1839.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



87 



OBSERVATIONS ON THE IRISH RAILWAY 

 COMMISSIONERS' REPORT. 



With no iinfiiendly feeling eitlier to tlie Irisli Railway Commis- 

 sioners, or to those professionally ronnocteJ with tliem, we again make 

 fnrtlier observations on the Irish U;iilw.ay Report, as a pnhlio iloenment 

 exeeuted at the expense of the people. 



Does not the following snggesteil distribution of railroads throngh 

 Ireland exhibit a spirit of favouritism and partiality, wlren, for the 

 southern division of Ireland, the Railway Commissioners have laid out 

 .')j!) miles of railway, estimate .'),;3 17,884/., and for tire northern 1.5'J 

 nriles, estimate '.2,3;)(i,'25S/. ; while no railway lr;is been laid out for the 

 centre of Ireland, nor for the whole province of Conirairghty 



Iri^the September number of this Journal we took a general view of 

 the Report ; we showed that the general system of railways laid out 

 throrrgh Irelarrd hy the Commissioners was wrong ; we also showed in 

 correct detail numerous errors, both in the maps, plarrs, sections, and 

 gi'adients, srrch as were sufficient not only to destroy the reputation of 

 the work, as to ils accur-acy, but even affecting the very chai-acter-s of 

 the individuals who had incautiorrsly compiled and jHrblished so erro- 

 neous a docrrmerrt. Those numerorrs and serious errors were laid 

 before the public throrrgh the colunrns of oirr Journal six months a^o, 

 and have not been iprestioned or r-eplied to in any pirblished works to 

 orrr knowledge, by any of the conrmissioners or their fiierrds, no, nor 

 even by the grandson of Charles Ilutton, nor the elece of Telford, 

 deeply and seriously as it affects both of them, the Railway Conrmis- 

 sioners, and everr theGovernment, after an expenditrrre of rrearly twenty 

 thoirsand [rorrnds, and a loss of more than two years' time. 



We ask, what will the engineers of France and of America say irr 

 examirringsrrch an iiraccurate prodirction ? Will they notjustly exclaim. 

 Behold, the people in the country of Newton, of Napier-, and Maclarrrin, 

 are now so reduced in scientific acquirement, that they are not able to 

 work accurately the simple operations of decimal arithmetic •' Is it not 

 humiliating to think that among the rrrleis of this great empire that so 

 few individuals of scientific acquirement are to be found ? Sir Davies 

 (iilbeit arrd Lord Oxmantown are men of science; the former has 

 now nearly reached the maximum age allotted to man, while we rc'jret 

 that political influence has swept the latter fi-om that position in "the 

 councils of the sovereign and the coinitry which Iris talents and acqrrire- 

 nreirts so pre-eminently entitled him to occupy, for to aid the advance- 

 ment and the progress of those interests connected witli the works of 

 science and improvement, which so few could comprehend and under- 

 stand so well among the represerrtatives of the country. Wo ar-e happy 

 to have an opportunity of testifying our great regai-d and esteem for 

 Lord Oxmantown, not only .as a cultivator of science in its hinhcst 

 branches, but also of his devotion to the pr'osecution of practical me- 

 chanics. Has not one of the most distinguished savann ofthe empire de- 

 clared — " That the sciences and the arts of England are in a wretched 

 state of depression, and that theirdecline is mainly owing to the igrrorance 

 and srrpineness of the Government, to the injrrdiciorrs organization of 

 our scientific bo.^rds and irrstitutions, to the indir-ect persecution of 

 scientific and liter-aiy men, by tlieir exclusion from all tlie honours of 

 the state." And has it not been truly said that — " The )oung diplo- 

 macy of the American States was raised into distinction when Franklin 

 took upon himself the functions of her ambassador, arrd France was at 

 the zenith of her glory when the Marquis La Place was President of her 

 Conservative Senate, Lagrange a Peer of France, and Carnot her 

 Minister of War." 



A few leading articles have appeared from time to time in the minis- 

 terial papers, praising the Irish Railway Report, but the acquirements 

 of the editors of newspapers are such as to exclude them from being 

 able to review such a work, and to those who understand such subjects, 

 those leading articles must appear to have been put forwar-d by l!ie 

 commissioners and their friends, to support their very oljjcctionable 

 system of Irish railway projects. It is remarkable that the government 

 of the country found it necessary to employ a gentleman to travel 

 throngh Ireland for the express purpose of praising this railway 

 report, at various public meetings which had been held in that country 

 — and this was actually acknowledged pirblicly by the individual so 

 employed. 



The " Quarterly Review" for January, 1839, contains an article on 

 the Report of the Irish Railway Commissicmers ; but it contains nothino- 

 that had not been previously published or well known before, and it {"s 

 only remarkable for introducing a vast variety of sulijects totally irrele- 

 vant to the one it professes to discuss. We beg to observe, that Mr. 

