which is called the "train wire," so that the messages of the public are in no way interrupted.

Recent projects gave promise of another, and not an unimportant improvement in the telegraph. Great, it might be supposed, would be the confusion, if two opposite currents of electricity met in one wire; but by a new adaptation, it is contemplated, that messages shall pass in opposite directions without the smallest interference with each other. The means employed are simply mechanical. The system would have been some time since in operation in England, but for the difficulty to be overcome from the variableness of the insulation of the wires, occasioned by the humidity of our climate. But already several beautiful modifications have been devised, in order to overcome this difficulty, and there is daily hope that the improvement will be perfected.

So much as regards railways. As regards the public, the electric telegraphs of England have been rapidly growing in importance, although, comparatively, we are still very backward in taking advantage of the facilities they afford. It is only a little more than eight years since the telegraph was first worked in this country. During the first quarter of 1848, the receipts of the Electric Telegraph Company were only £160; in the second quarter they increased to £240; in the third to £320; in the fourth to £400; and the receipts, despite the fact that other Companies have grown up, and that the charges are now only onethird of the amount originally demanded, have now reached £3,000 per week! The growth has thus been fifty-fold in seven years; a progress unexampled in commercial annals, except in association with railway intercourse.

One of the original grounds of opposition to railways was the dangerous character of the traffic. A writer in one of our most popular reviews thus expressed, some years ago, the common opinion upon the danger of railway travelling :—

"It is certainly some consolation to those who are to be whirled at the rate of 18 or 20 miles an hour, by means of a high-pressure engine, to be told that there is no danger of being sea-sick while on shore; that they are not to be scalded to death, nor drowned, nor dashed to pieces by the bursting of a boiler; and that they need not mind being struck by the scattered fragments, or dashed in pieces by the flying off or breaking of a wheel. But, with all

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these assurances, we should as soon expect the people of Woolwich to suffer themselves to be fired off upon one of Congreve's ricochet rockets, as trust themselves to the mercy of such a machine, going at such a rate."

It is curious, occasionally, to contrast prediction and event. The last return of the Government Railway Department shows that the number of passengers killed, in proportion to the number conveyed upon railways in the United Kingdom, was, for the first half-year of 1854, 1 in 7,195,343! Can it be assumed-would any Life Assurance Company in the world assume- that to English gentlemen and ladies sitting at home at their ease by their firesides, fatal accidents would only occur, during half a year, in the proportion of one in seven millions? In the active performance of the duties of life, it is impossible to find a case in which the proportion of fatal accidents is so small. But nevertheless, whenever an accident does occur upon a railway, the public are sure to find it regarded as "Another Fatal Railway Accident," just as if such accidents were constant, instead of being, as the Government statistics prove, most rare and extraordinary.

In comparison with deaths by railway accidents, how many are the accidents to persons walking in the streets! How fearful are the misadventures met with by those "who go down to the sea in ships!" Yet Parliament saw fit to provide, specially, for the smallest class of accidents arising from locomotion, and to afford only scanty redress for the greatest. Such has been the character of legislation for railways. The Merchant Shipping Law Consolidation Act, 1854 (17 and 18 Vict. c. 104), recognises in some sort the liability of shipowners, in cases of loss of life, or of personal damage to passengers. But this act only exemplifies, still more strongly, the partial character of legislation as against the Railway Companies. For whilst the damages, in the case of accident upon a railway, are unlimited, this Act expressly limits the amount, which can be recovered under its operation, to £30 per head. Still further, if a crowded emigrant ship should be wrecked, and all the lives on board be lost, the liability of the shipowner would be limited to the value of the ship and the amount due or accruing to him on account of freight in the voyage during which the accident occurred, so that, practically, the deodand amounts to nothing more than a first charge upon the insurance effected by the shipowner upon the ship and cargo. A shipowner might

thus send his vessel to sea, her condition unseaworthy, her compasses ill-adjusted, inefficiently commanded, and with a disorderly or incapable crew. The ship might be wrecked the same night, or be run down, for want of proper vigilance, by some steamer in the Channel. In such cases there would be only very partial redress against the shipowner, whatever might be his culpability. But let a railway carriage be thrown off a line in a dark night, by a stone or a log of wood carelessly or wilfully placed upon it,let a fatal accident occur in consequence of some wanton act, not of the Railway Company, but of that public who ought to guard and protect one another, —and the Railway Company, although suffering severe loss of property, without having any pecuniary redress, even on the legal conviction of the perpetrator of the deed, which may have been prompted either by a diabolical desire to wreak a petty vengeance, or for the gratification of a malicious disposition, is liable to be mulcted in the heaviest penalties, for the accidental loss of life the misfortune may occasion. Can it be said that this is equitable legislation, or that it is calculated to protect the public from the class of accidents against which protection is most required?

