CHAPTER XX 
THE UGANDA RAILWAY 
It may be confidently stated that, in proportion to 
the goods or passengers that it carries, more has been 
written about the Uganda Railway than of any rail¬ 
way in the world. The traffic manager must often 
wish he could charge freight on the amount of litera¬ 
ture under which it labours. Nevertheless, in spite of 
this previous overdose, no work which deals in any 
way with the Protectorate can be complete without 
reference to the line, if only for the fact that without 
it there would have been no Colony. 
The construction of the railway itself is owed to 
the Anglo-German ageement and to the “ General 
Act of the Brussels Conference ” in 1890. When the 
British East Africa Company in 1892 found that in 
attempting to administer and occupy Uganda they had, 
speaking vulgarly, cut off more than they could chew, 
and requested the British Goverment to relieve them 
of their obligations, it was absolutely touch and go 
whether or not we abandoned the whole territory. In 
all probability we owe our retention of this splendid 
tract mainly to the missionaries who were then working 
in the country. As a result of their representations, 
Sir Gerald Portal was sent from Zanzibar in 1893 to 
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