Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/159

 Fare, ten cents. All the cities in Australia have better street-railway accommodations than the country has steam-railway accommodations; it seems to me that the steam railways are not as numerous or efficient as the country demands, whereas I have everywhere remarked the excellence of street railways In the United States, the privately owned railways cross the country from north to south, and from east to west, but the government-owned railways have not done as much for Australia. Comparing Australia with the United States, there is no railway across the continent, whereas we have five or six systems; nor is there a railway here crossing the continent from north to south. The Australian railways fringe the populous coast for a distance of fourteen or fifteen hundred miles; they take few risks, and do not attempt to make fruitful districts out of arid districts, as do the privately owned railways in the United States. Our railways have done more to develop the country than the government has done. Nor do the government-owned railways in Australia move perishable freight more promptly: at many stations along the road from Sydney to Adelaide, I heard complaints because the railway company did not provide cars in which to ship wheat piled on the ground. And when a car is provided, it is a small open flat-car, and does not hold much more than a big wagon. So far as I have been able to make out, railway rates are a little higher here than in the United States, and the service very much poorer We think we notice that women are rather better dressed in Australia than in New Zealand, and possibly a little better looking In every