The St. Johns herald., 1893-02-02
RAILWAYS IN INDIA.
Great Care Taken to Protect the
 People from Accident.
4 Well Regulated System and a Low Mileage Rate-Smau Percentage of Deaths from AecideDtS-A
 Remarkable Record.

It appears that during the year 1890
 only 455 persons were killed and 775 ia-
 jurez upon the East India railways.
 while only one passenger met his death
 by an accident to regular passenger train, being one in the 120,000, ,000 car ried during the year.
 One hundred and ffty-one railway servants were killed, and the rest of the deaths were those of persons other ing 64 cases of suicide and 188 killed
 while trespassing on the track.
 This record is remarkable, when it is remembered that the railway system Of India extends from Peshawar to Cape Comorin, and from Bombay to Calcutta and Madras. and, with the exception Of the engine drivers and guards, the of fcials are, for the most part, natives of the country. It is true that very many of the railroads are single tracks, and that on nearly all the lines of railroad the rate Of speed is slow. Still the statistics which appear in the Govern ment Gazette show remarkable de gree of discipline in the railway system of that great empire.
 Every railway track is protected by an iron fencing, and level crossings are comparatively few, which doubtless ac- counts for the very small percentage o1 people killed by their own neglect.
 It would appear that the heatiien Hin doc is a good signal man; and if we must have foreign labor, it is a ques- tion whether it would not be better to import it from Calcutta or Madras than from Kilkenny or Firenze.
 1t is a curious circumstance that not withstanding the apparent efficient service of the native in railway traffic, the companies do not seem disposed to intrust him with either the engine driv- ing or the c0nductorship of train. It is said the men lack nerve.
 The India railway trains have four classes. First, second, intermediate and third, the natives of the country usually travelling third class. The first class carriages are luxurious and pro- vided with every convenience, and dur ing the hot weather are kept cool by thermantidotes. A first class compart- ment, taking half of the whole carriage, is not intended to carry more than four passengers and the sleeping coaches fold up in the daytime so as to form comfortable seats. Some first class car riages have a second class compartment adjoinining for the accommodation of servants, and as the journey from Pcsh- awar to Bombay or Calcutta occupies at least four days, this arrangement adds much to the comfort of first class trav- cling in India.
 The rates of passenger traffic are: Third class, half cent; intermediate, one cent; second class, one and a half cents; first class. two and half cents per mile.
 The number of miles open for railway traffic in India is seventeen thousand five hundred miles and about two thou sand miles more are under construc- tion. The English railway will shortly run as far as the city of Kandahar, and it is not improbable that the State line, now open to Peshawar, within nine miles of the Khyber pass. will be ex- tended to the city of Cabul and eventu- ally meet the Russian railway at Fash lSend or Samarkand.
 The government of Kashmir is now in treaty with the British government for the construction of a line of railway from Hasan Abdal to Sirinagar, a route familiar to the English reader as that travelled by Lalla Rookh in the imperial days of the Moghul rule.