308 History of Inland Transport 



which would be fabulously costly, and, also, wholly im- 

 practicable, on account of the great iron-works and other 

 industrial establishments which line almost the entire twelve- 

 mile route between Birmingham and Wolverhampton, forming, 

 with their hundreds of private basins, the actual boundary 

 of the canal on one side or the other. To " adapt " the Bir- 

 mingham Canal to through traffic would produce chaos for the 

 local traffic. 



Mr Jeans thus goes a little too far when he makes the 

 sweeping statement that " Canals as they were built a century 

 ago have no longer any function to fulfil that is worthy of 

 serious consideration. Their mission is ended, their use is 

 an anachronism." Even the title given to the present chapter, 

 " Decline of Canals," is to be read subject to the exceptions 

 represented by those of the waterways that still answer these 

 useful local purposes and should have every encouragement 

 therein. Mr Jeans is, however, fully warranted in declaring 

 that " it would be the idlest of idle dreams to expect that the 

 canal system of this or any other country as originally con- 

 structed can be resuscitated, or even temporarily galvanised 

 into activity, in competition with the railways." 



There is a still further consideration. 



Whatever the prospective advantages of resuscitation 

 when the point of despatch and the point of delivery are 

 both on the same canal and especially when both are on the 

 same level of the canal, so that passage through locks is 

 unnecessary it must be obvious that when commodities are 

 despatched from, or consigned to, places situate at such a 

 distance from a canal that supplementary transport is neces- 

 sary, the cost thereof must be added to the amount of the canal 

 charges. The sum of the two may then be so little below the 

 cost of rail transport that the latter coupled with the greater 

 speed and the greater convenience in the way, perhaps, of 

 sidings or of lines of rails coming right into the works will 

 be preferred. Academic theories, on paper, as to the com- 

 parative costs of hauling given weights of commodities on 

 water and rail respectively may, in fact, be rendered futile 

 by (i) the supplementary cost of transport to or from the 

 waterway and of various services or conveniences included in 

 the railway rate but not included in the canal charges ; and (2) 

 the consideration that if a large sum of money be spent on 



