Chapter V: Part 5

In rails, the same system has prevailed. Ironmasters have been pitted against each other, as to which should produce an apparent rail at the lowest price. At the outset of railways the rails were made of iron. Competition gradually produced rails in which a core, of what is technically called “cinder,” is covered up with a skin of iron; and the cleverest foreman for an ironmaster was the man who could make rails with the maximum of cinder and the minimum of iron. In more than one instance has it been known in relaying an old line the worn-out rails have been sold at a higher price per ton than the new ones were bought for; yet this would hardly open the eyes of the buyers. The contrivances which are resorted to to get hold of one another’s prices beforehand by competing contractors are manifold; and, when they attend in person, they commonly put off the filling up of their tender till the last moment. Once a shrewd contractor found himself at the same inn with a rival who always trod close on his heels. He was followed about and cross-questioned incessantly, and gave vague answers. Within half-an-hour of the last moment he went into the coffee room and sat himself down in a corner where his rival could not overlook him. There and then he filled up his tender, and, as he rose from the table, left behind him the paper on which he had blotted it. As he left the room his rival caught up the blotting paper, and, with the exulting glee of a consciously successful rival, read off the amount backwards. “Done this time!” was his mental thought, as he filled up his own tender a dollar lower, and hastened to deposit it. To his utter surprise, the next day he found that he had lost the contract, and complainingly asked his rival how it was, for he had tendered below him. “How did you know you were below me?” “Because I found your blotting paper.” “I thought so. I left it on purpose for you, and wrote another tender in my bedroom. You had better make your own calculations next time!”

—_Roads and Rails_, by W. B. Adams.

RAILWAY LEGISLATION.

A writer in the _Encyclopædia Britannica_ remarks:—“The expenses, direct and incidental, of obtaining an Act of Parliament have been in many cases enormous, and generally are excessive. The adherence to useless and expensive forms of Parliamentary Committees in what are called the standing orders, or general regulations for the observance of promoters of railway bills, on the one part, and the itching for opposition of railway companies, to resist fancied inroads on vested rights, supposed injurious competition, on the other part, have been amongst the sources of excessive expenditure. Mr. Stephenson mentioned an instance showing how Parliament has entailed expense upon railway companies by the system complained of. The Trent Valley Railway was under other titles originally proposed in 1836. It was, however, thrown out by the standing orders committee, in consequence of a barn of the value of £10, which was shown upon the general plan, not having been exhibited upon an enlarged sheet. In 1840, the line again went before Parliament. It was opposed by the Grand Junction Railway Company, now part of the London and North-Western. No less than 450 allegations were made against it before the standing orders subcommittee, which was engaged twenty-two days in considering those objections. They ultimately reported that four or five of the allegations were proved, but the committee nevertheless allowed the bill to proceed. It was read a second time and then went into committee, by whom it was under consideration for sixty-three days; and ultimately Parliament was prorogued before the report could be made. Such were the delays and consequent expenses which the forms of the House occasioned in this case, that it may be doubted if the ultimate cost of constructing the whole line was very much more than was expended in obtaining permission from Parliament to make it. This example serves to show the expensive formalities, the delays, and difficulties, with which Parliament surround railway legislation. Another instance, quoted by the same authority, will show not only the absurdity of the system of legislation, but also the afflicting spirit of competition and opposition with which railway bills are canvassed in Parliament, and the expensive outlay incurred by companies themselves.

“In 1845, a bill for a line now existing went before Parliament with eighteen competitors, each party relying on the wisdom of Parliament to allow their bill at least to pass a second reading! Nineteen different parties condemned to one scene of contentious litigation! They each and all had to pay not only the costs of promoting their own line, but also the costs of opposing eighteen other bills. And yet conscious as government must have been of this fact, Parliament deliberately abandoned the only step it ever took on any occasion of subjecting railway projects to investigation by a preliminary tribunal. Parliamentary committees generally satisfied themselves with looking on and watching the ruinous game of competition for which the public are ultimately to pay. In fact, railway legislation became a mere scramble, conducted on no system or principle. Schemes of sound character were allowed to be defeated on merely technical grounds, and others of very inferior character were sanctioned by public act, after enormous Parliamentary expenses had been incurred. Competing lines were granted, sometimes parallel lines through the same district, and between the same towns.”

AN EXPENSIVE PARLIAMENTARY BILL.

A writer in the _Popular Encyclopædia_ observes:—“But the most conspicuous example in recent times, which overshadowed all others, of excessive expenditure in Parliamentary litigation as well as in land and compensation, is supplied in the history of the Great Northern Company. The preliminary expenses of surveys, notices to landowners, etc., commenced in 1844, and the Bill was introduced into the House of Commons in 1845, when it was opposed by the London and North-Western, the Eastern Counties, and the Midland Railways. It was further opposed successively by two other schemes, called the London and York and the Direct Northern. The contest lasted eighty-two days before the House of Commons, more than half the time having been consumed by opposition to the Bill. The Bill was allowed to stand over till next year (1846), when it began, before the Committee of the House of Lords, where it left off in the Lower House in the year 1845 on account of the magnitude of the case. The Bill was before the Upper House between three and four weeks, and in the same year (1846) it was granted. The promoters of the rival projects were bought off, and all their expenses paid, including the costs of the opposition of the neighbouring lines already named, before the Great Northern bill was passed; and the ‘preliminary expenses,’ comprising the whole expenditure of every kind up to the passing of the bill was £590,355, or more than half-a-million sterling, incurred at the end of two years of litigation. Subsequently to the passing of the Act an additional sum of £172,722 was expended for law engineering expenses in Parliament to 31st December, 1857, which was spent almost wholly in obtaining leave from Parliament to make various alterations. Thus it would appear that a sum total of £763,077 was spent as Parliamentary charges for obtaining leave to construct 245 miles, being at the rate of £3,118 per mile.”

