Its total cost is to be £30,000,000 sterling—£16,000 a mile. Of the gross sum, one-third is guaranteed by the United States Government in money, in addition to the concession of immense tracts of land on each side of the railway. The state of Utah, or rather the individual Mormons, are good for £4,000,000, and private speculation furnishes the remainder. Of the mighty company which carries out these works, General John A. Dix (now United States Minister in Paris) is president; and in Colonel Heine (an _attaché_ of the Embassy) the Company has a warm, zealous, and active friend. We have said already that a third of the railway is already accomplished. By 1870, probably—by 1871, certainly—it will be finished in its entire length. New York will then certainly associate itself with Jeddo and Canton by this route; but not so London, Paris, and other parts of Europe. The writer in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_ says, that, on the completion of the railway, Europe will only be one month from Canton. Let us see:—London to New York, ten days; New York to San Francisco, 3,000 miles, at 20 miles an hour (all stops and delays included), 150 hours—six days and a quarter; San Francisco is from Canton, even by great circle sailing, exactly 6,900 nautical miles. No paddle-wheel steamer could take coals for such a voyage; a screw vessel of very large size, but depending mainly upon her sails for her speed, might make twelve, but very probably would not average more than ten, knots an hour, yet, at the former rate, her passage would be twenty-five days—total, forty-one days and a quarter; at ten knots an hour, the passage would be nearly twenty-nine days, or a total of forty-five days. The Mail now goes from London to Canton in fifty-two days; in 1871 the journey will be six or seven days shorter. The route to Jeddo _viâ_ San Francisco will be quicker than that _viâ_ Suez by seven or eight days, even under circumstances the most favourable for the latter route. By great circle sailing, San Francisco is distant from Jeddo 5,600 knots, and it is also eleven degrees farther to the north than Canton. These eleven degrees of north add 600 miles more in favour of San Francisco.