What the Railways Have Done 397 



Nor have the political and social results of the railway 

 system been in any degree less remarkable than the economic. 



Politically, the railway has been a factor in the rise of 

 Democracy. 



The construction of railways, by giving employment to 

 large numbers of navvies in various parts of the country, to 

 which they moved freely as occasion required, did much to 

 break down the restrictions to which the labouring classes 

 had so long been subjected under laws of settlement now 

 found to be no longer operative ; and this greater freedom of 

 movement, combined with the wider opportunities opened out 

 to them, had effects on the workers far beyond the results 

 accruing to them from an industrial standpoint alone. 



Under, again, the influences following on the spread of 

 railways throughout the country, England ceased to be simply 

 a collection of isolated communities, and attained to a greater 

 degree of national life. Better communication helped to make 

 men better acquainted with one another, to broaden their 

 sympathies, to spread a better knowledge of public events 

 at home and abroad and to establish closer links between 

 town life and country life. 



Then the railways which rendered this closer communication 

 possible proved to be among the greatest of social levellers. 

 The claims of the third-class passenger were recognised in course 

 of time, in spite of the unwillingness of the pioneer companies ' 

 to make them due acknowledgment ; and the day was to 

 come when the artisan would go by the same express train as the 

 noble lord, arrive at his destination just as soon, and, though 

 not having quite so luxurious a seat, be afforded facilities of 

 travel greater far than those that could once be commanded 

 even by kings and princes. Cheap excursion trains gave to 

 artisan and agriculturist the opportunity of visiting great 

 towns or pleasure resorts to which, in the old coaching days, 

 the well-to-do would alone have thought of travelling. In 

 the same way the advantages of a concentration of life, of 

 thought and of movement in the capital were spread by the 

 easier means of communication to country districts, and 

 brought the population in general into closer touch with the 

 leaders of public opinion. The railways were the greatest 

 disseminators of intelligence through the newspapers or books 

 carried by train or by the post, itself no less dependent, in turn, 