 David Stevenson never was at New Orleans, and that the information 

 regarding the steamers at New Orleans, which the " tiirarterly Re- 

 view" quotes at page (i, is from the pen of Captain Basil Hall, who 

 had visited New Orleans, and not from that of Mr. Stevenion, who 

 had not been there ; the statement of the "Quarterly" is therefore 

 No. 18.-- Vol. IL— March, 1833, 



not correct. The observations made on the democratic insfitntions of 

 the North American Republic at page 25, are not only quite unworthy 

 of the intelligence of the age, but they are, in our opinion, unfounded 

 and unfrrie. The property of the people of the IJnited States of 

 America is just as secure as that of the people of any other country. 

 The laws which govern the free and independent states of the North 

 American Republic are more likely to spread through the great 

 American continent than those of the ar-bitrary and despotic govern- 

 ments of Europe ; irr all likelihood those principles of freedom which 

 have been spreading so widely for the last 50 years, will yet be ex- 

 tended much ruore, and ameliorate the condition of the human i-ace in 

 the most remote and distant regions ofthe earth. Matter-s of a political 

 kind we do not profess to discuss, and we regret to do so in any 

 manner ; but our excuse is, that for the American people of the United 

 States we entertain the highest respect, and we therefore do not like 

 to see them and their institutions calumniated in pages which profess 

 and avow to be consecr'ated to the discussion of a scientific subject, 

 and which our avocations oblige us to notice, and more particularly as 

 an attempt will be made to convert the Irish railway monopoly into a 

 political state job ; it therefore becomes a sacred duty with us to expose 

 it to the fullest public animadversion. 



" We conceive the principal question in this inquiry to be — Does 

 the report emanate from persons possessing, in the opinion of Europe, 

 the requisite qualifications ? We have, accor-diugly, tak.en some 

 pains to inform ourselves upon this subject." — Quarterly Review, 

 December, 183S. 



The account given by the " (Quarterly Review" on this very im- 

 portant matter, has established, in the clearest manner possible, that 

 none of the Irish Railway Commissioners had ever executed any kind 

 of railway works ; and it therefore cannot fail to appear to those pos- 

 sessed of practical knowledge in railway engineering, that the nomina- 

 tion of such a railway board was a very extraoi-dinary proceeding on 

 the part of the executive ; to depute such men to legislate on matters 

 they never had been previously acquainted witli, was certainly, to say 

 the least of it, not an arrangement either consonant to reason, nor 

 ci'editable to the wisdom of the government of this countr-y. When 

 the legislature had deerued such a commission necessary to lay out a 

 system of railways for Ireland, why were not individuals of the highest 

 practical skill in railway engineering, totally unconnected with Ireland, 

 selected for such a purpose? And this service, we affirm, could have 

 been accomplished in four months, and the reports, sections, plans, 

 &e., might have been with ease delivered in less than eight months, 

 while these Railway Commissioners required nearly two years, involving 

 in its consequences a loss (>( three years to Iri'land in tlie progress and 

 extension of railways, inflicting a deep and lasting injui'y upon her 

 prosperity, and the unemployed population of that country. 



We are advocates that great works of national utility should ori 

 ginate with the people — we are inimical, in the highest degree, to legis- 

 lative interference with anything, from the making of a steam-engine 

 to that of the smallest article ; we conceive it is the duty of a wise 

 and a paternal Government to aid and assist public companiesin their 

 exertions and endeavours to execute works of public utility: but, on 

 the other hand, if a Government once assumes the mantle of general 

 manirfacturer of steam- engines, engineer-general of railroads, &c., 

 under an act ofthe legislature, then the rights and interests of all the 

 industrious classes are directly invaded, a monopoly set up, and the 

 spirit of enterprise, of invention, and improvement ceases, and all those 

 vigorous trading impulses which have so eiuinently contributed to the 

 wealth and to the prosperity of all h-cc and enlightened countries, but 

 particularly the great advantages which would i-esult to Ireland by the 

 introduction of English capitalists. We deny the right of the British 

 Government to step in at the eleventh hour and interfere, except so 

 far as the public interests may require, with either the English rail- 

 way companies, or even those of Ireland, which have been formed, 

 by men who have, in England, Scotland, and Ireland, congregated 

 together, subscribed and risked capital, called into existence a 

 new power, executed the most stupendous works with the most 

 triumphant success, and all without the aid of a Royal commission. 

 Will not the Gnvernnicnt of this country read a lesson of wisdom 

 from past events? Has not steam navigation across the Atlantic 

 Ocean been achieved in the nrost .'•atisfactory manner by private enter- 

 prise ? Have not the river navigations, and also the whole of the canals 

 of England, been executed by companies V Are not all the steam- 

 vessels which cover, not only the British seas, but also tl ose of 

 Europe, entirely due to the successful enterprise of comjjanies? 

 And have not the noblest engineering works in the world been accom- 

 plished by private companies ? Look at the bridges of Waterloo and 

 •S lUthwark; they will prove that the people are quite capable of exe- 

 cuting works as stupendous and nionumtntal as the pyramids uf Egypt, 

 but of a much more useful and nollj kind. We are thoroughly con- 



