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A
TREAT IS E
ON THE
PoliticAL Eco NoMY
RAILROADs;
IN WHICH
THE NEw MoDE OF LocoMotion Is ConSIDERED IN ITs
INFLUENCE UPON THE AFFAIRS OF NATIONS.
By ... • ‘ .
HENRY FAIRBAIRN.
“Through a long succession of generations he had been the progenitor of a virtuous
and able citizen; who by force of the arts of peace, had corrected governments of
oppression, and suppressed-wars of rapine.”—Burke, -Character of Mr. Fow.
*
:
:
.*
LONDON :
PUBLISHED BY JOHN WEALE,
ARCHITECTURAL LIBRARY, HIGH HOLBORN.
1836.
f. ONDON :
JOHN LEIGHTON, JOHNSON’s-courtT, 1"LIEET. STREET.
.

5.
*.
PREFACE.
THE importance of the railroad system is now
so fully established in the estimation of the
people of this and of all other nations
to whom the scientific inventions of Great
Britain are transmitted, that arguments are
no longer required in support of the general
advantages of iron roads. The object of the
present work is, accordingly, to attempt the
establishment of the system upon the most
economical, durable, and least hazardous
foundation, and to exhibit also the extraordi-
nary consequences which the right application
of this new mode of intercommunication
will probably produce upon the whole future
condition and prospects of mankind. So
iv tº PREFA CE.
great have been the revolutionary conse-
quences which have arisen from the invention
of the steam-engine, and from other scientific
discoveries at first apparently unimportant in
their operation, and so vast has been the
accumulation of wealth which England has
derived from these applications of the sim-
plest materials of which the universe is com—
posed,—that we now perceive that the ascen—
dancy resides in the nations distinguished
by commerce alone; and, turning with con-
tempt from the records of the battles and
victories of former times, we acknowledge
that science has become the distributor of
all power. Other nations are daily becoming
more confirmed in corresponding views of
the superiority of the arts of peace, and the
new mode of facilitating the intercourse of
the people of neighbouring countries has
certainly been discovered at a most fortunate
period in the changing sentiments of man-
kind. The projects which are contained in
the following pages, for connecting Scotland
PR E FA C E . * V
with Ireland, and England with France, by
railways over the seas which now separate us
from those countries, would have been mere
visions of the imagination to the people of
any preceding time; but it has now become
acknowledged that the interests of countries
are not less similar than the interests of
towns; that to be divided by the sea is not
different to the minor divisions by moun-
tains or by rivers, and, therefore, not the
policy, but the practicability of thus consoli-
dating the interests of nations, will become
the only object to be considered at some very
early period of time These portions of the
work were formerly published in the United
Service Journal, and were received with a
degree of favour both in England and upon
the continent, which has induced the writer
to extend his observations upon those projects
in the course of the present work. That such
propositions should be adopted immediately
is certainly not to be supposed ; but the accu-
mulations of population, capital, and com:
vi PREF A C E.
merce, which the abandonment of war will
have a tendency to create, will now furnish
the means for the accomplishment of designs
which could not be undertaken before the
cessation of that waste of the resources of
nations which at length has come to pass.
The facilities of communication by the intro-
duction of railways will very powerfully has-
ten the oblivion of all national animosities;
and so much is the writer impressed with the
value of the system in its tendency to banish
the envy and uncharitableness which hitherto
have been the prevailing sentiments amongst
the nations, that he does not hesitate to ac-
knowledge his belief and desire that England
will not remain a colossus amongst the mo–
dern states, but that the diffusion of wealth
will become more universal, and that the
means of acquiring the blessings of existence
be equalised all over the world.
The proposal for the employment of the
present turnpike roads as the sites of the new
roads, if adopted, will be injurious to the in-
PRE FA C E . vii
terests of many speculators in the railroad
projects, which are intended to be carried on
by incorporated companies; but as these
appear to the writer to be projected upon a
foundation so dangerous to the future inter-
ests of the country, the prevention of a
greater, must be the apology if the present
proposition should occasion some present, loss.
The railroad system has been yet so little
unfolded in its mechanical, commercial, or
political operation, that much must be left to
conjecture in works which are published upon
it in its present stage; and should Inaccuracies
appear in any of the calculations in the fol-
lowing pages, it is to be hoped that the ge-
neral correctness of the principles and out-
lines will outweigh those smaller errors
which may be reasonably expected to occur
in discussions upon a subject so little de-
veloped at the present time.
London, February 5th, 1836.
CONTENTS.
, Page
CHAPTER I.
Objects of the present work—Importance of Railroads—
Proper mode of constructing them considered—The
general principles of joint-stock companies explained—
Individual enterprise preferred to the operations of great
incorporated bodies—Expenses of joint-stock companies
frequently fatal to their profitable existence—Superior
advantages of private capitalists—All commercial legis-
lation should be avoided—Companies for the formation
of railroads shewn to be not an exception to the general
rule. ......... * @ & © & g g g is a sº e º 'º e e s e º e º 'º e º e s a e e s ºf tº e º 'º e º e º e º is s a e º e º sº e < * g e ..]
CHAPTER II.
The common turnpike roads the true sites for the forma-
tion of railroads—Practicability of constructing them on
the present roads—The traffic not impeded during the
formation of the tracks—Suspension railways proposed
—Plates exhibiting the proposed new system—Saving
of property by the use of the present roads—Costs of
parliamentary bills—Surveys and other expenses saved
—Saving of property in inns—Mortgages upon tolls and
other investments on the present roads prevented from
being lost—The sites of the turnpike roads in every re-
spect to be preferred. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .......................... 12
X CONTENTS.