Lord Campbell's Act not only creates a new and ill-adjusted liability, but it is also an exceedingly unfair Act, in its application to different classes of society. The value of life is measured under this Act by a class standard. A high public functionary may take a ticket for a journey of six miles at the cost of one shilling. In the same train there may be a working-man, who intends to travel one hundred miles, and who has paid ten shillings. The train meets with an accident, and both are killed. It is shown that being a rich man, in the enjoyment of high posts, honours, and emoluments, his life was worth £20,000 to his family. The jury give the full amount claimed. But what do the family of the poor man get? The widow, not being able to establish any pecuniary loss, by reason of the accident which befel her husband, has charitably awarded to her, by the jury, £10, as a matter of feeling; and the attorney probably applies that amount to the payment of his costs. As regards the railway, therefore, this law is unequal; and it is still more so as regards the public.

The practical effect of this law is to retard the full adoption of low fares on railways. The Railway Companies, driven to become insurers of the lives of the public travelling on their lines, ob

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viously must, in one form or another, have premiums to meet compensation. Hence, proposals to reduce fares to their minimum are constantly met by the consideration that the larger the number of passengers, the greater the liability to accident, and to the pecuniary loss incidental to it. It is, indeed, fortunate for the public that the proportion of accidents is so small. If the proportion was large, fares must no doubt be raised. And, let it be observed that the Companies, thus driven to insure their passengers, are obliged to do so apart from all proper apportionment of premium to the risk incurred. A man travelling one hundred miles obviously incurs more risk than a man travelling six miles; yet, as we have seen, the family of the latter may get enormous compensation from the Company, whilst that of the former gets nothing. Nothing can be less equitable, or more opposed to every sound commercial principle. If Railway Companies are to be taxed in this way at all, the proper course would be, that each passenger should declare the value of his life, when he takes his ticket, and be charged in proportion to the distance he is travelling. But no consideration can be expected from those who have thought themselves justified in applying special legislation to a case in which that law applies only in the proportion of 1 to every 7,195,343!

Having now directed attention to the principal and more important topics of this great subject, it is desirable, before bringing this address to a close, to endeavour to lay before you some of the general results of the system.

You have heard that there are more than 90,000 men directly employed by the railways of the United Kingdom. Collaterally, in the manufacture of iron, the felling and transporting of timber, the production of stores, the erection and improvement of buildings, &c., these lines give employment to at least 50,000 more men. Now, 140,000 men represent, with their wives and children, a population of more than half a million of souls. The result, therefore, is, that no less than 1 in 50, of the total population of these realms, is directly dependent on its railways! Having regard to this most startling fact, you will not be disposed to think that this is an interest which should be neglected, or be harshly treated by the Legislature, or which should be the subject of imperfect and unsatisfactory legislation.

The financial results of railways will occasion no less sur

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prise, when they are considered. In the gross, £20,000,000 of revenue are now realised annually by the Railway Companies of the United Kingdom-an amount nearly equal to one-half the ordinary revenue of the state. Now, consider how the national wealth is affected by this large amount received from the people by the Railway Companies. Suppose that to-morrow there was a stoppage of all the railways-a cessation of the existing railway means of transporting human beings, merchandise, and animals. In the first place, it is certain that the traffic, represented by £20,000,000, could not be accommodated at all. But assume that it could be, it is certain that the accommodation could only be offered at more than three times the charge now made by the railways. The result then is, that upon the existing traffic of the nation, railways are effecting a direct saving to the people of not less than £40,000,000 per annum; and that sum exceeds by about 50 per cent. the entire interest of our National Debt. It may be said, therefore, that the railway system neutralises to the people the bad effects of the debt with which the state is encumbered. It places us in as good a position as if the debt did not exist. And here the doubt arises as to which would be the most advantageous condition,-a nation without a national debt and also without a railway system; or a nation hampered by a national debt, but having the advantage of cheap internal intercourse by railway.

Again, "Time is money." At least 111,000,000 passengers travel every year by our railways an average of 12 miles each. They perform the journey in half an hour. At the average rate of speed of the stage-coach, a journey of twelve miles would have occupied an hour and a half. Here is a direct saving of one hour upon every average journey performed by 111,000,000 of persons annually. These 111,000,000 hours saved are equal to 14,000,000 days or 38,000 years, supposing the working man to labour eight hours a day; and allowing at the rate of 3s. a day for his labour, the annual saving to the nation, on this low average scale, is not less than £2,000,000 per annum.

Regard some of the moral results of the railway system. Observe how it operates in equalising the value of land. Railways enable the farmer in Scotland to send his beasts to Smithfield, and gardeners in the West of England to send their early fruits to Covent Garden. Distant properties, therefore, become as