LITMIR.BIZ

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all State loan business, and this circumstance effectually disposed of the proposal. At 3 per cent. a saving of £160,000 per annum would be made in this monopoly in interest alone. The value represented by the Custom dues on the Portuguese border we are not in a position to estimate, but roughly these collections and the 15 per cent. of the profits paid to the management and shareholders must, with other leakages, represent at least another £100,000 per annum, which should be saved the country. As the revenue of the corporation now exceeds £2,000,000 a year, of which only half is expended in working costs, the estimate we have taken does not err upon the side of extravagance. By its neglect of its duties towards the commercial and mining community enormous losses are involved. Thus, in the coal traffic, the rate—which is now to be somewhat reduced—has been 3d. per ton per mile. According to the returns of the Chamber of Mines, the coal production of the Transvaal for 1895 was 1,045,121 tons. This is carried an average distance of nearly thirty miles, but taking the distance at twenty-four miles the charges are 6s. per ton. At 1–½d. per ton per mile—three times as much as the Cape railways charge—a saving upon the coal rates of 3s. per ton would follow, equal to £150,000 per annum. Again, by the 'bagging' system, an additional cost of 2s. 3d. per ton is incurred—details of this item have been recently published in this paper—and if this monopoly were run upon ordinary business lines, a further saving of £110,000 would be made by carrying coal in bulk. The interest upon the amount required to construct the necessary sidings for handling the coal, and the tram-lines required to transport it to the mines, would be a mere fraction upon this amount; and as the coal trade in the course of a short time is likely to see a 50 per cent. increase, the estimate may be allowed to stand at this figure without deduction. No data are available to fix the amount of the tax laid upon the people generally by the vexatious delays and losses following upon inefficient railway administration, but the monthly meetings of the local Chamber of Commerce throw some light upon these phases of a monopolistic management. The savings to be made in dealing with the coal traffic must not be taken as exhausting all possible reforms; the particulars given as to this traffic only indicate and suggest the wide area covered by this monopoly, which hitherto has made but halting and feeble efforts to keep pace with the requirements of the public. Dealing as it does with the imports of the whole country, which now amount in value to £10,000,000, the figures we have given must serve merely to illustrate its invertebrate methods of handling traffic, as well as its grasping greed in enforcing the rates fixed by the terms of its concession. Its forty miles of Rand steam tram-line and thirty-five miles of railway from the Vaal River, with some little assistance from the Delagoa line and Customs, brought in a revenue of about £1,250,000 in 1895. Now that the Natal line is opened the receipts will probably amount to nearly £3,000,000 per annum, all of which should swell the ordinary revenue of the country, instead of remaining in the hands of foreigners as a reservoir of wealth for indigent Hollanders to exploit. The total railway earnings of the Cape and Natal together over all their lines amounted to £3,916,566 in 1895, and the capital expenditure on railways by these colonies amounts to £26,000,000. The greater portion of these receipts come from the Rand trade, which is compelled to pay an additional £2,500,000, carrying charges to the Netherlands Company, which has £7,000,000 of capital. Thus, railway receipts in South Africa amount now to £7,000,000 per annum, of which the Rand contributes at least £5,000,000.

      The revenue of the company is now considerably over £3,000,000 per annum. The management claim that their expenses amount to but 40 per cent. of revenue, and this is regarded by them as a matter for general congratulation. The Uitlanders contend that the concern is grossly mismanaged, and that the low cost of working is a fiction. It only appears low by contrast with a revenue swollen by preposterously heavy rates and protected by a monopoly. The tariff could be reduced by one-half; that is to say, a remission of taxation to the tune of one and a half million annually could be effected without depriving the Company of a legitimate and indeed very handsome profit.

      Selati Railway.

