These figures show that South African railways make high earnings as compared even with a great railway like the Canadian Pacific, a railway serving one of the most important trade routes in the world, and traversing a rich agricultural country, with a population of 5,000,000, as compared with South Africa's 700,000 whites and 2,000,000 blacks. The Queensland railways, with more than half the mileage, earn less than one-eighth the total earned by South African railways, while the enormous traffic of the famous London North-Western, with its large capitalised value, only brings in a matter of £3,000,000 a year more than the railways of South Africa, with their moderate capitalisation of £50,000,000. This comparison should bring home to investors the excellent opening which South Africa affords for safe and profitable participation in the reasonable railway expansion the country still requires, especially is this the case with the two new colonies. Another fifteen hundred miles could well be added. These new railways would have earning capacity little inferior to the existing lines, and the present margin of profits is so wide that a substantial reduction in rates would not materially affect the prospects, because such a reduction would inevitably result in a great increase in the volume of traffic. The comparison also leads to the conclusion that the present rates are excessive. They have been maintained at their high level through the system of the Colonial Governments looking to the railways for a large proportion of the revenue. The great pivot of South African industry is the Rand, with its goldfields, and both Natal and Cape Colony have for years past taken toll on the Rand traffic, and thereby swelled their own revenues.