THE RECTOR AND HIS PIG.

“I have been a rector for many years,” writes a clergyman, “and have often heard and read of tithe-pigs, though I have never met with a specimen of them. But I had once a little pig given to me which was of a choice breed, and only just able to leave his mother. I had to convey him by carriage to the X station; from thence, twenty-three miles to Y station, and from thence, eighty-two miles to Z station, and from there, eight miles by carriage. I had a comfortable rabbit-hutch of a box made for him, with a supply of fresh cabbages for his dinner on the road. I started off with my wife, children, and nurse; and of these impediments piggy proved to be the most formidable. First, a council of war was held over him at X station by the railway officials, who finally decided that this small porker must travel as ‘two dogs.’ Two dog tickets were therefore procured for him; and so we journeyed on to Y station. There a second council of war was held, and the officials of Y said that the officials of X (another line) might be prosecuted for charging my piggy as two dogs, but that he must travel to Z as a horse, and that he must have a huge horse-box entirely to himself for the next eighty-two miles. I declined to pay for the horse-box—they refused to let me have my pig—officials swarmed around me—the station master advised me to pay for the horse-box and probably the company would return the extra charge. I scorned the probability, having no faith in the company—the train (it was a London express) was already detained ten minutes by this wrangle; and finally I whirled away bereft of my pig. I felt sure that he would be forwarded by the next train, but as that would not reach Z till a late hour in the evening, and it was Saturday, I had to tell my pig tale to the officials; and not only so, but to go to the adjacent hotel and hire a pig-stye till the Monday, and fee a porter for seeing to the pig until I could send a cart for him on that day. Of course the pig was sent after me by the next train; and as the charge for him was less than a halfpenny a mile, I presume he was not considered to be a horse. Yet this fact remains—and it is worth the attention of the Zoological Society, if not of railway officials—that this small porker was never recognised as a pig, but began his railway journey as two dogs, and was then changed into a horse.”

SIR MORTON PETO’S RAILWAY MISSION.

Mr., afterwards Sir S. Morton Peto, having undertaken the construction of certain railways in East Anglia, was at this time in the habit of spending a considerable part of the year in the neighbourhood of Norwich, and, with his family, joined Mr. Brock’s congregation. It will afterwards appear how many important movements turned upon the friendship which was thus formed; but it is only now to be noted that, in the course of frequent conversations, the practicability was discussed of attempting something which might serve to interest and improve the large number of labourers employed on the works in progress. They were part of that peculiar body of men which had been gradually formed during a long course of years for employment in the construction, first of navigable canals, and then of railways, and called, from their earlier occupation, “navvies.” They were drawn from diverse parts of the British Islands, and professed, in some instances, hostile forms of religion, but were distinguished chiefly by extreme ignorance and all but total spiritual insensibility. They had, at the same time, a common life and an unwritten law, affecting their relations to each other, their employers, and the rest of the world. That they were accessible to kind attentions—clearly disinterested—followed from their being men, but they required to be approached with the greatest caution and patience. Mr. Brock’s wide and various sympathy, joined with his friend’s steady support, led—under the divine blessing—to measures which proved very successful. Mr. Peto constructed commodious halls capable of being moved onward as the line of railway advanced, and affording comfortable shelter for the men in their leisure hours, and furnished with books and publications supplying amusement, useful information, and religious knowledge. To give life to this apparatus, Christian men, carefully selected, mingled familiarly with the rude but grateful toilers, helping them to read and write, encouraging them to acquire self-command, and above all, especially when they were convened on Sundays, presenting and pressing home upon them the words of eternal life.

Mr. Brock had liberty to draw on the “Railway Mission Account,” at the Norwich Bank, to any extent that he found necessary, and in a short time he had a body of the best men, he was accustomed to say, that he ever knew at work upon all the chief points of the lines. No part of his now extended labours gave him greater delight than in superintending these missionaries, reading their weekly journals, arranging their periodical movements, counselling and comforting them in their difficulties, and visiting them, sometimes apart and at other times at conferences for united consultation and prayer, held at Yarmouth, Ely, or March.

Results of the best character, of which the record is on high, arose out of these operations.

—Birrell’s _Life of the Rev. W. Brock_, _D.D._

CLEVER CAPTURE.

