THE ENTERPRISES OF THE VICEROY OF EGYPT.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 566, 11 April 1876, Page 3

THE ENTERPRISES OF THE VICEROY OF EGYPT.

The correspondent of the Times at Alexandria gives a description of one of the Khedive’s great enterprises : “ Probably few of our readers have ever heard of the Soudan Railway. The world knows vaguely that the Egyptian Government has entertained the notion of largely extending its railway system, but the British public has not been sufficiently interested in the matter to ask what was to be done. Recent events have supplied a motive for curiosity, and it appears that the industrial conceptions of the Egyptian Government do not faP short in grandeur of its plans of conquest. The victories of peace are to follow close on those of war, and not to yield to them in splendor. While the Khedive’s troops advance to the conquest of Equatorial Africa, the whistle of the locomolive is to be heard on the upper waters of the Nile, and the navigation of the Red Sea is to be renderei needless by a railway which shal branch from the maio line and run to a port

on the sea coast of‘Abyssinia. This is not a new enterprise. It has been resolved upon for years, all the preparations have b. cn completed, and a considerable part of the expense has been incurred. The project is now seriously taken in hand. The surveys were made long ago ; rolling stock, machi nory, and other material have already gone forward in large quantities to the interior, and further shipments are c instantly arriving at Alexandr a, The estimated cost is four millions sterling. “ The co respondent gives a sketch of the Nubian Nile, the accuracy of which will be recognised by those who have made it a n w familiar voyage. After leaving the lira cataract, the traveller, in ascending the Nile, finds that the river makes a great curve to the west The stream is shut in by rock, and the country through which it passes is chiefly barren desert. It runs like a silver thread through a dreary waste. The bed of the river is rocky, and above the second cataract navigation is difficult. This great curve is followed by another in the opposite direction, through country of much the sarm character. The projected railway is for the purpose of abridging the s e two curves, and bringing Egypt into easy communication with the richer provinces which lie beyond them. Its length is to bo 550 miles. It starts from Wady Haifa, a scene (f desohdion, where is the second cataract. * The lino, as projected, soon leaves the river, and goes through desert, over rocky mountain, across wild gorges, down which after the rainy season, rush tropical flood wate.rs, with almost irresistible violence, to rejoin the river at Kobe, after a run of 150 miles.’ Here there is to be a great bridge, and then another run of 200 miles, through a similar country, to Ambnkol, a village at the southern point of the first curve of the river. 1 From Ambnkol .there is a final run of 150 miles to S bendy, across the Behmda desert, uninhabited save by wandering Bedawee tribes, subject at one season to violent dust storms, and at ano'hur covered with vast pools, the reservoirs of the tropi :al rainfall on the impervious slopes of the granite hills.’ Bhendy, which is at no great distance from Khartoum, is to be the present terminus of the railway, and is chosen as being the converging point of the various camel routes for the ports of the Red Sea, for Khartoum and the White Nile district, for Aboo Kharras and (he Blue Nile. “ Such is the Soudan railway, a line which is to commence at the point where ordinary travellers cease their explorations, and to traverse mountains, gorges, deserts, reservoirs of tropical rainfall, through a country of Bedouins and dust storms, to close upon the junction of the Blue and White Niles. But this enterprise, to be carried out at an ‘eati mated ’ cost of four millions sterling—we know what estimates are woith in these cases —is only one link in the system which the Egyptian Government contemplate. ‘lt is part,’ says the correspondent, ‘of a great plan for an extension of the Egyptian railway system so as to connect the Mediterranean with the southern end of the Red Sea.’ There is at preaentcommunication by railway or by steamer between Cairo and the First Cataract, aud the Soudan railway is intended to supply what is immediately wanted to bring the capital of Egypt and the Mediterranean in communication with the heart of Africa. But when the railway is completed the attention of the Government will be turned to the further development of the system. In the first place, there is to bo a line from Shendy, the southern terminus of the Soudan Railway, to Massowah, on the Red Sea. This line will be about 600 miles in length, through a country which is, perhaps, the most desolate and barbarous of all that lie within the range of Egyptian ambition. But this is not all. There would still lack railway communication between Egypt and the Northern terminus of the Soudan railway. This it is proposed to supply by completing the railway from Cairo to Assouan and Wady Haifa. Supposing these schemes to be carried out, there would be direct communication between Alexandria and Massowah ; and England would have an alternative route to India for her soldiers. This, no doubt, would be an advantage; bub the prospect, however attractive, cannot prevent us from questioning the policy of these remarkable enterprises at a time when Egyptian credit is so very low.”