of railways the rails were made of iron. Competition gradually produced rails in which a core, of what is technically called “cinder,” is covered up with a skin of iron; and the cleverest foreman for an ironmaster was the man who could make rails with the maximum of cinder and the minimum of iron. In more than one instance has it been known in relaying an old line the worn-out rails have been sold at a higher price per ton than the new ones were bought for; yet this would hardly open the eyes of the buyers. The contrivances which are resorted to to get hold of one another’s prices beforehand by competing contractors are manifold; and, when they attend in person, they commonly put off the filling up of their tender till the last moment. Once a shrewd contractor found himself at the same inn with a rival who always trod close on his heels. He was followed about and cross-questioned incessantly, and gave vague answers. Within half-an-hour of the last moment he went into the coffee room and sat himself down in a corner where his rival could not overlook him. There and then he filled up his tender, and, as he rose from the table, left behind him the paper on which he had blotted it. As he left the room his rival caught up the blotting paper, and, with the exulting glee of a consciously successful rival, read off the amount backwards. “Done this time!” was his mental thought, as he filled up his own tender a dollar lower, and hastened to deposit it. To his utter surprise, the next day he found that he had lost the contract, and complainingly asked his rival how it was, for he had tendered below him. “How did you know you were below me?” “Because I found your blotting paper.” “I thought so. I left it on purpose for you, and wrote another tender in my bedroom. You had better make your own calculations next time!”
—Roads and Rails, by W. B. Adams.
RAILWAY LEGISLATION.
A writer in the Encyclopædia Britannica remarks:—“The expenses, direct and incidental, of obtaining an Act of Parliament have been in many cases enormous, and generally are excessive. The adherence to useless and expensive forms of Parliamentary Committees in what are
called the standing orders, or general regulations for the observance of promoters of railway bills, on the one part, and the itching for opposition of railway companies, to resist fancied inroads on vested rights, supposed injurious competition, on the other part, have been amongst the sources of excessive expenditure. Mr. Stephenson mentioned an instance showing how Parliament has entailed expense upon railway companies by the system complained of. The Trent Valley Railway was under other titles originally proposed in 1836. It was, however, thrown out by the standing orders committee, in consequence of a barn of the value of £10, which was shown upon the general plan, not having been exhibited upon an enlarged sheet. In 1840, the line again went before Parliament. It was opposed by the Grand Junction Railway Company, now part of the London and North-Western. No less than 450 allegations were made against it before the standing orders subcommittee, which was engaged twenty-two days in considering those objections. They ultimately reported that four or five of the allegations were proved, but the committee nevertheless allowed the bill to proceed. It was read a second time and then went into committee, by whom it was under consideration for sixty-three days; and ultimately Parliament was prorogued before the report could be made. Such were the delays and consequent expenses which the forms of the House occasioned in this case, that it may be doubted if the ultimate cost of constructing the whole line was very much more than was expended in obtaining permission from Parliament to make it. This example serves to show the expensive formalities, the delays, and difficulties, with which Parliament surround railway legislation. Another instance, quoted by the same authority, will show not only the absurdity of the system of legislation, but also the afflicting spirit of competition and opposition with which railway bills are canvassed in Parliament, and the expensive outlay incurred by companies themselves.
“In 1845, a bill for a line now existing went before Parliament with eighteen competitors, each party relying on the wisdom of Parliament to allow their bill at least to pass a second reading! Nineteen different parties condemned to
one scene of contentious litigation! They each and all had to pay not only the costs of promoting their own line, but also the costs of opposing eighteen other bills. And yet conscious as government must have been of this fact, Parliament deliberately abandoned the only step it ever took on any occasion of subjecting railway projects to investigation by a preliminary tribunal. Parliamentary committees generally satisfied themselves with looking on and watching the ruinous game of competition for which the public are ultimately to pay. In fact, railway legislation became a mere scramble, conducted on no system or principle. Schemes of sound character were allowed to be defeated on merely technical grounds, and others of very inferior character were sanctioned by public act, after enormous Parliamentary expenses had been incurred. Competing lines were granted, sometimes parallel lines through the same district, and between the same towns.”
AN EXPENSIVE PARLIAMENTARY BILL.
A writer in the Popular Encyclopædia observes:—“But the most conspicuous example in recent times, which overshadowed all others, of excessive expenditure in Parliamentary litigation as well as in land and compensation, is supplied in the history of the Great Northern Company. The preliminary expenses of surveys, notices to landowners, etc., commenced in 1844, and the Bill was introduced into the House of Commons in 1845, when it was opposed by the London and North-Western, the Eastern Counties, and the Midland Railways. It was further opposed successively by two other schemes, called the London and York and the Direct Northern. The contest lasted eighty-two days before the House of Commons, more than half the time having been consumed by opposition to the Bill. The Bill was allowed to stand over till next year (1846), when it began, before the Committee of the House of Lords, where it left off in the Lower House in the year 1845 on account of the magnitude of the case. The Bill was before the Upper House between three and four weeks, and in the same year (1846) it was granted. The promoters of the rival projects were bought off, and all their expenses paid, including the costs of the opposition of the neighbouring
lines already named, before the Great Northern bill was passed; and the ‘preliminary expenses,’ comprising the whole expenditure of every kind up to the passing of the bill was £590,355, or more than half-a-million sterling, incurred at the end of two years of litigation. Subsequently to the passing of the Act an additional sum of £172,722 was expended for law engineering expenses in Parliament to 31st December, 1857, which was spent almost wholly in obtaining leave from Parliament to make various alterations. Thus it would appear that a sum total of £763,077 was spent as Parliamentary charges for obtaining leave to construct 245 miles, being at the rate of £3,118 per mile.”