A few days ago (1845), a gentleman left Glasgow in one of the day trains, with a large sum of money about his person. On the train arriving at the Edinburgh terminus, the gentleman left it, along with the other passengers, on foot for some distance. It was not long, however, before he discovered that his pocket book, containing £700, in bank notes was missing. He immediately returned to the terminus, where the first person he happened to find was the stoker of the train that had brought him to Edinburgh, who, on being spoken to, remembered seeing the gentleman leaving the terminus, and another person following close behind him, whom he supposed to be his servant; he further stated, that the supposed servant had started to return with the train which had just left for Glasgow. The gentleman immediately ordered an express train, but as some time elapsed before the steam could be got up, it was feared the gentleman and the stoker would not reach Glasgow in time to secure the culprit. However, having gone the distance in about an hour, they had the satisfaction of seeing the train before them close to the Cowlairs station, just about to descend the inclined plane and tunnel, and thus within a mile and a half of the end of their journey. The stoker immediately sounded his whistle, which induced the conductor of the passenger train to conclude that some danger was in the way, who had his train removed to the other line of rails, which left the road then quite clear for the express train, which drove past the other with great speed, and arrived at the terminus in sufficient time to get everything ready for the apprehension of the robber. The stoker, who thought he could identify the robber, assisted the police in searching the passenger train, when the person whom he had taken for the gentleman’s servant was found with the pocket book and also the £700 safe and untouched. The gentleman then offered a handsome reward to the stoker, who refused it on the plea that he had only done his duty; not satisfied, however, with this answer, he left £100 with the manager, requesting him to pay the expenses of the express train, and particularly to reward the stoker for his activity, and to remit the remainder to his address. Shortly after he received the whole £100, accompanied with a polite note, declining any payment for the express train, and stating that it was the duty of the company to reward the stoker, which they would not omit to do.

—_Stirling Journal_.

COMPENSATION FOR LAND.

Mr. Williams, in _Our Iron Roads_, gives much interesting information upon the subject of compensation for land and buying off opposition to railway schemes. He says:—“One noble lord had an estate near a proposed line of railway, and on this estate was a beautiful mansion. Naturally averse to the desecration of his home and its neighbourhood, he gave his most uncompromising opposition to the Bill, and found, in the Committee of both Houses, sympathizing listeners. Little did it aid the projectors that they urged that the line did not pass within six miles of that princely domain; that the high road was much closer to his dwelling; and that, as the spot nearest the house would be passed by means of a tunnel, no unsightliness would arise. But no; no worldly consideration affected the decision of the proprietor; and, arguments failing, it was found that an appeal must be made to other means. His opposition was ultimately bought off for twenty-eight thousand pounds, to be paid when the railway reached his neighbourhood. Time wore on, funds became scarce, and the company found that it would be best to stop short at a particular portion of their line, long before they reached the estate of the noble lord who had so violently opposed their Bill, by which they sought to be released from the obligation of constructing the line which had been so obnoxious to him. What was their surprise at finding this very man their chief opponent, and then fresh means had to be adopted for silencing his objections!

“A line had to be brought near to the property of a certain Member of Parliament. It threatened no injury to the estate, either by affecting its appearance or its intrinsic worth; and, on the other hand, it afforded him a cheap, convenient, and expeditious means of communication with the metropolis. But the proprietor, being a legislator, had power at head-quarters, and by his influence he nearly turned the line of railway aside; and this deviation would have cost the projectors the sum of _sixty thousand pounds_. Now it so happened that the house of this honourable member, who had thus insisted on such costly deference to his peculiar feelings respecting his property, was afflicted with the dry rot, and threatened every hour to fall upon the head of its owner. To pull down and rebuild it, would require the sum of thirty thousand pounds. The idea of compromise, beneficial to both parties, suggested itself. If the railway company rebuilt the house, or paid £30,000 to the owner of the estate, and were allowed to pursue their original line, it was clear that they would be £30,000 the richer, as the enforced deviation would cost £60,000; and, on the other hand, the owner of the estate would obtain a secure house, or receive £30,000 in money. The proposed bargain was struck, and £30,000 was paid by the Company. ‘How can you live in that house,’ said some friend to him afterwards, ‘with the railroad coming so near?’ ‘Had it not done so,’ was the reply, ‘I could not have lived in it at all.’

“One rather original character sold some land to the London and Birmingham Company, and was loud and long in his outcries for compensation, expatiating on the damages which the formation of the line would inevitably bring to his property. His complaints were only stopped by the payment of his demands. A few months afterwards, a little additional land was required from the same individual, when he actually demanded a much larger price for the new land than was given him before; and, on surprise being expressed at the charge for that which he had declared would inevitably be greatly deteriorated in value from the proximity of the railway, he coolly replied: ‘Oh, I made a mistake _then_, in thinking the railway would injure my property; it has increased its value, and of course you must pay me an increased price for it.’

“On one occasion, a trial occurred in which an eminent land valuer was put into the witness box to swell the amount of damages, and he proceeded to expatiate on the injury committed by railroads in general, and especially by the one in question, in _cutting up_ the properties they invaded. When he had finished the delivery of this weighty piece of evidence, the counsel for the Company put a newspaper into his hand, and asked him whether he had not inserted a certain advertisement therein. The fact was undeniable, and on being read aloud, it proved to be a declaration by the land valuer himself, that the approach of the railway which he had come there to oppose, would prove exceedingly beneficial to some property in its immediate vicinity then on sale.

