“The Euphrates and Indus lines together would, moreover, secure for us almost a monopoly of the trade with Central Asia, enabling us to meet Russia, our great competitor in these distant fields of commercial enterprise, on more than equal terms.”
“But it is not on commercial considerations that I would urge the claims of the Euphrates Valley Railway. It is on imperial grounds that the scheme commends itself to our support.”
“I believe that the establishment of the Euphrates route would add incalculably to our prestige throughout Europe and the East, and would do more to strengthen our hold on India than any other means that could be devised.”
“The Euphrates Valley Railway, as proposed from the Gulf of Scanderoon to the Persian Gulf, has been specially designed with a view to its ultimately forming part of a through line from Constantinople to the head of the Persian Gulf; while it is capable also of being in due time extended eastwards to Kurrachee, the port of India nearest to Europe.”
“The line from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf has been demonstrated to be eminently practicable and easy, while the other portions of the route between Constantinople and India are not. While capable of forming part of a through line, it would at the same time be complete in itself, and independent of any disturbances in Europe—the only portion, in fact, of a through line of railway which would be always, and under all circumstances, at the absolute control of this country.”
“It would always be to this country the most important portion of any through line; and, indeed, I believe a through line could not be constructed, except at overwhelming cost, without the assistance of a port in Northern Syria. It would, moreover, provide us with a complete alternative route to India, and would thus at once secure to this country advantages admitted to be of the highest national moment.”
“It is for these reasons that during the long period in which I have devoted myself to the advocacy of the Euphrates route to India, I have thought it expedient to urge upon our own Government and that of Turkey, the special claims of that section only which would connect the Mediterranean with the Persian Gulf.”
“The objection that, although the Euphrates Valley Railway would afford us the undoubted advantage of an alternative, a shorter, and a more rapid means of communication with India, it would still leave a considerable portion of the journey to be accomplished by sea, and that consequently it would accelerate our communications with the East in a minor degree only, is sufficiently disposed of by the circumstances already pointed out; that a railway from a point on the Mediterranean, at or near Scanderoon, to the head of the Persian Gulf, would naturally form part of a through line of railway from Constantinople to India, if at a future time it should be considered necessary or desirable to construct the remaining sections.”