"Since the year 1797, when the above account of the inland navigation of the county of Salop was made out, another mode of conveyance has frequently been adopted in this country to a considerable extent; I mean that of forming roads with iron rails laid along them, upon which the articles are conveyed on waggons, containing from six to thirty cwt.; experience has now convinced us that in countries whose surfaces are rugged, or where it is difficult to obtain water for lockage, where the weight of the articles of produce is great in comparison with their bulk, and where they are mostly to be conveyed from a higher to a lower level,—that in those cases, iron rail-ways are in general preferable to a canal navigation.
"On a rail-way well constructed, and laid with a declivity of 55 feet in a mile, one horse will readily take down waggons containing from 12 to 15 tons, and bring back the same waggons with four tons in them....
"This useful contrivance may be varied so as to suit the surface of many different countries at a comparatively moderate expense. It may be constructed in a manner much more expeditious than navigable canals; it may be introduced into many districts where canals are wholly inapplicable; and in case of any change in the working of the mines or manufactures, the rails may be taken up and put down again, in a new situation, at a moderate expense."
Thomas Gray, writing in 1821, warned investors in canal shares that the time was "fast approaching when rail-ways must, from their manifest superiority in every respect, supersede the necessity both of canals and turnpike roads, so far as the general commerce of the country was concerned." He further expressed the conviction that "were canal proprietors sensible how much their respective shares would be improved in value by converting all the canals into rail-ways, there would not, perhaps, in the space of ten or twenty years remain a single canal in the country."
Blinded by their prosperity, however, the canal companies failed to adopt the necessary measures for ensuring its continuance, though the Duke of Bridgewater himself saw sufficient of the new rival to get an uneasy suspicion of what might happen. "We may do very well," he is reported to have said to Lord Kenyon, when asked about the prospects of his canals, "if we can keep clear of those —— tram-roads." Unfortunately for the canal interests, though fortunately for the country, the qualified tram-roads were not to be kept clear of, but, with the encouragement they got from those they afterwards impoverished, were to bring the Canal Era to a close, and to inaugurate the Railway Era in its place.
CHAPTER XIX
THE RAILWAY ERA
Between 1801 and 1825 no fewer than twenty-nine "iron railways" were either opened or begun in various parts of Great Britain. The full list is given by John Francis in his "History of the English Railway." It shows, as Francis points out, that from Plymouth to Glasgow, and from Carnarvon to Surrey, "there was scarcely a county where some form of the railway was not used." Most of these new railways were, however, still operated in conjunction with collieries or ironworks and canals or rivers, as the following typical examples show:—
1802: Sirhowey Tramroad, built by the Monmouthshire Canal Company in conjunction with the Tredegar Iron-works; length, eleven miles; cost £45,000.
1809: Forest of Dean Railway, for conveying coals, timber, ore, etc., to the Severn for shipment; length, seven and a half miles; cost £125,000.