CHAPTER XXII. 



EJELY DAYS OF RAILWAYS. 



Having seen what coaching business was before the 

 days of railways, and something about the persons 

 who carried it on, and the large amounts they contri- 

 buted to the National Exchequer, it may be as well 

 to inquire into the mode by which their trade was 

 abolished, and also to see what difficulties and ob- 

 stacles railway companies had to encounter before 

 they succeeded in acquiring a position which enabled 

 them entirely to supersede road-travelling. 



Some of the notions as to the capabilities of steam- 

 engines as locomotives can scarcely be read at this 

 time without exciting some surprise and raising a 

 smile, so very circumscribed were the ideas of the 

 most sanguine. 



Sixty or seventy years ago — or at all events at 

 the commencement of the present century — I sup- 

 pose nobody in existence dreamt of railways ever 

 coming into use as an ordinary means of convey- 

 ance, still less of their attaining the present rate of 



