a few months satisfactory. The tender of Mr. E. Keane (£105,312) for the construction of the Chidlow's Well to York section was accepted on 22nd October, 1883, and the line was opened on 29th June, 1885, amid demonstration. The interior was at last connected with the seaboard, and although this trunk line did not immediately pay as handsomely as was originally anticipated in the estimates, it proved of paramount importance to development by cheapening production.
According to the view of Mr. J.A. Wright, who had been appointed Engineer-it-Chief, the policy of the Government in the construction of the Eastern railways had been, throughout, short-sighted and weak. In a report dated 24th August, 1885, after an examination of the line, he decided that it had been nearly ruined because of lack of funds, and of false economy practised from first to last. With a small additional outlay on trial surveys, to ensure the best route, and on additional earthworks, a railway might have been built, the working expenses for which would have been reduced by at least one third. The line, he said, was "starved from beginning to end," and until necessary improvements were made trains would have to be limited, both in number and load. He objected to the gradients, curves, equipment, and the methods allocating the loan funds for these purposes. The loans floated for the laying of one section were insufficient to complete it, and moneys were taken out of the funds designed for the next section. The total receipts on the Eastern line in 1885 represented £24,796, and the working expenses £24,731, leaving a profit of £65; the receipts on the Geraldton-Northampton line were £2,557, and the expenditure was £3,456, or a loss of £899.
Different proposals were being made to build land grant railways to Beverley, Northam, Newcastle, and other places, but for obvious reasons the Legislature discreetly preferred to have these centres attached to the Government system. The public, with Councillors, were by now almost unanimous in their support of railway extension. The perfervid opposition had been broken down, for the colony had tasted of the sweets of loan moneys vigorously expended on public works. A syndicate offered to build a railway on the land grant principle from Albany to York, but as circumstances of settlement made impossible for the Government to satisfy its demands in regard to the section from Beverley to York, an Act was passed providing that this be constructed out of loan funds. The contract was let on 21st April, 1885, to Mr. Keane for £59,878, and the line was opened by Governor Broome, on 5th August, 1886. So that the other chief eastern districts centres might enjoy equal advantages with York and Beverley, the Legislative Council decided, in 1886, to build a line from Spencer's Brook (on the York Railway) to Northam, and in 1887, a second branch from Clackline to Newcastle. Acts were passed in 1886 to build a railway from Geraldton to Greenough, and a tramway from Roebourne to Cossack. The works were projected under another loan bill, passed in 1884, amounting to £525,000. The line to Northam built by Mr. Keane (contract £13,436) was thrown open to traffic on 13th October, 1886; from Geraldton to Greenough (Mr. Keane, contractor, £42,561) on 21st June, 1887; and from Clackline to Newcastle on 5th January, 1888. The tramway connecting Roebourne with Cossack was built by Wright and Atkins. Still another important trunk line was proposed. It was suggested that a railway should be built from Perth to Busselton, through Pinjarra, draining a splendid class of country at places along the route, and connecting with wealthy jarrah forests. A Legislative committee recommended the construction of the line by a company, under a guarantee of interest, a proposal that was received with favour by the Council. The Secretary for the Colonies was communicated with by Governor Broome, and in November, 1887, refused to countenance the scheme.
The desire to build railways of one kind or other became almost unlimited in some quarters. The special, and pleasing, and apparently cheap method of securing these connecting links was by means of extensive land grants to private companies and syndicates. Proposals were made, and found their supporters, to lay railways to Albany, Eucla, Hampton Plains, Geraldton, Roebourne, and even to Kimberley. The whole of the huge colony seemingly required buckling with strong hoops of iron. Whether the stages of development in the various districts warranted such facilities was hardly taken into consideration by the sponsors of these schemes. Some people thought that as they had huge areas of waste lands, it would be just as well to give them to these railway-building syndicates as to keep them in idleness. It seemed a cheap means of getting railways. Happily, the actual fell very far short of the proposed, for had the local Government accepted all the offers made to them the colony might have outshone Central America in railway "bubbles."
In 1880-1 advocates arose who proposed that a railway should be built to King George's Sound on the land-grant principle. Governor Robinson communicated with the Secretary for the Colonies, and that official promised that he would sanction any scheme of the kind which was brought forward by responsible and competent persons on terms advantageous to the colony. On 13th September, 1881, Lord Gifford, the new Colonial Secretary, proposed in the Legislative Council that the sum of £600 be expended in obtaining information concerning the country through which the railway would pass, and to bring the scheme before the notice of capitalists in England. Surveyor-General Fraser suggested in a report:—"That in consideration of European capitalists constructing a railway of a similar class to the New Zealand lines (3 feet 6 inches), and undertaking the settlement of not less than, say, 5,000 people in the colony, the Crown shall grant in fee 2,000,000 acres of land, to be selected by them between Beverley and King George's Sound;" the Government to build a connecting line from Perth to Beverley.
Capitalists willing to construct the railway were soon forthcoming. On 7th January, 1882, Mr. Jules Joubert, on behalf of people in the eastern colonies, submitted an offer to Governor Robinson. He proposed that the line be constructed and handed over to the Government, equipped and in good working order, on or before 31st December, 1885, on the following terms:—The contractors to introduce not less than 2,000 immigrants of European origin who should receive and accept land as part payment for work done; the Western Australian Government granting to him in fee simple 10,000,000 acres, viz., one-half along the line of railway, one-fourth east of the line towards the South Australian boundary, and one-fourth west of the line, in the country between Geographe Bay and Albany. The cost of construction was estimated by Mr. Joubert at £1,000,000. The Governor transmitted the proposal to the Council, asking members to quickly decide. Mr. L.C. Burges found fault with Mr. Joubert's estimates, but believed that if the line were opened up and the proposed immigrants settled on the land, the brightest prospects ever known in Western Australia would be ushered in. Mr. Carey agreed with Mr. Burges; but Mr. W.H. Venn was not satisfied. He thought Mr. Joubert's proposal was made in contempt of the intelligence of the inhabitants of the colony, and of the Council in particular. No railway scheme would have his support that sought to lower the fee simple of lands
