The next branch of the transit by land appertains to the conveyance of persons and goods per rail. The railways of the United Kingdom open, in course of construction, or authorised to be constructed, extend over upwards of 12,000 miles, or four times the distance across the Atlantic. The following is the latest return on the subject, in a Report printed by order of the House of Commons, the 22nd of March last:—
| Miles. | Chains. | Persons employed. | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total length of railway open on June 30, 1849, and persons employed thereon | 5447 | 10¾ | 55,968 |
| Total length of railway in course of construction on June 30, 1849, and persons employed thereon | 1504 | 20½ | 103,846 |
| Total length of railway neither open nor in course of construction on June 30, 1849 | 5132 | 38¾ | |
| Total length of railway authorised to be used for the conveyance of passengers on June 30, 1849, and the total number of persons employed thereon | 12,083 | 70 | 159,784 |
There are now upwards of 6000 miles of railroad open for traffic in the three kingdoms, 549 miles having been opened in the course of the half-year following the date of the above return. At that date 111 miles of railroad were open for traffic, irrespective of their several branches. 266 railways, including branches, were authorised to be constructed, but had not been commenced.
The growth of railways was slow, and not gradual. They were unknown as modes of public conveyance before the present century, but roads on a similar principle, irrespective of steam, were in use in the Northumberland and Durham collieries, somewhere about the year 1700. The rails were not made of iron but of wood, and, with a facility previously unknown, a small cart, or a series of small carts, was dragged along them by a pony or a horse, to any given point where the coal had to be deposited. In the lead mines of the North Riding of Yorkshire the same system was adopted, the more rapidly and with the less fatigue, to convey the ore to the mouth of the mine. Some of these “tramways,” as they are called, were and are a mile and more in length; and visitors who penetrate into the very bowels of the mine are conveyed along those tramways in carts, drawn generally by a pony, and driven by a boy (who has to duck his head every here and there to avoid collision) into the galleries and open spaces where the miners are at work.
In the year 1801, the first Act of Parliament authorising the construction of a railway was passed. This was the Surrey, between Wandsworth and Croydon, nine miles in length, and constructed at a cost, in round numbers, of 60,000l. In the following twenty years, sixteen such Acts were passed, authorising the construction of 124¾ miles of railway, the cost of which was 971,232l., or upwards of 7500l. a-mile. In 1822 no such Act was passed. In 1823, Parliament authorised the construction of the Stockton and Darlington; and on that short railway, originated and completed in a great measure through the exertions of the wealthy Quakers of the neighbourhood, and opened on the 27th of December, 1825, steam-power was first used as a means of propulsion and locomotion on a railway. It was some little time before this that grave senators and learned journalists laughed to scorn Mr. Stephenson’s assertion, that steam “could be made to do twenty miles an hour on a railway.” In the following ten years, thirty railway bills were passed by the legislature; and among these, in 1826, was the Liverpool and Manchester, which was opened on the 16th September, 1830—an opening rendered as lamentable as it is memorable by the death of Mr. Huskisson. In 1834, seven railway bills were passed; ten in 1835; twenty-six in 1836; eleven in 1837; one in 1838; three in 1839; none again till 1843, and then only one—the Northampton and Peterborough, which extends along 44½ miles, and which cost 429,409l. The mass of the other railways have been constructed, or authorised, and the Acts of Parliament authorising their construction shelved, since the close of 1843. I find no official returns of the dates of the several enactments.
The following statement, in averages of four years, shows the amount of the sums which Parliament authorised the various companies to raise from 1822 to 1845. Upwards of one-half of the amount of the aggregate sum expended in 1822-6 was spent on the Manchester and Liverpool Railway, 1,832,375l. The cost of the Stockton and Darlington, (450,000l.), is also included:
| From | 1822 | to | 1825 | inclusive | £451,465 |
| „ | 1826 | „ | 1829 | „ | 816,846 |
| „ | 1830 | „ | 1833 | „ | 2,157,136 |
| „ | 1834 | „ | 1837 | „ | 10,880,431 |
| „ | 1838 | „ | 1841 | „ | 3,614,428 |
| „ | 1842 | „ | 1845 | „ | 20,895,128 |
Of these years, 1845 presents the era when the rage for railway speculation was most strongly manifested, as in that year the legislature sanctioned the raising, by new railway companies, of no less than 59,613,536l. more than the imperial taxes levied in the United Kingdom, while in 1844 the amount so sanctioned was 14,793,994l. The total sum to be raised for railway purposes for the last twenty years of the above dates was 153,455,837l., with a yearly average of 7,672,792l. For the four years preceding the yearly average was but 112,866l.
The parliamentary expenses attending the incorporation of sixteen of the principal railway companies were 683,498l., or an average per railway of 42,718l. It will be seen from the following table, that the greatest amount thus expended was on the incorporation of the Great Western. On that undertaking an outlay not much short of 90,000l. was incurred, before a foot of sod could be raised by the spade of the “navvy.”