170 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[April, 



to find an advocate so stanncli come forward to defend them, one ear- 

 nest to do tliem due justice, at the same time too impartial to defend 

 tlieir errors. Those, liowever, who have deeply studied tlie subject, 

 and been intimately connected with them as our author has been, 

 know that railway bodies have been much more sinned against than 

 sinning, and will feel cautious in what way they inteifere with an 

 institution which has shown and possesses such elements of good. 

 The railway system of England is both a moral and physical pheno- 

 menon of the age. A connected chain of public ways extending over 

 1800 miles, and in the construction of which 60 millions sterling have 

 been embarked, the hirgest sum ever yet applied in any country in 

 bulk to any other purpose than that of war, naturally excites attention 

 to the colossal magnitude of the enterprise, but the mural features are 

 still more deeply interesting. Not only has this vast sum been raised 

 by private means, and expended under private direclion,'but difficul- 

 ties of the most serious character have had to be contended with. At 

 every step experience had to be acquired, invention exerted to over- 

 come difficulties and establish new precedents, the immense amount of 

 money required and expended, enhanced the cost of procuring it, and 

 the price of every kind of labour and materi.d. No colony, no new 

 political instiluticm, was ever formed with such difficulties and such 

 success as the railway system ; financiers, engineers, contractors, had 

 to be created, while, as we have said, the very vastness of the works 

 have enhanced the cost of their execution. It is well, at the present 

 time, and with our present experience, to turn round and say the rail- 

 ways could have been executed for iess. It is true if, as our author 

 savs, there had been no parliamentary contests, no law,no extravagant 

 landed compensatiun, that much might have been saved, but we are 

 not quite so sure as he is that the future lines to be executed will cost 

 only the present moderate rate, and we deny, therefore, the propriety 

 of measuring things by the present standard. At this time money is 

 abundantand interest low,so is the price of labour and materials, and as 

 many contractors have been ruined, and none have too much work, a 

 line can be let at a very low price. Prices are however rising, and 

 will rise; labour will cost more, timber will get up, iron duuble in 

 price, to say nothing of a crisis by and bye, and the serious consequences 

 of depression in the money market, which it is in the nature of events 

 to bring about from time to time. We would not have contractors or 

 engineers blind to these facts, for it was to such facts that many diffi- 

 culties were owing at a previous period. The much vilified estimates of 

 Stephenson, Brunei, Kastrick, Braithwaite, &c., were founded upon 

 works actually executed, but, in the interval, a most serious diiference 

 in prices was created by the number of contracts in the field. While, 

 however, we expect prices to rise as a matter of course, we do not 

 anticipate the serious excesses of the old system, because many of the 

 difficulties have been overcome. In the infancy of the railway system, 

 as the development of traffic was not foreseen, so neither was the cost 

 of stations duly provided for, then it must be remembered that in 

 those days contractors were not used to works so gigantic, and were 

 not so competent to undertake them. Now, the weight of locomo- 

 tives is ascertained, and the rails will nut have to be increased in 

 weight 50 per cent, above the estimate, as was the case previously in 

 consequence of the experience gained in the course of the working. 

 Now, many and economical arrangements are well known, people are 

 not afraid to lay down timber bridges, as to which formerly much pre- 

 judice and misconception prevailed. 



We say that this experience, now so advantageous, bad then to be 

 gained and to be bought at every step, and that the old system instead 

 of being chargeable with blame, is deserving of the highest degree of 

 praise and admiration. Ftw know the burthen which weighed un the 

 minds of railway managers in those days, and rarely have exertions so 

 great been made, and received so little appreciation. Our author 

 graphically describes the difficulties of the panic. 



"Still worse was the condition of some other lines two years later. 

 The commercial embarras^ments that weighed so heavily upon the 

 countrv bent them to the ground. The proprietors were totally 

 unable to answer the calls upon them. No credit could be given — no 

 money could be obtained. Contractors failed — works were stopped — 

 loans were raised at usurious interest — capital was provided at a 

 s.icrifice of one-third of ils amount. Whatever censure boards of 

 directors deserved in other matters, at this time they stood forward 

 manfullv to face the storm. Many of them supplied large sums from 

 their individual resources, and pledged their credit to a frightlul extent. 

 They risked ruin fur the benefit of lln-ir fellow-proprietors, which 

 they never would have hazarded for their own. Few know the 

 perilous state of some of these now flourishing concerns, or of the 

 anxious days and sleepless nights of those who had to provide the 

 sinews of war, to uphold a sinking credit, and ward olf impending 

 bankruptcy and ruin." 



