that object. As they stand, the railways alone are an asset worth the whole of the debt. But as an additional security there are still in the hands, and at the disposal, of the various Governments 1,782,558,693 acres of unalienated land. So that the investor in Australian stocks is secure beyond all possibility of question.
There is no more absorbing or debatable question than the extent to which State or municipal enterprise can be carried with advantage to the community. There can be no question as to the direction in which the whole world is at present travelling. The construction of the Pacific cable by the British and Colonial Governments in direct competition with private enterprise may be cited as the latest and most pronounced expression of State Socialism. Australia, in common with New Zealand, is conducting experiments from which other countries may, in matters of the deepest importance, derive the dearly-bought lessons of experience without expense to themselves, and can ascertain what it would be well to avoid and what to imitate in the solution of problems with which they may soon be called upon to deal.
Doubtless the explanation of the apparent anomaly that the United States and Australia, those two great sister offshoots from a common ancestry, are poles asunder as regards the sphere of State activity is to be found in the different condition of industry and transport at the time of their origin. The foundations of the policy of the United States were laid ages anterior to the advent of railroads and the industrial revolution. The giant power of steam had not then been harnessed to human service, intricate and expensive machinery was unknown, and highly-organized industry was unnecessary. There was at that time nothing in the problem of colonization which surpassed the power of men single-handed or grouped together for some temporary purpose. Knit together in the strongest bonds of fellowship by religious fervour, and welded by perse-
