German Post-War Recovery.

The first hotel to be constructed and operated by the German Railways Company is located alongside the newly-built passenger terminal in Stuttgart. This hotel possesses 125 bedrooms, equipped with luxurious bathrooms, telephones, and all the amenities beloved by the Marco Polo of to-day. A special feature is made of an exhibition room for the display of commercial travellers' samples, while an added convenience is the provision of direct covered access between the platforms of the terminal and the hotel reception room.

Vast progress has been made on the German lines in every field of activity. In the fifth annual report of the Commissioner for the German Railways, covering the financial year ended December 31st, 1926, this progress is everywhere reflected. During the year the railways paid out some 575 million gold marks for the service of reparation bonds, and in the current year the liabilities of the system under this head should also be fully met. Owing to the serious economic situation at the beginning of the year 1926, the total receipts showed a reduction of three per cent. as compared with 1925, but business has now reached higher levels, and the receipts for the first four months of the present year were 18 per cent. higher than those for the corresponding period of 1926. The German railway system covers 53,000 route kilometres, and in the year 1926 the trains of the German Railway Company ran some 570,000,000 kilometres, or 1,600,000 kilometres per day. This makes the daily activities of the system equivalent to the running of a train forty times round the Equator, a truly remarkable performance unequalled by any single railway system the world over.