“An illustration of the difference between the exorbitant demands made by parties for compensation, and the real value of the property, may be mentioned. The first claim made by the Directors of the Glasgow Lunatic Asylum on the Edinburgh and Glasgow railway is stated to have been no less than £44,000. Before the trial came on, this sum was reduced to £10,000; the amount awarded by the jury was £873.

“The opposition thus made, whether feigned or real, it was always advisable to remove; and the money paid for this purpose, though ostensibly in the purchase of the ground, has been on many occasions immense. Sums of £35,000, £40,000, £50,000, £100,000, and £120,000, have thus been paid; while various ingenious plans have been adopted of removing the opposition of influential men. An honourable member is said to have received £30,000 to withdraw his opposition to a Bill before the House; and ‘not far off the celebrated year 1845, a lady of title, so gossip talks, asked a certain nobleman to support a certain Bill, stating that, if he did, she had the authority of the secretary of a great company to inform him that fifty shares in a certain railway, then at a considerable premium, would be at his disposal.’

“One pleasing circumstance, however, highly honourable to the gentleman concerned, must not be omitted. The late Mr. Labouchere had made an agreement with the Eastern Counties Company for a passage through his estate near Chelmsford, for the price of £35,000; his son and successor, the Right Honourable Henry Labouchere, finding that the property was not deteriorated to the anticipated extent, voluntarily returned £15,000.

“The practice of buying off opposition has not been confined to the proprietors of land. We learn from one of the Parliamentary Reports that in a certain district a pen-and-ink warfare between two rival companies ran so high, and was, at least on one side, rewarded with such success, that the friends of the older of the two projected lines thought it expedient to enter into treaty with their literary opponent, and its editor very soon retired on a fortune. It is also asserted, on good authority, that, in a midland county, the facts and arguments of an editor were wielded with such vigour that the opposing company found it necessary to adopt extraordinary means on the occasion. Bribes were offered, but refused; an opposition paper was started, but its conductors quailed before the energy of their opponent, and it produced little effect; every scheme that ingenuity could devise, and money carry out, was attempted, but they successively and utterly failed. At length a Director hit on a truly Machiavellian plan—he was introduced to the proprietor of the journal, whom he cautiously informed that he wished to risk a few thousands in newspaper property, and actually induced his unconscious victim to sell the property, unknown to the editor. When the bargain was concluded, the plot was discovered; but it was then too late, and the wily Director took possession of the copyright of the paper and the printing office on behalf of the company. The services of the editor, however, were not to be bought, he refused to barter away his independence, and retired—taking with him the respect of both friends and enemies.”

A LANDOWNER’S OPPOSITION.

In _Herepath’s Railway Journal_ for 1845 we meet with the following:—“A learned counsel, the other day, gave as a reason for a wealthy and aristocratic landowner’s opposition to a great line of railway approaching his residence by something more than a mile distance, that ‘His Lordship rode horses that would not bear the puff of a steam engine.’ Truly this was a most potent reason, and one that should weigh heavily against the scheme in the minds of the Committee. His Lordship has a wood some two miles off, between which and his residence this railway is intended to pass. His lordship is fond of amusing himself there in hunting down little animals called hares, and sometimes treats himself to a stag hunt. Not the slightest interference is contemplated with his lordship’s pastime, or rather pursuit, for such it is, occupying nearly his whole time, and exercising all the ability of which he is possessed; but still he objects to the intrusion. The bridge that is to be constructed by the Company to give access to the wood, or forest, is in itself all that could be wished, forming, rather than otherwise, an ornamental structure to his lordship’s grounds; but then he fears that should an engine chance (of course, these chances are not within his control) to pass under the bridge at the same moment as he is passing over, his high blood horses would prance and rear, and suffer injury therefrom. His lordship is very careful and proud of his horse-flesh, and thinks it hard, and what the legislature ought not to tolerate, that they (his horses) are to be worried, or subjected to the chance of it, by making a railway to serve the public wants!

“This _noble_ man is of opinion, too, that, should the railway be made, he is entitled to an enormous amount of compensation; and, through his agent, assigns as a reason for his extravagant demand—we do not exaggerate the fact—that he is averse to railways in general, and considers the system as an unjustifiable invasion of the province of horse-flesh. This horse jockey lord thereby excuses his conscience in opposing and endeavouring to plunder the railway company as far as he possibly can.”

PICTURE EVIDENCE.

Amongst laughable occurrences that enlivened the committee rooms during the gauge contest, was a scene occasioned by a parliamentary counsel putting in as evidence, before the committee on the Southampton and Manchester line, a printed picture of troubles consequent on a break of gauge. The picture was a forcible sketch that had appeared a few days before in the pages of the _Illustrated London News_. Opposing counsel of course argued against the production of the work of art as testimony for the consideration of the committee. After much argument on both sides the chairman decided in favour of receiving the illustration, which was forthwith put, amidst much laughter, into the hands of a witness, who was asked if it was a fair picture of the evils that arose from a break of gauge. The witness replying in the affirmative, the engraving was then laid before the committee for inspection.

—_Railway Chronicle_, June 13, 1846.

EXTRAORDINARY USE OF THE ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.

