Engineering Wonders of the World
Volume I

THE HEDJAZ RAILWAY. 349 all the money subscribed for the railway was used for that purpose. This renunciation is in itself sufficient to render the Hedjaz scheme a memorable feature of the Ottoman Empire. It remains to lay 285 miles of track across the desert from Medina to Mecca. The work is being pushed forward with A unabated vigour, and soon it wiH be possible for Moslems Ahead. r to travel to that—in the eyes of the unbeliever—mysterious city with speed and in such comfort as the pilgrim of other days could hardly conceive as existing out- side his Paradise. When the Bagdad Rail- way has progressed another 200 miles, and the Bosphorus has been spanned by a bridge, Mecca will be in direct communication with Constantinople itself, and the influence of the Sultan must necessarily increase among the Arabian tribes who at present refuse him fealty. Looking still further into the future, we see the great land of Arabia, as yet largely unexplored by Europeans, thrown open to the tourist, who will book right through to it from Paris, Berlin, Vienna, and other great continental cities. VADI PTIL BRIDGE. The only one built by Turkish soldiers.