'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎635] (704/714)

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RAILWAYS
635
than has ever been anticipated ; and the receipts at the two ocean
termini would not avail to compensate for the utter lack of
intervening receipts. I hazard the statement that the returns
from merchandise would be small, because I do not see how it
could pay any trader to incur the heavy additional expense of
railroad carriage, as well as the risks and delays of one, and
possibly of two, transhipments en route, in order to save four or, at
the most six, days in the voyage from England to India; and
that the returns from passenger traffic would be equally insignifi
cant, because I know that travellers to and from India, whether
soldiers, or civilians, or ladies, or infants, want as much air and
physical stimulus as they can get, and would by no means consent
to be cooped up for days in stifling railway carriages, exposed to
the dust, and heat, and fatigue of a long journey over such a
country. If I were a shareholder in the P. and 0. Company, I
would not, except for the possible loss of the mails, be in the least
alarmed at the competition of such a railway.
These are the principal objections which appear to me to
disqualify and condemn the scheme of a Euphrates Valley railway
to India. Since the construction of the Suez Canal, the
need for such an alternative route has to a great extent
ceased to exist. Without desiring to embark upon larger political
theses, I would venture to say that, in keeping a firm hold upon
Egypt, and a safe watch upon the Suez Canal, and in quickening
and cheapening the maritime service between England and India,
are to be found far preferable methods for ensuring rapidity
of communication between the two parts of the empire in time of
clanger.
I have hitherto discussed the Euphrates Valley railway in its
Syrian and Mesopotamian sections, terminating on the threshold of
Schemes P 61 ' 8 * 3,11 Gulf. I must not omit, however, to notice
of Persian that schemes have been projected for continninw the line
railroad r* •i i . .
continua- of rails by land for the entire distance to Knrrachi.
One of these schemes contemplated the construction of a
line along the northern or Persian shore of the Gulf, from, say,
Mohammerah, via Bushire, Lingah, Bunder Abbas, Jask, and
Gwadur, to Kurrachi. Such a plan seems to me to be destitute of
even the most elementary recommendations, and to fail far more
conspicuously if subjected to the fourfold test that I have pre
viously applied, than even the Euphrates Valley scheme. It would
Summary