Oct. 7, 1847. An extraordinary instance has occurred of the application of the electric telegraph at the London Bridge terminus of the South Eastern Railway.

Hutchings, the man found guilty and sentenced to death for poisoning his wife, was to have been executed at Maidstone Goal at twelve o’clock. Shortly before the appointed hour for carrying the sentence into effect, a message was received at the London Bridge terminus, from the Home Office, requesting that an order should be sent by the electric telegraph instructing the Under-Sheriff at Maidstone to stay the execution two hours. By the agency of the electric telegraph the communication was received in Maidstone with the usual rapidity, and the execution was for a time stayed. Shortly after the transmission of the order deferring the execution, a messenger from the Home Office conveyed to the railway the Secretary of State’s order, that the law was to take its course, and that the culprit was to be at once executed. The telegraph clerk hesitated to sending such a message without instructions from his principals. The messenger from the Home Office could not be certain that the order for Hutchings’s execution was signed by the Home Secretary, although it bore his name; and Mr. Macgregor, the chairman, with great judgment and humanity, instantly decided that it was not a sufficient authority in such a momentous matter.

An officer of confidence was immediately sent to the Secretary of State, to state their hesitation and its cause, as the message was, in fact, a death warrant, and that Mr. Walter must have undoubted evidence of its correctness. On Mr. Walter drawing the attention of the Secretary of State to the fact, that the transmission of such a message was, in effect, to make him the Sheriff, the conduct of the railway company, in requiring unquestionable evidence and authority, was warmly approved. The proper signature was affixed in Mr. Walter’s presence; and the telegraph then conveyed to the criminal the sad news, that the suspension of the awful sentence was only temporary. Hutchings was executed soon after it reached Maidstone.

—_Annual Register_, 1847.

LOST LUGGAGE.

Sir Francis Head, giving an account of the contents of the Lost Luggage Office, at Euston Station, observes:—“But there were a few articles that certainly we were not prepared to meet with, and which but too clearly proved that the extraordinary terminus-excitement which had suddenly caused so many virtuous ladies to elope from their red shawls—in short, to be all of a sudden not only in ‘a bustle’ behind, but all over—had equally affected men of all sorts and conditions.

“One gentleman had left behind him a pair of leather hunting breeches! another his boot-jacks! A soldier of the 22nd regiment had left his knapsack containing his kit. Another soldier of the 10th, poor fellow, had left his scarlet regimental coat! Some cripple, probably overjoyed at the sight of his family, had left behind him his crutches!! But what astonished us above all was, that some honest Scotchman, probably in the ecstasy of suddenly seeing among the crowd the face of his faithful _Jeanie_, had actually left behind him the best portion of his bagpipes!!!

“Some little time ago the superintendent, on breaking open, previous to a general sale, a locked leather hat-box, which had lain in this dungeon two years, found in it, under the hat, £65 in Bank of England notes, with one or two private letters, which enabled him to restore the money to the owner, who, it turned out, had been so positive that had left his hat-box at an hotel at Birmingham that he made no inquiry for it at the railway office.”

VERY NICE TO BE A RAILWAY ENGINEER.

A lady in conversation with a railway engineer observed, “It must be very nice to be a railway engineer, and be able to travel about anywhere you want to go to for nothing.”

“Yes, madam,” was the reply, “It would, as you say, be very nice to travel about for nothing, _if we were not paid for it_. But you see,” he remarked, “railway engineers are like the cabman’s horse. The cabman has a very thin horse. ‘Doesn’t your horse have enough to eat?’ inquired a benevolent lady passenger. ‘Oh yes, ma’am,’ replied cabby, ‘I give him lots o’ victuals to eat, only, you see, he hasn’t any time to eat ’em.’ So it is with the railway engineer; he has lots of pleasure of all kinds, only he has not any time to take it.”

AN ACCOMMODATING CONTRACTOR.

One railway of some scores of miles hung fire; the directors were congested with their fears of exceeding the estimates, and so a shrewd man of business, a contractor, i.e., a man with a mind contracted to profit and a keen eye to discern the paths of profit, called on them. This man had made his way upward, and passing through the process of sub-contracting, had obtained a glimpse of the upper glories. And thus he relieved the directors from their difficulties, by proffering to make the railway complete in all its parts, buy the land at the commencement, and, if required, to engage the station-clerks at the conclusion, with all the staff complete, so that his patrons might have no trouble, but begin business off-hand. But the latter condition—the staff and clerks—being simply a matter of patronage, the directors kept that trouble in their own hands.

Our contractor loomed on the directors’ minds as a guardian angel, a guarantee against responsibilities, backed by sufficient sureties, so the matter was without delay handed over to him, and he knew what to do with it.

—_Roads and Rails_, by W. B. Adams.

THE TWO DUKES AND THE TRAVELLER.

The following amusing anecdote is related of a commercial traveller who happened to get into the same railway carriage in which the Dukes of Argyle and Northumberland were travelling. The three chatted familiarly until the train stopped at Alnwick Junction, where the Duke of Northumberland got out, and was met by a train of flunkeys and servants. “That must be a great swell,” said the “commercial,” to his remaining companion. “Yes,” responded the Duke of Argyle, “he is the Duke of Northumberland.” “Bless my soul!” exclaimed the “commercial.” “And to think that he should have been so condescending to two little snobs like us!”

