THE NARROW GAUGE.

Evening Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2473, 19 January 1871, Page 2

THE NARROW GAUGE.

The following extract from a private letter received by a gentleman in Wellington, from the Hon. P. I illun Bdl, has been published by the Imh-pvndtnt. After illustrating that “colonising work must be organised to bp successful,” he proceeds Of course a very powerful agent will be found in this new system of Narrow Gauge Railway. I have just been to see the Ffestiniog line, which you have heard so much of, and of which we write officially about. I can only say that no description can give the least idea of it. You see a toy ; it is a giant in its power. Nothing looks so absurd, after thundering along the great railways to the North, and being dazed by thg size of the engines, the length of the trains, and the ceaseless rush and whirl through tunnels, over embankments, along cuttings, and across bridges—ns the little Ffestiniog line with its tiny engine and train, aloagside of which a man looms enormously. You get in, wondering what next; present y you begin running up a steep hill at the rate of fifteen miles an hour, following the contour of the ground. You ccme to a sharp curve, turning round you see the tail carriages of the train coming round the last sweep. You are in the middle of what seems all but a circle of little carriages, the engine looking ridiculously small, the lopg line of trucks behind being just big enough to hold a bale of wool. You are running along a lino of 1 foot Hi inches gauge, and while on one side the hill is a few inches from your feet, for the Irish jaunting-car projects over the rails, and you can’t help fancying you are going .to have your brains dashed out by the riding, as soon as you turn to the other side you see only a precipitous descent o'f the hill, with nothing between you and the slide down. Presently you look at the distant hills,' the stream shining silvery in the valley below, the ferns close enough to pluck, the trees on your right and left; why, this is New Zealand ! The illusion is wonderful. I never saw any one so struck M'ith a novel scene as Knowles was, who accompanied me. Heaps of travellers who know the Alps by heart have never seen this quiet Ffestiniog Vale, and of course the Now Zralander who comes home must do his Rhine and his Lucerne ; but if you want him _ to be reminded of his country, send him to the Ffestiniog Railway. But apart from the surprises of the scene, the cool calculation of the adaptability to our wants soon comes; I do not hesitate to confess that, after read* i, l( r w hat I could and talking to people who knew, the surprise I felt was as if 1 had never heard of a cheap railway. All \ can say is that after seeing'this one I have ceased to consider there is any difficulty in New Zealand. As for the Wairarapa road, the Horokiwi, the Waikouati, and dozens of others where we have made expensive metalled lines because we knew not of possible railways there, it certainly will not be long before these are in favor of the narrow gauge railway. Ffestiniog lines qace seen, atl si-i% -,a of difficulty or trouble absolutely vanishes ; and although I aip no engineer, and am finite incompetent to decide whether Fairlic’s

Bode engines or Fox’s Norway engines are the best, it is satisfactory—perfectly satisfactory—to have been on a hue which for seven years has done what I _ have seen a Ffestiniog. Fcathcrston’s visit to the ISoiwc"ian lines with the 3ft. tiin. gauge will he very interesting to you ; and when you take the impressions we have each received and wei-h them together, you will realise as well as we do ohrselves that an entirely new era is open, and that the “ Hallways of the Futui c,” to use the title of the Juiif* Essays, will give New Zealand a place sun never dreamt of getting by any other moans. Whenever the time conics that you shall he able to spend money on Now Zealand railways, you need entertain no sort of douba that here, already done and in full work, arc evaoHy the patterns wc want, suited precisely to the country in which wc live, and possessing the elements of advantage in is precious to ns. This is the evidence before our eyes of the fact, and the men are here too. I don’t want to be sanguine, hut lam unite certain in my own mind; and. 1 only regret I did not see for myself in tunc to write before the Assembly met.