168 RAILWAYS, HIGHWAYS, AND CANALS. 



would be far safer in the hands of that government than in those of 

 any private proprietor or company. For such a canal, there is 

 generally only one line ; and if that line is vested in private hands, 

 a monopoly is established against the public, which effectually puts 

 an end to all competition and all further improvement. A boat- 

 canal, on which there is a great and permanent carriage, approaches 

 to the nature of a ship-canal ; and the bad effects of monopoly in such 

 a case, are well instanced by Mr. Grahame, in that of the Duke of 

 Bridgewater, between Liverpool and Manchester. But the principal 

 canals in England were all executed during the time when, as Mr. 

 Grahame very justly says, there was " a great distrust on the part 

 of the community in the government, and in its justice and proper 

 management." 



Thus, these means of conveyance, supplemental to public roads, 

 have from the first been private speculation, sanctioned by acts of 

 parliament, really for the advantage of the undertakers, and with a 

 view chiefly of securing them both a large profit and a close mono- 

 poly. Still, as Mr. Grahame observes, there was, in the canal, as 

 originally formed by the corporated proprietors, some resemblance to 

 a public road under a trust: the public had the use of it for their 

 own boats on payment of the canal dues. Thus, though a monopoly, 

 it was but a partial one a monopoly as to the dues, but open to 

 competition in as far as the freight of boats is concerned. The boats, 

 too, were cheap vehicles, and no great capital was required in order 

 to become a canal carrier. It was the interest of all parties, too, 

 that the limits of the canals without lockage should be as long as 

 possible ; and this gave great facility to the conveyance of heavy 

 articles for short distances along the lines, which conduced much to 

 local improvement. Such canals have, therefore, proved useful addi- 

 tions to the common roads ; and though this was certainly not the 

 original intention of the projectors, they have probably been, upon 

 the average, more beneficial to the public than to the proprietors. 

 But for this branch of the inquiry also, we must wait the appearance 

 of the other parts of Mr. Grahame's treatise. Rail-roads are the 

 species of accommodation which, in the present part, Mr. Grahame 

 considers more in detail ; indeed, with a searching keenness of in- 

 vestigation for which the public owe him their most hearty thanks. 



The work is, indeed, highly valuable, inasmuch as rail-roads, along 

 . which passengers and goods shall be conveyed at rates unprecedentedly 

 rapid, and charges as correspondingly low, are the mania of the day, 

 a subject which admits of much amplification in speech, and about 

 which every body speaks ; but which, as is not unusual in such cases, 

 very few understand. One can hardly go into any company where 

 public improvement is at all spoken of without hearing that these 

 roads will speedily supersede all other means and modes of inter- 

 course, and change the whole state of society " very much for the 

 better." This is exactly that temper of the public mind which lays 

 the unthinking most open to the imposition of schemers j and forms 

 the great merit of this, the chief part, of Mr. Grahame's work. 



He puts aside all the public excitements, and all the eulogies of 

 the parties, as well as all bias or prejudice on his own part, and then 