THE GREAT RAILWAY MANIA DAY.

Never had there occurred, in the history of joint-stock enterprise, such another day as the 30th of November, 1845. It was the day on which a madness for speculation arrived at its height, to be followed by a collapse terrible to many thousand families. Railways had been gradually becoming successful, and the old companies had, in many cases, bought off, on very high terms, rival lines which threatened to interfere with their profits. Both of these circumstances tended to encourage the concoction of new schemes. There is always floating capital in England waiting for profitable employment; there are always professional men looking out for employment in great engineering works; and there are always scheming moneyless men ready to trade on the folly of others. Thus the bankers and capitalists were willing to supply the capital; the engineers, surveyors, architects, contractors, builders, solicitors, barristers, and Parliamentary agents were willing to supply the brains and fingers; while, too often, cunning schemers pulled the strings. This was especially the case in 1845, when plans for new railways were brought forward literally by hundreds, and with a recklessness perfectly marvellous.

By an enactment in force at that time, it was necessary, for the prosecution of any railway scheme in Parliament, that a mass of documents should be deposited with the Board of Trade, on or before the 30th of November in the preceding year. The multitude of these schemes in 1845 was so great that there could not be found surveyors enough to prepare the plans and sections in time. Advertisements were inserted in the newspapers offering enormous pay for even a smattering of this kind of skill. Surveyors and architects from abroad were attracted to England; young men at home were tempted to break the articles into which they had entered with their masters; and others were seduced from various professions into that of railway engineers. Sixty persons in the employment of the Ordnance Department left their situations to gain enormous earnings in this way. There were desperate fights in various parts of England between property-owners who were determined that their land should not be entered upon for the purpose of railway surveying, and surveyors who knew that the schemes of their companies would be frustrated unless the surveys were made and the plans deposited by the 30th of November. To attain this end, force, fraud, and bribery were freely made use of. The 30th of November, 1845, fell on a Sunday; but it was no Sunday at the office near the Board of Trade. Vehicles were driving up during the whole of the day, with agents and clerks bringing plans and sections. In country districts, as the day approached, and on the morning of the day, coaches-and-four were in greater request than even at race-time, galloping at full speed to the nearest railway station. On the Great Western Railway an express train was hired by the agents of one new scheme. The engine broke down; the train came to a stand-still at Maidenhead, and, in this state, was run into by another express train hired by the agents of a rival project; the opposite parties barely escaped with their lives, but contrived to reach London at the last moment. On this eventful Sunday there were no fewer than ten of these express trains on the Great Western Railway, and eighteen on the Eastern Counties! One railway company was unable to deposit its papers because another company surreptitiously bought, for a high sum, twenty of the necessary sheets from the lithographic printer, and horses were killed in madly running about in search of the missing documents before the fraud was discovered. In some cases the lithographic stones were stolen; and in one instance the printer was bribed, by a large sum, not to finish in proper time the plans for a rival line. One eminent house brought over four hundred lithographic printers from Belgium, and even then, and with these, all the work ordered could not be executed. Some of the plans were only two-thirds lithographed, the rest being filled up by hand. However executed, the problem was to get these documents to Whitehall before midnight on the 30th of November. Two guineas a mile were in one instance paid for post-horses. One express train steamed up to London 118 miles in an hour-and-a-half, nearly 80 miles an hour. An established company having refused an express train to the promoters of a rival scheme, the latter employed persons to get up a mock funeral cortege, and engage an express train to convey it to London; they did so, and the plans and sections came _in the hearse_, with solicitors and surveyors as mourners!

Copies of many of the documents had to be deposited with the clerks of the peace of the counties to which the schemes severally related, as well as with the Board of Trade; and at some of the offices of these clerks, strange scenes occurred on the Sunday. At Preston, the doors of the office were not opened, as the officials considered the orders which had been issued to keep open on that particular Sunday, to apply only to the Board of Trade; but a crowd of law agents and surveyors assembled, broke the windows, and threw their plans and sections into the office. At the Board of Trade, extra clerks were employed on that day, and all went pretty smoothly until nine o’clock in the evening. A rule was laid down for receiving the plans and sections, hearing a few words of explanation from the agents, and making certain entries in books. But at length the work accumulated more rapidly than the clerks could attend to it, and the agents arrived in greater number than the entrance hall could hold. The anxiety was somewhat allayed by an announcement, that whoever was inside the building before the clock struck twelve should be deemed in good time. Many of the agents bore the familiar name of Smith; and when ‘Mr. Smith’ was summoned by the messenger to enter and speak concerning some scheme, the name of which was not announced, in rushed several persons, of whom, of course, only one could be the right Mr. Smith at that particular moment. One agent arrived while the clock was striking twelve, and was admitted. Soon afterwards, a carriage with reeking horses drove up; three agents rushed out, and finding the door closed, rang furiously at the bell; no sooner did a policeman open the door to say that the time was past, than the agents threw their bundles of plans and sections through the half-opened door into the hall; but this was not permitted, and the policeman threw the documents out into the street. The baffled agents were nearly maddened with vexation; for they had arrived in London from Harwich in good time, and had been driven about Pimlico hither and thither, by a post-boy who did not, or would not, know the way to the office of the Board of Trade.

