TRANSPORTATION AND COMMUNICATION. There are many roads throughout the well-settled parts of China, hut they are in bad repair. and are al most in-passable for wheeled vehicles. As has been seen above. the navigable rivers furnish many avenues of commerce, and these, with the numerous canals, carry a vast volume of trade. The railway question may be said to be the pivotal matter of Chinese economic) and political life to-day. The immense extent of territory and the wretched condition of Chinese high roads combine to hinder Coln mereial intercourse between the various parts of the country; in deed, to thwart all economic development. At the same time the backward state of the Chinese people in all matters requiring advanced indus trial equipment. and a genius for and experience in financial organization and ability to handle inidertakings on so large a scale as a national railway requires. throws the initiative on the foreign nations who are eagerly seeking Chinese trade. Hence, this subject of railroads has be come in China a politieo-diplontatie matter. each of the great powers endeavoring to secure concessions 14(r what are expected to be the most profitable roads, as well as for such is may have an important strategic value should a partition of China or a conflict of foreign powers in her territory eventually take place. Railway build ing in China is in its infancy; but the lines of what will become main trunk roads have not only been mapped out. but actually surveyed, and all preliminary steps. such as securing Gov ernment concessions and financial Iravkine% have been taken. Knowing already the resources and relative economic importance of the various sec tions of China, we may analyze the constructed and projected railways as controlled and planned by the various foreign nations. Thus far the total mileage of completed railways in China, with the exception of the Russian line to Port Arthur, does not exceed 1000 miles.
(1) The Russian Sphere of I nItuence.—In the northeastern section of the empire ( Manchuria) Russia has laid her line from Port Arthur, at the southern end of the Liao-tung Peninsula, running north through Mukden and farther on through Kirin and liodune ( Petuna )— a line of nearly Imo miles. finally connecting with the Trans-Siberian Itail way. A branch road con nects this feeder of the trans-Siberian road with the rich port of Niu-chwang, near the eastern coast of the Liao-tung Gulf. This road, though of immense value to Chinese trade, especially the tea trade, is entirely in Russian hands. and is less subject to Chinese control than any other rail road in the country, although by a clause of doubtful value it is supposed to revert to the Chinese Government in eighty years. The road is not only of supreme strategic importance to Russia, but promises to become quite lucrative as well. Within the two years of IS96-9S its freight trallie more than trebled, increasing from 192,000 tons to 616,000, and the number of pas sengers increased almost fourfold—from 244,000 to 94S'.000. A concession for building a railway
from Cheng-ting. in Pe-chi-li, to Tai-yuan, in Shan-si, With an eventual extension to Si-ngan-fu, the capital of Shensi, has been secured by the Russo-Chinese Bank, and the work of construc tion delegated by the latter to a French syndi cate. Si-ngan-fu is the terminal point of the cant Nan route, and Russia thereby secures for its railways the entire tea trade, as well as the still more important mineral and agricultural trade which is bound to spring up in that region as soon as the road is completed. Thus Russia has eut into the heart. of the mining region of China, on which the English thought they had secured a firm hold through their mining con cessions. Russia has, moreover, secured the privilege of connecting the port of Niti-ehwang with Peking, should such a road be decided upon by the Chinese Government. in that case the Russian Government would be in a. position, in the event of war, to pour its troops into the very capital of the Chinese Empire. But all of these lines are comparatively insignificant, or may be called mere feeders, compared with the great concession wrung by Russia front the Chinese in the teeth of the fiercest opposition on the part of Great Britain and Germany—viz. the great projected Chinese trunk line which is to traverse the entire length of Chinn all the way from Peking in the north to Canton in the south. The road, when completed. is destined to bring into closest 14111(11 111'0 which have hitherto stood far a Dart—namely, the Russian and American. The Peking Canton railroad nat urally falls apart into two distinct and almost equal divisions. (north and south) of the Yang tse-kiang. The northern section is to run from Peking to Ilanko• on the Vang-tse-kiang. a rich river port aceessible to large ocean-going vessels, and, with the two neighboring towns of Ilan yang and Wn-chang, having:i population of about 1.500,000. This section was originally granted to a Chinese railway syndicate, which, owing to general incapacity and lack of native financial support, was constrained to seek foreign aid. A lielgi in syndicate then secured the conmssion through the copal\ ance of the French and Rus sian ministers and the Itusso-Chinese Bank. This disposition of the concession was little relished by the English, first, because the railway will serve to connect. the Itussian and the French spheres of influence in the northeast and south west respect ivel V, and, second, because through its entire length of about 851) miles it 11 ill tap sonic of the richest of China's provinces, furnishing an outlet for the agricultural and mineral products which the English themselves largely eontrol.