What the Railways Have Done 387 



followed by the adoption of the sliding-scale_principle under 

 which the rates per ton per mile decreased in proportion as 

 consignments were sent for a greater distance than twenty 

 miles. 



The towns and the industrial centres expanded further 

 as rail transport afforded increased facilities for the conveyance 

 of raw materials to works which, thanks to the steam-engine, 

 could be set up in any part of the country, regardless of the 

 once indispensable water power ; and the procuring of these 

 raw materials not only gave a further great expansion to 

 national wealth, but led to the opening up to industrial 

 activity of many a district previously isolated and undeveloped. 



Increased congestion in the towns was thus none the less 

 supplemented by a widespread development of the interior 

 resources of the country ; and in this respect the railways 

 accomplished results that could not have been attained by 

 the most complete system either of canals or of turnpike roads. 

 There certainly were losses, besides those in the rural districts, 

 and this was notably the case in some of the county, market, 

 or smaller towns which no longer command the same dis- 

 tinction in the social and economic world as before ; but the 

 balance as between gains and losses was in favour of an 

 industrial expansion, a commercial development, and an 

 unexampled increase in general prosperity. 



On the general trade of the country the railway was to 

 produce results no less striking than those that related to 

 individual industries. 



When the facilities for distributing domestic and other 

 necessaries throughout the inland districts, and even in the 

 most remote parts of the country, were so greatly increased, 

 the reason for the fairs which had for many centuries played 

 so all-important a part in English trade and commerce no 

 longer existed, and the country hastened to deserve Napoleon's 

 sarcasm by becoming " a nation of shopkeepers." 



To the country trader the railway gave new opportunities. 

 There was no longer any need either for his going to one of the 

 periodical fairs or for his awaiting a call from a travelling 

 middleman with his troop of packhorses in order to obtain 

 supplies. Nor was it now necessary for him to purchase com- 

 paratively substantial quantities of wares at a time. Thanks 

 to the railway, he could generally have goods sent to him 



