With the wealth of the landlord his political power will pass away. The government of European countries will pass out of the hands of the great landowners, but not into those of the rabble, as is feared. It will pass into the same hands that govern America to-day--the territorial democracy, the owners of small farms, and the manufacturers and merchants. When this comes to pass, attempts will be made to settle international disputes by arbitration instead of war, following the example of the Geneva arbitration between the two greatest industrial nations of the world. Whether our Federal system will ever extend to the rest of the world, no one knows, but we do know that without railways it would be impossible. When we consider the effects of all these wonderful changes upon the sum of human happiness, we must admit that the engineer should justly take rank with statesmen and soldiers, and that no greater benefactors to the human race can be named than the Stephensons and their American disciples--Allen, Rogers, Jervis, Winans, Latrobe, and Holley. FOOTNOTES: [1] It is proper here to say that English engineers now appreciate the merits of the American swivelling truck or bogie. In the article on Railways in the last edition of the "Encyclopædia Britannica," speaking of locomotives, the author of the article, who is an English engineer of high authority, says: "American practice, many years since, arrived at two leading types of locomotive for passenger, and for goods traffic. The passenger locomotive has eight wheels, of which four in front are framed in a bogie, and the four wheels behind are coupled drivers. _This is the type to which English practice has been approximating._" The italics are ours. [2] The statistics of ten leading English and ten leading American lines, given by Dorsey, show the following results: 1. The cost per year of the rations, wages, fuel of an American locomotive is $5,590; of an English locomotive, $3,080. 2. Average yearly number of train-miles run by American locomotive, 23,928; English locomotive, 17,539. 3. Yearly earnings: American locomotive, $14,860; English locomotive, $10,940, although the English freight charges are much greater than those of the United States. [3] The writer has obtained many of the statistics used in this article from A. M. Wellington's "Economic Theory of Railway Location," a perfect mine of valuable information upon all such matters. [4] The amount of permanent wood and iron truss bridges, and of temporary wooden trestles on the Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul is as follows: Truss bridges, 700 spans, average 93 feet, 12-4/5 miles. Trestle " 7,196 " " 77 " 103-1/10 " ------ -------- Total, 7,896 115-9/10 " The approximate total number of bridges in the United States was in 1888: