Similarly, all the broken rock for the concrete had to be brought from the quarries at Miami, and with the cement was stacked in huge heaps at Knight’s Key, which constituted the supply depot. The scattered situations of some of the constructional gangs taxed the efforts of the commissariat to a straining-point. In many cases the supply boats, in order to get to their destination, only perhaps a mile distant as the bird flies, had to follow a circuitous route of eight or ten miles to get there. When it was seen that Mr. Flagler was serious in his intentions, and that the first stretch of viaduct was completed successfully, it was maintained that “Flagler’s Folly,” though a wonder of engineering, never could hope to pay its way. Time alone can prove or disprove this contention, but it is worth while to observe that, as each section of the line has been completed, strenuous efforts to develop the country penetrated thereby have been made. The Florida East Coast railway serves an essentially pleasure country--the Riviera of America. Yet, as the line plunged southwards, hotels sprang up at various sylvan spots, and they rapidly assumed positions of importance. The only barren stretch is the Everglades. The commercial conquest of this useless expanse must come later inevitably, and indeed energetic measures to this end are in active progress. CHAPTER XX THE LAND OF REMARKABLE RAILWAY BRIDGES In order to describe fully the complete conquest which the iron horse has accomplished in British India, volumes would be required. In that country the steel highway has been driven forward in the face of prodigious difficulties of every description; the story is an exciting romance. But the features which impress the traveller most strongly are the bridges. Some compel more than passing interest because of their great length, such as the Sone bridge, on the East Indian railway, which consists of 93 spans, giving the structure a total length of 10,952 feet, making it one of the longest bridges in the world; or the Godavari over the river of the same name on the Madras North-East line, 9,066 feet in length; others because of their height, as, for instance, the Gokteik Viaduct in Burma, 325 feet high; or the Dhorabhave Viaduct, 178 feet above the stream; while here and there attention is challenged because of the massive proportions of the structure or its unusual design, as, for instance, the Jubilee Bridge across the river Hooghly at Naihati, or the Lansdowne Bridge across the Indus at Sukkur, the main span of which is 790 feet clear. It may be safe to assert that no country has offered the bridge-builder such striking opportunities to display his ability or enterprise as the Indian Empire. The Americans point to the great width of their waterways, and the huge structures which leap across the Mississippi, Missouri or Columbia rivers, but, compared beside the erections which carry the railway across the Indian waterways, they appear puny.