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Rh suggested by Sir Macdonald Stephenson and others in 1841-43. But it was reserved to Lord Dalhousie to overcome what seemed to be the insuperable difficulties, and to initiate the work. The year after his annexation of the Punjab, 1850, saw the first sod turned.

In 1853, the year in which he removed the headquarters of the Bengal Artillery a thousand miles inland from the outskirts of Calcutta to Meerut, Lord Dalhousie wrote his great Railway Minute. That scheme, one of the most comprehensive and far-seeing which ever issued from a human brain, remains the basis of the whole railway system of India to this day. Lord Mayo, when amplifying it by feeder-lines and filling in connecting links, seventeen years afterwards, was careful to point out that his proposals still proceeded on the plan laid down by his illustrious predecessor. Lord Dalhousie pushed on the work so vigorously that the terminal section of the Great Indian Peninsular Railway was opened as far as Thána in 1853; and before the end of 1856, thousands of miles were under construction or survey. During the official year 1856-57, the lines carried close on two million passengers: they now carry over a hundred millions per annum. The railway system of India thus devised by Lord Dalhousie, and developed by his successors, had 15,245 miles at work in 1888-89.

Lord Dalhousie seized the opportunity, afforded