614 POST-OFFICE, ROADS, AND CONVEYANCE. 



they accepted office, viz., to promote the greatest good of the greatest 

 number, was a real bond Jide conscientious intention, and not mere 

 worthless verbiage. The more than favourable manner in which 

 Mr. Gurney's petition for the removal of these legislative enactments, 

 which have hitherto opposed and postponed the introduction of 

 steam-carriages, was received a few weeks ago, shews that the House 

 of Commons are fully alive to this most important subject ; whilst 

 the very circumstance of their having given 20,000,000/. to break 

 the chain of slavery abroad, renders it presumptive that they will not 

 refuse half the sum to introduce a project which will break the chain of 

 pauperism at home. That chain will never be broken in any other 

 way than by the artificial means which the progress of invention has 

 put within our power. The substitute in question has been delayed 

 for several years from no other circumstance than want of co-operation ; 

 and if it be delayed for a few more, that convulsion may take place, 

 which, through the good providence of God, it seems provided to 

 obviate. 



Scotland has already got the start of England in steam locomotion 

 upon common roads. Mr. Russell's steam carriages are plying daily 

 between Glasgow and Paisley. " On Thursday last/' says the 

 Glasgow Argus of the 18th of April, " a single steam carriage be- 

 longing to the Steam Carriage Company of Scotland, performed the 

 most successful runs that have ever been accomplished upon the 

 common roads, having gone six successive trips with passengers be- 

 tween Glasgow and Paisley, and in an average time of forty-one 

 minutes, the first trip having been done in forty minutes, the second 

 in forty-three, and so on ; being a distance in all of forty-six miles in 

 four hours and a half, at the rate of more than ten miles an hour. 

 On the previous day the same carriage had run the same distance 

 four times at a similar rate, and on Wednesday it was again done 

 within forty minutes. The other carriages continue running daily, 

 and the communication between Glasgow and Paisley, by means of 

 these carriages, may now be considered as fully and permanently esta- 

 blished." 



Had it not been for the passing of these toll acts in 1831, which 

 the Committee of the House of Commons in their report acknowledged 

 to be " to an amount which would utterly prohibit the introduction 

 of steam carriages," and the (( determination on the part of road 

 trustees to obstruct as much as possible the use of steam as a propel- 

 ling power," Mr. Gurney's steam carriages, which commenced run- 

 ning for the public between Gloucester and Cheltenham upon the 

 21st of February, 1831, and continued to the 22d of June, would 

 never have been discontinued, and steam carriages would have been 

 common before this time upon all our great lines of road. We trust, 

 however, that the time is not distant when parliament shall act upon 

 the recommendation of the committee, " that legislative protection 

 should be extended to this the most important improvement in the 

 means of internal communication ever introduced with the least possible 

 delay, and that the nation with one consent shall urge the adoption of 

 a project which will go far towards annihilating our distress, instead 

 of simply changing its character. Certainly to accomplish a consum- 



