low percentage of receipts expended. On the 
other hand administrations that aim at deve- 
loping the traffic potentialities of their districts, 
set themselves to entice to their metals the second 
and generally larger, class of contingent traffic as 
it niay be styled, and in this pursuit necessarily 
lay out a larger proportion of their receipts. 
Let us submit the method to the test of actual 
cises of railway management. Working Ex- 
penses on the Midland and L. & N. W. of Eng- 
land were, in 1893, 08 per cent, of gross receipts, 
the average of the United Kingdom being 56 per 
cent on a minimum of 44 per cent. (Metropolitan) 
and a maximum of 61 per cent. (Waterford and 
Limerick). On the Cape Government Railways for 
the same year they were 59 per cent., and 011 
the Ceylon Government Railway 45 per cent. 
The last is certainly the best looking figure, but 
before congratulating ourselves about it, let us 
glance at the work done. Against their 58 per 
cent the Midland supplied the public With 
aservice of 27,000 train-miles per mile of line ope- 
rated ; the L. & N. W. one of 22,000 ; on the 
( ' ylon Government Railways the service amounted 
to 4,210 train miles, and at the Cape to 3,096. 
Again, the Midland ran 24 freight waggons to 
1 "passenger carriage ; the L. & N. W. ,s waggons 
to I carriage : the Cape Government Railways 
12: the Ceylon Government Railways only 2*5 t 
or putting the difference in another way, the 
Ceylon Government Railways carry 13 passengers 
to 1 ton of freight, as against 3 passengers for 
every ton on the English, and 6 on the Cape 
lines. Add to these figures the fact that pas- 
senger traffic is from 25 per cent to 30 per 
cent cheaper to operate than goods traffic, and 
in the light of them the statement of expen- 
diture in percentage of receipts wears another 
complexion. 
The subjoined table, 
return-- of the Cape 
will complete what we 
futility of this method of representing working ex- 
| penses. The first column gives the several admini— 
i native systems into which the Cape Government 
Railways are divided with their mileage, and 
' the second column shows the actual expenditure 
' per unit of work done. The relatively low rate 
I pet 1 train-mile oh the Northern system was owing 
to the tact that the bulk of the traffic was in 
passengers, w ho, as we have already remarked, 
ure cheaper to operate than freight, In 1893, 
on the completion of the line, the good* traffic 
abstracted from the 
Government Railways 
have to say as to the 
