The future cost and time of transport depends upon the completion of the railway construction at present in hand, and the decision of the Government with regard to the suggested new line to connect the tin fields with some selected spot upon the Baro-Kano line of railway. The Lagos railway to Jebba in Northern Nigeria is 307 miles in length, but although the last constructed stretch of 60½ miles from Ilorin was only opened in August last, the line has already been continued for some 50 miles beyond the Niger, and the balance of 70 miles to be completed to Zungeru, the capital of Northern Nigeria, is expected to be finished early in the coming year. By this route, when the connecting line from Zungeru to the Baro-Kano railway is constructed, and the branch from the latter railway to Bauchi is built, it will be possible to carry machinery all the way from Lagos to the new field by train, and bring the metal down to the port by the same service. But although this Lagos railway, as it is still called, taps a fertile and thickly populated country and connects the capital of the north with the coast, it became, with the commencement of the new Baro-Kano line the second, instead of the first, most important factor in the development of Northern Nigeria. Until the year 1907 the Northern Protectorate possessed in the way of railways but one light 2 feet 6 inch tramway of 22 miles in length, which connected its capital, Zungeru, with Baro, the nearest navigable point on the river. It was in May 1907 that Sir Percy Girouard, the Governor, whose name had already become famous in connection with his splendid railway work in the Sudan and in South Africa, formulated the railway policy, and recommended the construction by the Public Works Department of the Protectorate of a 3 feet 6 inch gauge railway from Baro, on the Niger River, to Kano, a distance of a little short of 400 miles, on an estimate of £3000 per mile. In August of the same year the Imperial Government sanctioned the construction of the proposed line. At the same time the views of the administrative Southern Protectorate were met by the extension of the Lagos line into Northern Nigeria, with a connection to be established from Zungeru with the Baro-Kano railway, making it possible to travel from Kano either all the way by rail to the coast at Lagos, or by rail to Baro, and thence by river steamers to the mouth of the Niger. It is expected that the bulk of the exports will follow the line to Baro, and thence be carried to the sea by water transport, but the Lagos line serves such a rich and well populated country, that when the Port of Lagos has been rendered accessible by the harbour improvements now in construction, the line should prove of increasing economic value, quite apart from any trade it may attract from the more easterly provinces of Northern Nigeria. NEW LINE ADVOCATED