      The Selati Railway Scheme! 'Conceived in iniquity, delivered in shame, died in disgrace!' might be its history, but for the fact that it is not quite dead yet. But very nearly! The concession was obtained during the Session of 1890 by a member of the First Volksraad, Mr. Barend J. Vorster, jun., who himself took part in and guided the tone of the debate which decided the granting of the concession. The Raad resolved to endeavour to obtain the favourable opinions of their constituents, but before doing so the generous Mr. Vorster made what he was pleased to call 'presents' to the members—American spiders, Cape carts, gold watches, shares in the Company to be floated, and sums in cash—were the trifles by which Mr. Vorster won his way to favour. He placated the President by presenting to the Volksraad a portrait of his Honour, executed by the late Mr. Schroeder, South Africa's one artist. The picture cost £600. The affair was a notorious and shameless matter of bribery and the only profit which the country gained from it was a candid confession of personal principles on the part of Mr. Kruger himself, who when the exposure took place stated that he saw no harm in members receiving presents. Debentures to the amount of £500,000 were issued, bearing Government guarantee of 4 per cent. The Company received £70 for each £100 debenture. Comment is superfluous. A second issue of a million was made, nominally at £93 10s., but the Company only received £86—a commission to the brokers or agents of 8–¾ per cent., at a time when the Company's previous issue of 4 per cents. were standing at £97 in the market. The costs of flotation were charged at upwards of £32,000; the expenses of one gentleman's travelling, etc., £6,000.

      But these are 'trifles light as air.' This Selati Railway Company, which being guaranteed by Government is really a Government liability, arranged with a contractor to build the line at the maximum cost allowed in the concession, £9,600 per mile. Two days later this contractor sub-let the contract for £7,002 per mile. As the distance is 200 miles, the Republic was robbed by a stroke of the pen of £519,600—one of the biggest 'steals' even in the Transvaal. During the two years for which Dr. Leyds was responsible as the representative of the Republic for the management of this affair, none of these peculiar transactions were detected—at any rate none were reported or exposed; but on the accession to office of an ignorant old Boer the nest of swindles appears to have been discovered without any difficulty. And it is generally admitted that Dr. Leyds is not a fool. This exposure took place at the end of the Session of 1894, and, inured as the Uitlanders had become to jobs, this was an eyeopener even for them, and the startled community began wondering what more might be in store for them—the unfortunate tax-payers—who had to bear the brunt of it all.

      Revenue.

      Turning to the finances of the country, the following tables are as instructive as anything can be:

      REVENUE AND EXPENDITURE OF THE SOUTH AFRICAN REPUBLIC.{10}

      Fiscal period. Revenue. Expenditure. Remarks.

       £ £

       Aug. 1, 1871 to July 31, 1872 … 40,988 … 35,714

       " 1, 1872 " Jan. 31, 1873 … 43,239 … 41,813

       Feb. 1, 1873 " " 31, 1874 … 49,318 … 45,482 Gold discovered

       in Lydenburg.

       " 1, 1874 " " 31, 1875 … 58,553 … 61,785

       " 1, 1875 " " 31, 1876 … 64,582 … 69,394

       " 1, 1876 " " 31, 1877 … 62,762 … 64,505

       " 1, 1877 " April 12, 1877 … 25,752 … 17,235

       April 12, 1877 " Dec. 31, 1877 … 54,127 … 70,003

       Jan. 1, 1878 " " 31, 1878 … 76,774 … 89,063

       " 1, 1879 " " 31, 1879 … 93,409 … 177,596

       " 1, 1880 " " 31, 1880 … 174,069 … 144,943

       " 1, 1881 " Oct. 14, 1881 … 25,326 … 186,707 British Govt.

       Aug. 8, 1881 " Dec. 31, 1881 … 37,908 … 33,442 Boer Govt.

       Jan. 1, 1882 " " 31, 1882 … 177,407 … 114,476

       " 1, 1883 " " 31, 1883 … 143,324 … 184,344

       " 1, 1884 " Mar. 31, 1884 … 44,557 … 18,922

       April 1, 1884 " " 31,

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