The _Times_ newspaper, in the same month, devoted three whole pages to an elaborate analysis, by Mr. Spackman, of the various railway schemes brought forward in 1845. “There were no less than 620 in number, involving an (hypothetical) expenditure of 560 millions sterling; besides 643 other schemes which had not gone further than issuing prospectuses. More than 500 of the schemes went through all the stages necessary for being brought before Parliament; and 272 of these became Acts of Parliament in 1846—to the ruin of thousands who had afterwards to find the money to fulfil the engagements into which they had so rashly entered.

—_Chambers’s Book of Days_.

PARODY UPON THE RAILWAY MANIA.

About the time of the bursting of the railway bubble, or the collapse of the mania of 1844–5, the following clever lines appeared:—

“There was a sound of revelry by night.”—_Childe Harold_.

“There was a sound that ceased not day or night,
Of speculation. London gathered then
Unwonted crowds, and moved by promise bright,
To Capel-court rushed women, boys, and men,
All seeking railway shares and scrip; and when
The market rose, how many a lad could tell,
With joyous glance, and eyes that spake again,
’Twas e’en more lucrative than marrying well;—
When, hark! that warning voice strikes like a rising knell.

Nay, it is nothing, empty as the wind,
But a ‘bear’ whisper down Throgmorton-street;
Wild enterprise shall still be unconfined;
No rest for us, when rising premiums greet
The morn to pour their treasures at our feet;
When, hark! that solemn sound is heard once more,
The gathering ‘bears’ its echoes yet repeat—
’Tis but too true, is now the general roar,
The Bank has raised her rate, as she has done before.

And then and there were hurryings to and fro,
And anxious thoughts, and signs of sad distress
Faces all pale, that but an hour ago
Smiled at the thoughts of their own craftiness.
And there were sudden partings, such as press
The coin from hungry pockets—mutual sighs
Of brokers and their clients. Who can guess
How many a stag already panting flies,
When upon times so bright such awful panics rise?”

RAILWAY FACILITIES FOR BUSINESS.

A gentleman went to Liverpool in the morning, purchased, and took back with him to Manchester, 150 tons of cotton, which he sold, and afterwards obtained an order for a similar quantity. He went again, and actually, that same evening, delivered the second quantity in Manchester, “having travelled 120 miles in four separate journeys, and bought, sold, and delivered, 30 miles off, at two distinct deliveries, 300 tons of goods, in about 12 hours.” The occurrence is perfectly astounding; and, had it been hinted at fifty years ago, would have been deemed impossible.

—_Railway Magazine_, 1840.

RAILWAYS AND THE POST-OFFICE.

It might naturally be thought that the new and quicker means of transport afforded by the railway would be eagerly utilised by the Post-office. There were, however, difficulties on both sides. The railway companies objected to running trains during the night, and the old stage-coach offered the advantage of greater regularity. The railway was quicker, but was at least occasionally uncertain. Thus, in November, 1837, the four daily mail trains between Liverpool and Birmingham on ten occasions arrived before the specified time, on eight occasions were exact to time, and on 102 occasions varied in lateness of arrival from five minutes to five hours and five minutes. There were all sorts of mishaps and long delays by train. The mail guard, like the passenger guard, rode outside the train with a box before him called an “imperial,” which contained the letters and papers entrusted to his charge. In very stormy weather the mail guard would prop up the lid of his imperial and get inside for shelter. On one occasion when the mail arrived at Liverpool the guard was found imprisoned in his letter-box. The lid had fallen and fastened in the male travesty of “Ginevra.” Fortunately for him it was a burlesque and not a tragedy. Bags thrown to the guards at wayside stations not unfrequently got under the wheels of the train and the contents were cut to pieces. On one occasion, on the Grand Junction, an engine failed through the fire-bars coming out. The mails were removed from the train and run on a platelayer’s “trolly,” but unfortunately the contents of the bags took fire and were destroyed. But many of these mishaps were obviated by the invention of Mr. Nathaniel Worsdell, a Liverpool coachbuilder, in the service of the railway, who took out a patent in 1838 for an appliance for picking up and dropping mail bags while the train was at full speed. This is still used. The loads of railway vehicles, it may be mentioned, were limited by law to four tons until the passage of the 5 and 6 Vic., c. 55. In 1837, when the weight of the mails passing daily on the London and Birmingham line was only about 14cwt., the late Sir Hardman Earle suggested that a special compartment should be reserved for the mail guard in which he could sort the letters _en route_. The first vehicle specially set apart for mail purposes was put upon the Grand Junction in 1838. From this humble beginning has gradually developed the express mails, in which the chief consideration is the swift transit of correspondence, and which are therefore limited in the number of the passengers they are allowed to carry. The cost of carrying the mails in 1838 and 1839 between Manchester and Liverpool by rail, including the guard’s fare, averaged about £1 a trip, or half of the cost of sending them by coach. The price paid to the Grand Junction for carriage of mails between Manchester and Liverpool and Birmingham was 1d. a mile for the guard and ¾d. per cwt. per mile for the mails. This brought a revenue of about £3,000 a year. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed and carried the imposition of the passenger duty, in 1832, the company intimated to the Post-office that they should advance the mail guard’s fare ½d. per mile. In 1840 an agreement was negotiated between the Post-office and railway authorities to convey the mails between Lancashire and Birmingham four times daily for £19 10s. a day, with a penalty of £500 on the railway company in case of bad time keeping. This agreement was not carried into effect.

