648 
Light Railways. 
Having settled what light railways are, the next point for 
inquiry is, Are such railways wanted here ? If so, for what pur- 
pose ? “ Why,” it may be asked, “ have an inferior article ? 
The English railways, as we know them to-day, are the best 
and mo3t perfect in the world. For speed, for safety, for con- 
venience, Continental lines cannot hold a candle to them. Why 
should we deliberately accept a lower standard ? ” The answer 
is simple ; that, unless we do, we shall have no new railways 
at all in this country, except it be new main lines, affording an 
alternative route for an important wholesale traffic already in 
existence. Ten thousand pounds a mile — the lowest sum at 
which railways of the existing standard can be built at all — is a 
sum on which the traffic of an agricultural district can never 
hope to pay interest. Unless, therefore, they are prepared to 
put up with railways of a radically different type — -simpler and 
cheaper in every way than the existing lines — the districts 
which are at present without railway communication must 
make up their minds to go without it to the end of time. 
It may, however, be further asked, “ Why should they 
not go without it ? If these lines are to be inferior at all points 
to the existing railways, is it worth our while to have them at 
all?” It is difficult to give any positive reply based on actual 
experience in England, for practically we possess no light rail- 
ways, and therefore have no experience of what they might do. 
We have, however, a few lines broadly comparable to what 
would be called light railways abroad. Take, for example, the 
Southwold Railway, which runs nine miles from the market 
town of Halesworth to the coast of Suffolk. Before this little 
line, which is on a 3-foot gauge, was open, there was an omni- 
bus now and then between Halesworth and Southwold. Last 
year the railway carried 87,000 passengers and 9,000 tons of 
goods and minerals. Or take another and more modern 
instance. Easingwold is a little place of about 2,000 inhabi- 
tants, lying on the old main high road from York to Tkirsk and 
the North. Till two or three years back its communication 
with the outside world was kept up by an omnibus that plied 
two or three times a day backwards and forwards to a station 
on the North Eastern main line, a couple of miles off, at Alne. 
Last year the railway carried 43,000 passengers and 12,500 
tons of goods and minerals. It can hardly be that such lines 
have not met a real and serious want. Take, again, two other 
lines, which also would be classed as light railways in Conti- 
nental countries, but which here are legally tramways, because 
they run along the high road, and were constructed under the 
provisions of the Tramways Act of 1870. The Wantage tram- 
