THE INDIAN ROUTE. (From the "Britannia.")

New Zealander, Volume 8, Issue 616, 10 March 1852, Page 3

THE INDIAN ROUTE. (From the "Britannia.")

To have girdled the earth in forty seconds, the fairy achievement of the sprite of the " Mid-sum-mer Night's Dream," to have run down the lino of the ecliptic on a sun-beam, or have journeyed on a broom-stick to the moon, would scarcely have seemed more supernatural some fifty years ago, than the startling fact that the iron-bound road, already planned and in progress between Calais and Calcutta, will when completed unite those distant termini of the globe by a journey of less than seven days. Yet such is the announcement of engineers, who have both genius to contrive and skill to complete this gigantic undertaking.

Wv ;.ie prom. v\\ lint, in ((nird-en \oav> tiom (.lie pie>cntdate l!ie line of iJlway communication between London and. Calcutta, whh the e x cepiion only of the n.uvow stiip of channel which separates Dover from Cala'P, -will be uninterrupted. It i; itiijio^'Jjlc io foie-<v the lYtndnpvnl il c!i list's \\'n. !i ihir, easy M i.ipid coimmriu aliiui Ik'tw.vn tiie p.iienl lohifiv niii! her distant Indian Colonies may t ilcrt m <>tr i ommei ei.il icla( ion->; but as «■(> ni.iny find -judi > imim! intm^N • at. ,\n,l i-, the <-'ibje.'t i 1i 1 one of • urli vast and vital import since, v, c v.ill jri\e a Iniel sketch of the plan of tliiti railway, and of the- route it, io intended lo take. The j<umey is to consist of four great divisions, two of which are in c<.ur-e of enmplelion, a#l partly in opeiatiun, and two are already so far planned, that it is not likely there Vvillbenmeli deviation from the proposed line. The oveikind route, as it is called, which since the year 1840 hnt> been partially substituted for the circuitous voyage round the Cape, occupies on the average nine and thirty days. The sea por : tions of this route, if the journey from Calais to Mtu-seilles or Trieste, is adopted in preference to the sea-voyage round the Spanish Peninsula, are from Marseilles to Alexandria, and from Sue/ to ißombay.i Bombay. A distance of some 5,000 miles has thus to be traversed by sea in the&e t^f> stages; and the first object of the projectors of the continuous line of railway is to substitute for the circuitous sea-route down the lied Sea, through the Straits of IJabebuandeb, and across the Indian Ocean, a direct line of rail runmmr from the mouth of the Oront"«, toTvludi liver theMediter r mean mails are intended to ply, across the Turkish territory, and down the "\ alley of the Euphrates to Bassorali at the head of ihe Persian Gulf. The length of the railroad intended to be thus substituted for a sea passage of nearly 3,000 miles A\o;i!d not exceed in length 000, and when in operation would reduce the distance of London from Cilcutta by one-half, or b_) three out of six weeks now spent in the journey. Bassorali would then have to be connected with Bombay, and a direct railroad from Calais or Ostend to O-rontes substituted for the circuitous and tedious sea passage up the Mediterranean from Marseilles or Trieste to that river. The continuous line from Ostend to Oisova on the Turkish frontier is already in progress. Orsova is distant from Constantinople and Bassorali is about 1,300, of which 900 woulil, as we stated above, be already completed. The" line between Constantinople, the Orontes, and Bassorah, is likely to be finished by the year 1860, and the distance in time between London and Calcutta would then be reduced to twelve days. In five years longer the projector imagines that the line of railway might be carried from Bassorali on the Persian Gulf, along the coast line of Persia and Beloocliistan to Hyderabad, the old capital of the Ameers on the Indus, whei'e it would meet the branch lines already in progress from Bombay, Lahore, and Calcutta. The distance in time, after the entire completion of these four great divisions from London to Calcutta, will be seven days, and in long measure 5, G00 miles. Such is the undertaking of the projector, and, when we remember that of these 5,600 piles nearly 3,000 are in course of construction, we see no reason to doubt the accuracy of his estimate, and the practicability of his scheme. Railway communication is already working silent and gradual, but important changes wherever it exists, and the eflects of the completion of this unprecedented scheme upon the civilization, manners, morals, and religion of the Eastern world, no human intelligence can calculate. The distant hordes of Tartars, and the still more distant Chinamen, will feel the influence of an immediate communication iuth the most enlightened nations of the globe, and Eastern ignorance and infidelity will quail before the Western light of Christianity and civilization.