We disagree with him, however, as to railway dirnclors pushing on 



the works at any cost, lecanse they were deeply imbued with the 

 gambling spirit of the day. They pushed on the works as a matter 

 of financial necessitv, to which they were in the strongest degree 

 urged by their proprietors. To the bulk of the then holders on the 

 realization of a traffic and a dividend depended the tenure of their 

 property, often whether they were to be rich men or beggars. When 

 the panic came the rcsourcns of many became inadequate to meet the 

 heavy calls; they had to borrow or to hold on by any means. To go 

 into the market and sell was ruin, to hold was their only chance, 

 until the opening of some portions of the line made their shares a 

 better security, or until the subscription of two-thirds of the capital 

 enabled the companies to postpone the calls, and to raise money on 

 debentures. Any sacrifice of capital to gain time was preferable to 

 throwing shares on the market, where scarcely any description of 

 property was at par, while the perils of forfeiting everything by 

 non-compliance with the act of parliament made shares without a 

 traffic totally unavailable as a security for raising money. When all 

 these circumstances are taken into consideration, railwaj' managers 

 will not be censured for excesses of estimates, which circumstances 

 alone produced. 



The evils produced by the legislature the pamphlet before us well 

 shows, it particularly dwells on the legalized extortions of land- 

 owners, and the prohibitions of level crossings of common roads, 

 which, of course, it proposes to remedv. 



We have now, therefore, to consider the present state of the 

 railway interest. We have so many hundred miles of railway, 

 costing so many millions, and as a new institution has arisen, UfW 

 public wants have been created, first and foremost of which is cheap 

 travelling. In a national point of view there can be no question upon 

 this subject; cheap travelling is in th^ highest degree desirable: how 

 is it to be obtained ? Every one has his remedy ; and the legislature 

 is called upon by many well-meaning individuals to cut the Gordian 

 knot, and to buy up the whole of the lailways: others, among whom 

 our author is one, propose modifications of this principle. For our 

 own parts we are most free to admit, that on the leading lines of 

 traffic the charges for travelling are absurdly high, and the accommo- 

 dation for the labouring classes totally inadequate; still we are in- 

 clined to say that it is better to let the matter alone than to legislate 

 upon it. The mischief hitherto has been in legislating for questions 

 of public enterprise, imposing restrictions and giving privileges, 

 which are the fertile sources of mischief, and we anticipate little good 

 thf refore from anv legislative remedy, the most efficient in such cases 

 being in our opinion to legislate as little as possible, but to proceed 

 upon the broad economical principle of leaving industry to regulate 

 itself. Not that we doubt the right of the legislature to interfere in 

 this specific case or in any similar case. Apart from the question of 

 rails and locomotives, shares and shareholders, the railway system is 

 an institution having the same public relations as a bank, a college, 

 an hospital, or a public house, and in which any rights of private pro- 

 perty exist subordinate to the public objects. On the equity of the 

 case, it must be remembered, that if railways have been allowed a 

 maximum fare, it was on the express condition that any body should 

 be allowed to compete with them un their own lines. This, however, 

 is found to be injurious to the public, and ihr-. legislature have, there- 

 fore, the equity of requiring some other equivalent security for a rea- 

 sonable rate of fare. Our ground for letting the railways alone on 

 the subject of fares is, that it is more remunerative for railway com- 

 panies to charge low fares than it is to charge high fares, and that 

 this principle is making satisfactory progress, and must and will be 

 adopted by all companies. — The following observations from a very 

 able article in the Railway Record, will be read with interest. "Avery 

 large amount of manufacturing business has been created by the rail- 

 way system, for the supply of railway stuck, and this will be ever on 

 the increase, not merely for England alone, but for her colonies, and 

 for foreign lands. We are prepared to see railways rise in value, in 

 the same proportion that canals have rist'n. For although it be true, 

 that the price of making railways has been reduced very low of late, 

 it is quite certain that, with increasing traffic, those prices will rise. 

 When railways shall commence in the East and West Indies, in Aus- 

 tralia and China, English capital will find so many vents, that the in- 

 tense existing competition will be lessened, and assuredly the value 

 of land will rise as our population thickens. The greater the num- 

 bers of the community the mure valuable will the roads become. Eng- 

 land will be virtually the metropolis of the continent, by means of free 

 communication throughout all lands. 



" Nothing can defVat railway prosperity, but, at the same time, 

 nothing can check it so much as injudicious high fires. We camiut 

 too strongly insist on this point. The increase of expenses in railways 

 is great in proportion to the diminution of traffic, and the increase of 

 traffic is followed by u very slight increase of expenses on the annual 