—_Manchester Guardian_.

RAILWAY SIGNALS.

The history of railway signals is a curious page in the annals of practical science. For some years signals seem scarcely to have been dreamt of. Holding up a hat or an umbrella was at first sufficient to stop a train at an intermediate station. At level crossings the gates had to stand closed across the line of rails, and on the top bar hung a lamp to indicate to drivers that the way was blocked. In 1839, Colonel Landman, of the Croydon line, said that he should avoid the danger at a junction during a fog by going slowly, tolling a bell, beating a drum, or sounding a whistle. The first junction signal was denominated a lighthouse. The difficulties attending junctions may be judged of by the fact that when the Bolton and Preston line was ready for opening it was agreed that no train should attempt to enter or leave the North Union line at Euxton junction within fifteen minutes of a train being due on the main line which might interfere with it. The movable rails at junctions had to be removed by hand and fixed into position by hammer and pin. Mr. Watts, engineer to the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway, is believed to have been one of the first to use the tapering movable switch. One of Mr. Watts’s men invented the back weight, another designed the crank, while a third suggested the long rod. These improvements were all about the year 1846. The first fixed signal set up at stations was an ordinary round flag pole having a pulley on the top, upon which was hoisted a green flag to stop a train and a red one to indicate danger on the road. The night signal was a hand lamp hoisted in the same way. These were superseded by a signal on which an arm was worked at the end of a rod, and a square lamp with two sides, red and white, having blinkers working on hinges to shut out the light. These were used until 1848. The semaphores only came into practical use some 20 years ago, and it is remarkable that the first time they were used on the Liverpool and Manchester line they were the cause of a slight collision. The use of signal lights on trains was much advanced by two accidents which occurred on the North Union line on the 7th September, 1841. One of these happened at Farrington, where two passenger trains came into collision. The other happened at Euxton, where a coal train ran into a stage coach which was taking passengers to Southport. The Rev. Mr. Joy was killed, and several others, including the station master, who lost one leg, were injured. These were the first serious accidents investigated by the now Government Inspector of Railways, Sir Frederic Smith, who was appointed by the Board of Trade under Lord Seymour’s Act.

—_Manchester Guardian_.

FOG-SIGNALS.

During the prevalence of fogs, when neither signal-posts nor lights are of any use, detonating signals are frequently employed, which are affixed to the rails, and exploded by the iron tread of the advancing locomotive. All guards, policemen, and pointsmen who are not appointed to stations, and all enginemen, gatemen, gangers and platelayers, and tunnel-men, are provided with packets of these signals, which they are required always to have ready for use whilst on duty; and every engine, on passing over one of these signals, is to be immediately stopped, and the guards are to protect their train by sending back and placing a similar signal on the line behind them every two hundred yards, to the distance of six hundred yards; the train may then proceed slowly to the place of obstruction. When these detonating signals were first invented, it was resolved to ascertain whether they acted efficiently, and especially whether the noise they produced was sufficient to be distinctly heard by the engine driver. One of them was accordingly fixed to the rails on a particular line by the authority of the company, and in due time the train having passed over it, reached its destination. Here the engine driver and his colleague were found to be in a state of great alarm, in consequence of a supposed attack being made on them by an assassin, who, they said, lay down beside the line of rails on which they had passed, and deliberately fired at them. The efficiency of the means having thus been tested, the apprehensions of the enginemen were removed, though there was at first evident mortification manifested that they had been made the subjects of such a successful experiment.

—F. S. Williams’s _Our Iron Roads_.

“ALMOST DAR NOW.”

The following anecdote, illustrative of railroad facility, is very pointed. A traveller inquired of a negro the distance to a certain point. “Dat ’pends on circumstances,” replied darkey. “If you gwine afoot, it’ll take you about a day; if you gwine in de stage or homneybus, you make it half a day; but if you get in one of _dese smoke wagons_, you be almost dar now.”

WORDSWORTH’S PROTEST.

Lines written by Wordsworth as a protest against making a railway from Kendal to Windermere:—

“Is there no nook of English ground secure
From rash assault? Schemes of retirement sown
In youth, and ’mid the world kept pure
As when their earliest flowers of hope were blown,
Must perish; how can they this blight endure?
And must he, too, his old delights disown,
Who scorns a false, utilitarian lure
’Mid his paternal fields at random thrown?
Baffle the threat, bright scene, from Orrest-head,
Given to the pausing traveller’s rapturous glance!
Plead for thy peace, thou beautiful romance
Of nature; and if human hearts be dead,
Speak, passing winds; ye torrents, with your strong
And constant voice, protest against the wrong!”

THE HON. EDWARD EVERETT’S REPLY TO WORDSWORTH’S PROTEST.