THE CREATORS OF THE AGE OF STEEL. 251 



laws establishing reasonable maximum rates of charges for the transportation of 

 passengers and freight on said railroads, and enforce all such laws by adequate 

 penalties."^ 



If the question be asked, why did we ever grant in special charters to rail- 

 road companies the right to fix rates by their directors, we reply that a full and 

 complete answer to this question was made on page eleven of the Report of this 

 Board for 1878, and if that be not deemed satisfactory, we add that at the time 

 these charters were granted the unanimous opinion of the civilized world was, 

 that railroads were merely improved highways, and that competing carriers were 

 to be allowed on each line. 



That accounts for the non- restriction of carriers' rates, but not for the failure 

 to limit the tolls for the use of the road, in respect to which it may be said that 

 the liberal spirit manifested in this concession is of the same character as that 

 shown in other legislative enactments upon this subject, and particularly in the 

 munificent subsidies granted for the purpose of securing the use of railroad trans- 

 portation facilities, which Hberality cannot be used in argument against the rights 

 of the people, and does not prove that the Legislature would if it could; or could 

 if it would, barter away the public interest, or in any way restrict the people in 

 their right to use these transportation facilities in whatever mode or manner may 

 be consistent with the general good. We are therefore unavoidably forced to 

 the conclusion that railroad companies are not only subject to all restrictions 

 applicable either to private owners of public thoroughfares, or to common car- 

 riers, but that as they alone exercise the functions of both, they form an excep- 

 tional class, requiring peculiar and exceptionally stringent regulation. 



THE CREATORS OF THE AGE OF STEEL. 



BESSEMER, SIEMENS, WHITWORTH AND GILCHRIST. 



There is more of truth than poetry in giving to the century beginning with the 

 year 1850 the name of "The Age of Steel." The metallurgical inventions and 

 discoveries which mark abruptly that period have effected a revolution in the 

 industry of the world. Steel is to us what iron was to our grandfathers; what 

 bronze was to the armies that sat in league before Troy ; what stone was to the 

 naked savages that dwelt in the caves of Gaul before the beginning of history. 

 The very web and woof of modern civilization is woven out of steel. The pro- 

 duction of steel in 1882 was as great as the crude iron product of 1850. The 

 metal is omnipresent ; it has replaced iron, wood, brass and copper. The rails, 

 ships, cannon, and machinery of the world are steel. The best definition yet 

 given of man is that he is a tool-using animal ; his tools are steel, and the tools 

 wherewith he makes his tools are steel. 



As Carlyle says, " We are to bethink us that the epic verily is not Arms 



3 Article 12, Section 14. 



