18 Railway Accidents. (January, 
great measure obviated. Some of the great railway com- 
panies have made, and others are making, great progress in 
providing the necessary remedies. It was stated by Mr. T. 
B. Farrer, in his evidence before the Sele¢t Committee of 
the House of Lords last year, that the railway companies 
had then already spent upon the introduction of the block 
. system and the system of interlocking signals, between 
£700,000 and £800,000, and that they were proposing to 
spend a great deal more ; on a previous occasion, however, 
it had been stated before the same Committee, by Mr. J. S. 
Farmer, that, in his opinion, a great deal of expense had 
been thrown away in tinkering at the signals, in trying to 
do as little as possible, instead of grasping the thing com- 
prehensively in the first place. 
However much has already been accomplished, a good 
deal yet remains to be done, especially on certain railway 
systems ; and Captain Tyler expresses it as his opinion that 
it is partly on account of sufficient attention not having 
been paid in previous years to the various means of safety 
that some of the great railway companies now appear so 
unfavourably at the head of the accident list, and partly 
also because they have found it difficult, with constantly 
increasing traffic, simultaneously to make up for past 
omissions and to keep up with present requirements. 
In a circular letter addressed by the President of the 
Board of Trade to the several railway companies in Novem- 
ber, 1873, on the subject of the great increase in the number 
of railway accidents during 1872, Mr. Chichester Fortescue 
remarked that a large proportion of these casualties ap- 
peared to have been due to causes within the control of the 
railway companies. ‘‘ If it may be contended,” the circular 
goes on to state, ‘‘that the traffic on many lines has very 
greatly increased, and with it the risks of railway travelling, 
it is no less true that it is within the power of the companies 
to take care that the permanent way, the rolling stock, and 
the station and siding accommodation, are kept up to the 
requirements of the traffic; that the officers and servants 
are sufficient in number and quality for the work to be done, 
and that proper regulations for their guidance are not only 
made, but enforced; that pains are taken to test every 
reasonable invention and expedient devised for the purpose 
of preventing danger; and that such of those expedients as 
experience proves to be effective are adopted without undue 
delay. 
‘“‘In the face of the facts colleCted and analysed by Captain 
Tyler, and of the numerous accidents of the present year 
