Railway Rates. 
Kingscote at the Council Meeting, the 
Committee did not make any recom- 
mendation. Various letters on the 
subject of the prize sheet had been 
read, and instructions given for the 
replies thereto. 
Railway Rates. 
Sir Nigel Kingscote then 
moved : — 
That, looking to the revised 
schedules of rates for the carriage 
of live stock and agricultural pro- 
duce which have been issued by the 
various railway companies, it is 
desirable that the Royal Agricul- 
tural Society should co-operate with 
the Mansion House Association on 
Railway and Canal Traffic in en- 
deavouring to obtain a reconside- 
ration of those rates, and that the 
Society should contribute an annual 
subscription of 10 1. 10*. to the funds 
of such Association. 
He said he did not very often rise to 
ask the Council to spend money ; it 
was generally the other way. He 
hoped, however, that he should have 
the Council with him on that occasion. 
He was very much disappointed that 
this trouble with regard to railway 
rates should have arisen again ; but 
everyone hoped that, as the result of 
the Committee over which the noble 
duke (the Duke of Richmond) had 
presided, and the tribunal on. which 
Lord Balfour of Burleigh and Sir 
Courtenay Boyle had sat, the matter 
would have been finally settled. He 
was afraid that the railway com- 
panies had rather overshot the mark 
in imposing the new rates. He had 
a letter in his pocket from a repre- 
sentative of his county of Gloucester, 
stating that the rates from the 
localities between Bristol and Bir- 
mingham had risen 35 per cent. It 
was certain that some investigation 
into the matter was required, as this 
was only one instance of hundreds — 
he might say of thousands. It would 
cost the Society a considerable sum 
if they undertook inquiries them- 
selves with regard to the details of 
these rates. Such inquiries could be 
made through the Mansion House 
Association very readily, and if they 
subscribed 10L 10*. to the funds of 
VOL. iV. T. S. — 13 
xxxiii 
the Association, they would be able 
to get the information required. He 
brought the question before the 
Council because he thought it was a 
step in the right direction ; and it 
would save trouble and be an eco- 
nomy if they became subscribers to 
the Association. 
Mr. Sanday seconded the motion. 
Mr. Dent did not raise the 
slightest opposition to the motion 
for the proposed subscription, if 
the Council liked to make it. But 
he understood that at the Mansion 
House meeting the other day the cry 
was that the Board of Trade should 
have power to regulate railway rates 
and fares. The moment they went 
to a Government Department or to 
the Legislature to interfere with the 
price of commodities — and he held 
that the carriage of commodities was 
an article which could be paid for in 
the same way as the commodities 
themselves — they would get worse off 
than by dealing directly with the 
companies. A great deal of mis- 
understanding had arisen, and a 
great deal of pressure had been put 
upon the railway companies, to bring 
out their revised schedules of rates. 
From his own experience, he knew 
that many of the railway officers had 
been pretty well killed in their 
endeavour to get out these rates by 
the time required by the Legislature. 
There was very little doubt that 
agriculturists would find, as had been 
found in the North of England, that, 
generally speaking, the rates would 
be put upon something like their old 
level. He thought that the matter 
was more likely to be settled, and 
put upon a satisfactory footing, by 
the traders themselves dealing with 
the railway companies than by 
putting the matter into the hands of 
the Mansion House Association, and 
by endeavouring to get the Legis- 
lature to put power into the hands of 
a Government Department. 
The Duke of Richmond said that 
as he had had the honour of presiding 
over the Committee on Railway 
Rates, he should like to make one or 
two observations. The present con- 
dition of things was due, not to the 
action of the railway companies, but 
to the traders. When they con- 
sidered that the rates were not satis-. 
C 
