At places, construction averaged as much as £70,000, or $350,000, per mile.
Occasionally the advance of the railway has been resented by the inhabitants. For instance, when it was decided to carry the railway across the Parahybuna River at Campos, the populace of the latter town considered it an unwarranted intrusion. They were urged that the railway bridge would cause their trade on the waterway to shrink to infinitesimal proportions. Thereupon the inhabitants raided the railway, and zealously set to work to destroy everything destined for the bridge. The situation looked ugly, but the authorities took stern measures and quelled the riot, though not before damage to the extent of £40,000, or $200,000, had been wrought.
This bridge is one of the most important upon the whole system. From end to end it measures 1,113½ feet, divided into six through truss spans supported upon five pairs of piers in the waterway.
This outbreak of hostility, however, was quite exceptional. In the interior the natives have welcomed the railway rather than attempted to arrest its progress. This feeling has taken an unusual turn at places where the communities have presented the land for the right-of-way, and in other cases have built stations at their own expense. Since the railway has been under British control the expansion of the country has proceeded rapidly, and the exploitation of the soil has proved highly profitable. The railway maintains an active progressive policy, throwing out spur lines wherever the local conditions promise an equitable return, to encourage development. These branches are not built upon pioneer principles, but are equal in every respect to the trunk roads.
The amount of earthwork incurred in the construction is enormous. Ninety per cent. of the mileage of the line is carried out upon the sides of the hills, necessitating cuttings sufficiently deep and wide to carry the track. The location for the most part is along the banks of the rivers, inasmuch as these offer the easiest channels to penetrate the mountain ridges. As these waterways describe extremely meandering courses, the railway is a maze of twists and turns. In fact, the line might be described, after it leaves the flats along the coast, as a continuous succession of curves and reverse curves, more often than not, without an intervening stretch of tangent, or straight, length of track. As a result fantastic “S” windings, horse-shoe bends, and figure-eight loops abound, though the minimum curve is of 266 feet radius.
Despite its remarkable serpentine character, however, the Brazilian engineers displayed marked ability in the original location, bearing in mind the state of railway engineering at the date these lines were undertaken. When Mr. Dickson appeared on the scene to straighten out the railway, the natives constituted his sole labour, and he found that the Brazilian engineers were adapted eminently to the work of surveying and locating, being possessed of a specially good eye for a railway line through difficult country. The labour, too, in general, was found to be of a high standard. The Chinaman is generally regarded as the best navvy, but according to this engineer who has had experience in railway construction in all parts of the world, his preference is overwhelmingly in favour of the Brazilian Portugee. He takes a pride in his work, is conscientious, and performs his task thoroughly. These traits stood the engineer-in-chief in good stead in his work of overhaul, for it enabled him to produce a line which, from the point of excellence and solidity, would be difficult to rival in more advanced countries. In the upkeep of the line the same characteristics are observable. The men are tidy, keep the track in excellent condition, and leave little cause for complaint in regard to the maintenance of the railway buildings, taking pride in their individual sections. They have proved first-class engine-drivers, displaying every care, for on a railway of this character, bristling with sharp curves and steep banks, accidents are liable to be caused from the slightest miscalculation. When disasters have occurred, it has been found that the causes have been quite beyond the men’s control.
Under British management the railway has been rescued completely from its former moribund condition, greater stretches of fertile country have been brought under cultivation, and a general air of prosperity has been imparted to the territory which it serves. From the financial point of view the investment has proved a complete success, with the result that the Leopoldina railway to-day offers a most powerful example of the beneficial influences of English management among the railways of South America.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE FIRST CANADIAN TRANS-CONTINENTAL RAILWAY
As the railway expansion of Canada developed by leaps and bounds, ambitious spirits contemplated larger and larger conquests, culminating in a desire to build a link of steel right across the country from coast to coast. This feeling was natural. On the Atlantic seaboard, settlement advanced at a rapid rate in the Lower Provinces and forced its way steadily inland. On the Pacific side, civilisation firmly planted in British Columbia spread towards the Rocky Mountains. These two colonising forces, working in the same country, were as wide apart as if at the Poles, for the intervening plains stretching from the Great Lakes to the Rockies were considered useless.