Book I I. CANALS. 619 



the engineer will prepare his general report and estimate, to be laid, with the plan, 

 before a meeting of the adventurers or proposed proprietors. 



Sect. III. Powers granted to Canal Companies by Government. 



3812. As a canal must pass through a great variety of private property, and necessarily 

 affect different individuals in very opposite ways, considerable powers are requisite to 

 carry it into execution. The first steps to attain these are the appointment of a solicitor, 

 and an application to parliament for an act of incorporation and regulation. 



3813. A canal bill contains numerous clauses ; but the following may be considered 

 the most general heads : — 



Regulations as to raising money by shares or other. Removing the surface-soil, and clamping it, for 



wise. the purpose of being again laid on the surface of the 



Election of committees, and general meetings of exterior banks of the canal ; or fur other pur- 

 proprietors, poses. 



Enactments relative to purchasing lands, &c. Forming watering places for cattle or irrigation. 



Powers for erecting wharfs, and enforcing certain Regulations as to mills, <V<". 



equitable rates of wharfage. Power to make by-laws. 



Tolls, or rates of tonnage, with exemptions, if any. Form nj conveying hind to the canal company. 



Fixing 7iiile-stones, for regulating distances and Regulations as to depositing plans of the canal, 



tonnage. and making variations from them, iVc, 



3814. The act of parliament for a canal being passed, and therein the time and place 

 for the first meeting of the subscribers or proprietors thereof being fixed; the first 

 business of such meeting will be the election of a general committee of management, 

 consisting of the most independent, respectable, and generally informed persons among 

 the proprietors. The committee of management will then proceed to elect a chairman 

 and subordinate officers; to fix upon their place of meeting, and to arrange the order of 

 their business. 



3815. A resident engineer and land-surveyor and valuer should now be fixed on, and pro- 

 bably also a local or select committee: auditors of accounts will be appointed, and salaries 

 determined. The chief engineer will now revise the line, and divide it into different 

 parts, assigning names to each for convenient reference. Of these distinct parts, or divi- 

 sions, a separate account of the expenses should be strictly kept by the resident engineer ; 

 the overseers, or counters, as they are generally called, that the engineer is to recommend 

 or employ upon the works ; and by the office clerks, in a ledger, with proper heads for 

 each length of canal, set of locks, tunnel, embankment, deep cutting, reservoir, aqueduct, 

 or other great work, that may form a separate division: such particular and divided 

 accounts of the works will prove of the most essential service to the committee, and to all 

 others concerned, in informing and maturing their judgment on the actual or probable 

 expense of every different kind of work ; and w ill enable the committee to explain to the 

 proprietors how great, and sometimes unavoidable, as well as unexpected, expenses may 

 be incurred. 



3816. Such lands as are wanted should now be treated for by the land-surveyor, and 

 the purchase and conveyance concluded with the approbation of the committee, and the 

 aid of the solicitor, with or without the aid of the sherifF and a jury, as the case may re- 

 quire. In general, the ground for reservoirs and locks ought to be the first purchased, 

 to permit the embankments and masonry to be proceeded with. 



Sf.ct. IV. Execution of the Works. 



3817. The first operation of execution is the setting out of the work by the resident engi- 

 neer and survevor. He will accurately trace and indicate the levels of each pound 

 or level reach of the canal, marking them with stakes, and comparing his work with 

 the bench marks ; he will also make two or more of the men who assist him perfectly 

 acquainted with the position of the stakes, to provide against their derangement by cattle 

 or from other causes. 



3818. The calculations for excavation form the next part of execution. The great desi- 

 deratum in canal-digging is, that the stuff dug from one part of the work shall, with the 

 least labour of moving, exactly supply or form the banks that are to be raised in another, 

 so that, on the completion of the work, no spoil banks, or banks of useless soil, shall 

 remain, nor any ground be unnecessarily rendered useless by excavations or pits. 



38 1 9. Six different cases will be found frequently to occur in the cutting or forming of 

 a canal. In each case the towing-bank (jig. 575. a) is wider than the off-bank (b) ; 



575 n - 



and, in all, the sides slope one foot and a half for one foot in depth, that being found the 

 least slope which can be given. 



