3862-3 the Isthmus of Krau. 350 
6 th. We would here observe again, that our survey was rough, 
that we merely passed along the native line (which is well defined, 
but in many places in the beds of rivers) with perambulator, compass 
and aneroid, that our aneroid showed no height above the sea of 
more than seventy-five feet, and that our route presented no obstacle 
of engineering difficulty, beyond dips to nullahs, ordinarily twenty 
or thirty feet wide, with some three or four rivers from one to two 
hundred feet wide. A careful survey would be necessary. 
7th. We would, however, recommend very little masonry, though 
lime and fuel for bricks are in abundance, but the vast and in¬ 
exhaustible forests, through which the line passes, are full of timber 
suitable for sleepers, for bridges, for stations and wharfs and for fuel 
for the locomotives, all that would be required from England would 
be plant, permanent-way, and rolling stock, the labour for the work 
being procurable from China to any amount. 
8th. We will double, what in our own, somewhat experienced 
minds, would be the cost of such a railroad across the Isthmus, and 
put down the amount at £5000 per mile, including stations, 
wharfs, hotels, coal-sheds, &c., &c. and rolling stock for fifty 
miles of rail £250,000. For the river service three tug steamers 
with all the advantages of disconnecting engines, towing with a 
single hawser &c. which the Thames tugs possess, at £15,000 each 
equal to, .. £ 45,000 
12 Coal Barges @ £800, . 9,600 
Bolling Stock 50 miles,. 250,000 
Contingencies at 50 per cent, including Buoying 
Biver, . 27,300 
Total £331,900 
or say l-3rd of a million sterling. But there is the interest on a 
capital of one 'million of money , saved every year in fuel , and 
establishment of running steamers alone ; surely it must be worth 
while the expending such a capital, in establishing this communi¬ 
cation. 
20, We therefore think, that without reference to the dangerous 
navigation, the Straits line should be abandoned as a communication 
between India and Europe, and China; as the old Cape of Good 
Hope line was abandoned for the Suez line. Considering, however, the 
