five years at £50,000,000 sterling, which, added to the normal requirements of the country apart from those of mining, would mean an annual outlay of at least £60,000,000 for the benefit of commerce. It will be seen that no allowance is here made for possible developments in agriculture and kindred pursuits, which may not unreasonably be expected to ensue as the result of the fostering care of the administrations, under the Imperial Government, of the Transvaal and Orange River Colonies, although large disbursements might with perfect safety be placed to the credit of these and other industries which may safely be assumed to be promoted during the interval between the present and the year to which these estimates relate. That the Rand gold industry can never be checked again, short of another war, which is extremely improbable, is as certain as that the sun shines, and the same remark applies to the other mineral propositions. It is therefore well within the bounds of probability to predict that the total purchasing capacity of South Africa five years hence will be at least £60,000,000 sterling per annum (which is an exceedingly moderate computation in view of the fact that the estimated total in 1902 is £42,000,000), a sum which, assuming our other colonies and possessions do not advance in the same ratio, will make that country an easy first as Great Britain's best market. If Messrs. Hatch and Leggett be correct in their surmise that the life of the Rand is forty-two and a half years--and in the main they are supported by other competent authorities--excluding altogether the possibility of other discoveries of precious metals and minerals in that long interval, and eliminating for the moment, what is improbable, that the remainder of the three hundred and fifty mining and exploration companies above referred to remain idle meantime, or that their number is not hugely increased, we arrive at a total expenditure of _two thousand five hundred and fifty millions sterling_ as South Africa's contribution to trade in the period in question. As it would be futile to dilate upon what this overwhelming sum means to British industries, it must be left to the imagination. It is worth thinking about nevertheless.