Feb, 11.
For the first time in the history of the agitation for the construction of a railway between Weihsien and Chefoo there is hope that the obstacles that have hindered its commencement are removed. Japan, by the settlement of the Shantung question, has done herself and her reputation an incalculable amount of good. She has furnished the world with practical evidence that she does desire friendship with China, and to contribute where she may to the latter's progress and development. The news is gratifying, for it cannot but help to fruition a scheme that should have been accomplished long before this. The late Viceroy Ji Hung-chang was approached years ago by Mr. Ferguson with a view to getting the necessary railway line constructed, and had that attempt succeeded, Chefoo would have been to-day as Prosperous a port as could desired, and the neighbourhood between it and Weihsien a great hive of industry.
A trip into the interior of the province of Shantung commenccing from Chefoo is a veritable eye-opener to those who are under the erroneous impression that little or nothing is done in that region. Its latent potentialities are simply immense. It is rich, and its undeveloped resources, when they once begin to materialize, will reveal to China what a fine province she has in Shantung, and will enable her to appreciate how much she owes to the foreign and Chinese business merchants in Chefoo, who, despite heavy odds and almost insurmountable difficulties and numerous disappointments, have never ceased to press on the construction of the much-needed railway line between Weihsien and their port. Germany would never have opposed the scheme had she not realized what it meant. To Chefoo it constituted the guarantee of its ability to compete with Tsingtao, and to declare itself the centre of industry and commerce that it ought to be. But the Germans were far-seeing and having secured Kiaochou they naturally wanted to get all that they could out of it. The Kaiser caused enormous sums of money to be poured into the newly acquired port. The harbour at Tsingtao was dredged, a breakwater constructed and every improvement effected to make it an up-to-date and modern port. But German enterprise did not reap the fruits of its reward. Tsingtao, it is true, took most of Chefoo's trade, but Germany never got returns at all commensurate with her huge expenditure. When Japan wrested Kiaochou from her, China thought there would be nothing to hinder the construction of the railway necessary to enable Chefoo to live. Adverse influences, however, still prevailed, and German obstruction continued to exist under another name. Throughout it all, however, Chefoo business men, Chinese and foreign, continued to agitate and to keep the movement alive. It might well be thought that Chefoo residents were sick of talk about the railway for they have heard little else for the last twenty years and more, but, if perseverance commands success, then the Chefoo-
Weihsien Railway ought soon to be a living reality. In bygone days the harbour lacked protection from the northeasterly gales. A great and sustained effort was made to remedy this defect. But perseverance and a deter: nined refusal to cease agitating till the breakwater was finished saw the scheme commenced, and to-day the fine engineering feat accomplished at the end of last year provides Chefoo with the security from the fierce gales that blow on many days of the year, and allows ships to load and unload cargoes in the roughest of weather. The breakwater has involved a vast expenditure of money, but without the railway much of this will have been spent in vain. It was never intended that the breakwater and the railway should be two separate schemes, but each a part of the one big plan for providing Chefoo with what it lacked, to make it the busy prosperous and commercial centre that it ought to be. Now at last the way is clear Chefoo, since the war, has gone ahead by leaps and bounds. The hair net industry during the year that has just passed employed thousands. Even more significant is the enormous amount of building that has been and is still going on. It is impossible to get away from the sound of the hammer. Buildings are being erected all over Chefoo and, as fast as they are completed, are occupied. The place has the appearance of being either on the eve of a great awakening or else actually experi-oncing a wave of prosperity. The chief silk firm, which is generally regarded as a sort of thermometer indicating the trade of the city, prospered so that shareholders received the excellent dividend of ten per cent., and a huge sum was placed to reserve. If, even without the railway, Chefoo has existed and progressed as it has done, what may it not accomplish when it has the line laid between it and the interior? By the aid of famine funds a mud road has been constructed, which some declare is strong enough to carry the railway, but this is extremely doubtful. A few months ago it was questionable whether motors could have travelled on it. When the severe weather is over it will be possible to give an opinion as to the suitability of the newly made road for the railway.
China at present is in financial straits and this may birder an immediate commencement of the much needed line. But it is the sort of project for which money
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.