wholly disinterested assistance of the French and Russian legations,
obtained in 1896 a concession to construct the Lu Han
Railway from Peking 750 miles southward to Hankow, the
commercial metropolis on the middle Yang-tze River. It is significant,
however, that while the Belgian syndicate was temporarily
embarrassed, the Russo-Chinese Bank of Peking aided
the Chinese Director-General of Railways to begin the section
running from Peking to Paoting-fu. The road is open to
Shunte-fu, 300 miles south of Peking and to Hsu-chou, 434
kilometers north of Hankow. The Russo-Chinese Bank is
building a branch line from Ching-ting via Tai-yuen-fu to Singan-fu
in Shen-si, where it will be well started on the beaten
caravan route between north China and Russian Central Asia.
On November 13, 1903, the Belgian International Eastern
Company signed a contract to construct a railway from Kai-
feng-fu, the capital of the Province of Honan, 110 miles west
to Honan-fu.

I found the line running south from Peking well-built with
solid road-bed, massive stone culverts, iron bridges, and heavy
steel rails. The first and second class coaches are not attractive
in appearance, and though the fare for the former is double
that of the latter, the chief discernible difference is that in the
first class compartment, which is usually in one end of a second-
class car, the seats are curved and the passengers fewer in
number, while in the second-class the seats are straight boards
and are apt to be crowded with Chinese coolies. Neither class
is upholstered and neither would be considered comfortable in
America, but after the weeks I had spent in a mule-litter, anything
on rails seemed luxurious. Our train was a mixed one,--