The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-10-18

SASot ihleE -ConNlnental system span ming not only two continents, but five of them. The great Cape-to-Cairo Railway which is to pass through the very heart of darkest Africa, fs no longer to be the unfuIfilled dream of a departed Napoleon of finance. Already the plans of Cecil Rhodes. greatest of all pioneers in the development of yir- gin territory. are being given force and effect, and English capitalists are proceeding with the work of closing the vast gap which Hes between the road Gp the Nile on the north and the one which has passed the Congo on te south.
 Then there is Asia. Already one may cross that vast continent and
 reach the very western coast of
 Europe by rail-. As the years come and go, new lines are being projected
 and long before the young man of to-
 day becomes old and gray he will be able to take his choice of going from eastern Asia to western Europe, or from eastern Asia to southern Africa. some day it is going to be possible to go by rail from Vladivostok to Cairo as 1t now Is to go from Mukdin to St. Petersburg or Paris. The route will
 lie through Jerusalem and the Holy Land, and will cover nearly all the territory famed in sacred story
 And then there Is but a small re- maining gap to be filled, the one which would connect the railroads of Alaska with those of east Asia. It may sound ike dream, but as the years come qua so' steel rails are reaching out further north This Is the most uncer- tain piece of construction of all. but not so uncertain as was the building or the line across the Rocky Noun
 tains fifty years ago. The building of this link would be the crownng achievement of the ages. Every con
 tinent on the globe. except Australia
 couId De reached by rail from the others, and as daylight shades away Into darkness there would ever be a connecting link between the civiIiza-
 tion' of the Orient and of the Occident
 between the North and the South
 What boon for the tourist that
 coming era will bel To travel over
 Tive continents in personally con oucted tour that would not necessi-
 tate his vacating his Pullman state-
 room in all that journey During this
 time his eye could behold every char acter Of lanscape the world affords could see every kind of humanity that lives. could look at every sort of bird l or beast that breathes It would be an experience that would make the
 neart or even the most blase globe trotter kindIe with delight.
 No one could reasonably expect any through passenger traffic, beyond the tourists, over this yact 25, 900 mile sys- tenn But the intercourse between ma
 tions that 1t would engender would be or fnestimable value to civilization
 The way travel on an American rail road does as much to support 1t as the through traffic, and its effect on people. wiping out provincialism and local limitations, is even greater than that of through traffic. So it would
 be with the Quincontinental
 As for freight no one supposes that coal and iron would be shipped from South America to South Africa by the ali-rail route. It would be even worse than the classic illustration of rail- road men, in which a teamster started to market with a load of wheat, and the market was, so far away that he had to feed every grain of his wheat to his team before he, got there. One would require high class of freight for such traffic. Even at five cents. for an ordinary letter, the railroad | could not carry through mail except
 at loss. Someone has. said that on | such a system even diamonds would not be worth the freight charges when sent from South Africa to South Amer lea.
 The possibilities of way freight
 however. would be great The terri tory through WnlCn all the connecting links will pass is full of undeveloped
 wealth. The situation is identical
 with the one which existed on our | own Western frontier less than a gen , eration ago. There are men without
 gray hair who recall the time when 1t was predicted that the Atchison. Topeka and Sante Fe would not pay for the axle grease used in It's opera
 tion. Along about the same time men
 were referring to the Northern Pacific
 as Hills Folly" but that great rall-
 road genius had looked into the future | and had seen a vast industrial empire | rising out of region of solitude. He l had simply discounted the years to
 come and 1t made him the railroad king that he Is. When they were dis | cussing the building of one road across | the Rockies with Federal Treasury | back of it, many a statesman, clothed
 with the solemn responsibility of pro-
 noting the welfare of the nation, call
 ed 1t a chimera. and predicted that | 1t would end in dismal failure. Some
 of those very men have lived to see a half dozen such lines built, and pros i pering where they predicted that one l could not sustain itself.
 The originator of the Pan American l project was Hinton Rowan Helper.
 For thirty years It has been the dream | of his life. In season and out he | has sought to interest the United States government in the plan. At