CHAPTER III. Page.
Some of the lines now in the act of construction examined
as to their probability of success—The Greenwich and
London railway—Its expensive construction and little
probability of its success—The Southampton and Lon-
don railway investigated—Shewn to be premature, and
not a beneficial line—The Birmingham and London,
and Great Western railway liable to similar objections—
Great losses anticipated from the many proposed joint-
stock schemes............... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . e e º º ºs e º e º e º a s & © e s 25
CHAPTER IV.
Steam locomotive power considered with reference to its
expense—Shewn to be too expensive for use in conveying
merchandise—The cause of its expense, and compara-
tive cost of locomotive and stationary steam-engine—
Cheapness of horse-power, and its speed sufficiently
great for the transit of goods—Horse-power discussed in
a statistical point of view. ... ................. .............. ... 31
CHAPTER V.
Further improvements proposed—The rails should be
narrow, hard, and smooth—Facings of polished steel
proposed—Railroads should be straight—Tunnels con-
sidered, and the levelling of the hills generally to be
preferred—Excavation of hills lessened in expense by
the sale of the materials—Cheap transport will favour
the formation of levels—Many extensive results of the
system anticipated—Agriculture extended and im-
proved—Mountains levelled, and climate improved—
Great influence of the system upon the future prospects
of mankind................................. , s = e s a s e º e º e º e º s e e º is t < * 40
CHAPTER VI.
Railways and canals compared—The superior advantages
of railroads when economically managed—The present
CONTENTS, xi
Page.
advantages of canals owing to the misuse of steam power
upon railways—Canals inferior to railways in economy
and speed—Render great tracks of country damp—
Have a humid influence upon climate—In every respect
a rude mode of conveyance—Their disappearance a
great advantage in a national point of view................. 49
CHAPTER VII.
Proposal for one great line from Dover to Glasgow—
Through the centre of the manufacturing districts of the
kingdom—First division of the work from Dover to
London—The navigation of the Thames superseded—
Consequences to dock property not disadvantageous—
The trade of London will be increased by railway tran-
sit—Calculations of the general saving by the superces-
sion in the Thames—The line from Dover to be carried
to the Thames Tunnel–Proceeds due north to Birming-
ham, Manchester, Glasgow, and Carlisle. . . . . . . . . . . . 58
CHAPTER VIII.
The works now in progress at the harbour of Dover
considered—Its improvement shewn to be difficult from
natural causes—Proposed new harbour upon that part
of the English Channel—Mode of constructing it—Its
expenserepaid by the shipping drawn from the Thames—
Proposed land communication with France—Shallowness
of the sea, and facility of constructing a pass—Several
modes proposed, a bridge, causeway, tunnel, steam ferry
or floating bridge—Great revenue and international
consequences to arise from the pass. . . . . . . . . . . ............ 70
CHAPTER IX.
Central position of the pass amidst the European states—
Railways from Calais to Paris, and the Mediterranean
sea—Another great line from Calais through Belgium
Holland, and the Hanse Towns to the Baltic sea—
xii cont ENTs.
Page
Calculations of revenue—Bridges between nations more
required, if practicable, than bridges between towns–
Objections to the effect upon the coasting trade removed
—Importance of the reciprocity of nations . . . . . . ........ 98
CHAPTER X.
Return to the main line of British railroads to Portpatrick
in Scotland—Land communication with Ireland proposed
—The soundings and islands between Portpatrick and
Donaghadee described—Circumstances favourable to
the formation of a causeway—Proposal to employ the
army in the construction of the work........................ 98
CHAPTER XI,
Review of the present commercial relations of England
and Ireland—True causes of the poverty of Ireland and
the wealth of England—Manufactures the principal
source of English wealth and national power—They
are founded upon steam power—Ireland cannot have
steam power because destitute of coal—Agriculture
shewn to be not the great source of national wealth...... 105
CHAPTER, XII.
Remedies for this deficiency of fuel pointed out—Coal of
good quality may probably be found in Ireland—The
coals of Scotland may be brought across the land pass—
The steam-engine may be superseded, and coals no
longer required—English superiority in manufatures
then would decline—Probability that the railway system
will equalize the advantages of all nations................... 115
CHAPTER XIII.
Effect of land communication upon the agriculture of
Ireland—General improvement of that country through
the opening of the English markets—Prices of produce
will be raised, the bogs reclaimed, and fisheries revived—
2it+...;
CONTENTS. xiii
Page
A land communication with Scotland and England will
have other extensive consequences—Steam navigation
shewn to be insufficient for these purposes—The union
considered; its importance to England, shewn to be over-
rated—General observations upon Irish politics and trade 124
- CHAPTER XIV.
Lines of railroads required through Ireland—Line to the
Atlantic Ocean on the Bay of Donegal—New harbour
proposed—Lines from the Clyde to Donaghadee and the
Bay of Donegal—Line from Dublin to Donaghadee, and
thence to Scotland and England—Project of a railway
from Valentia to Dublin considered—Central position of
the Isle of Man pointed out—The intervening sea
shallow, and this a favourable position for a land pass
between England and Ireland.......... ........................ 135
. CHAPTER XV.
Proposed railroad from Limerick to the Irish Channel—
Importance of this line—A navigation of fifteen hundred
miles towards England will be thus cut off—Consequen-
ces of this upon the agriculture and general condition
of the population of the centre and the west of Ireland—
Line to be carried to Dungarvon Bay—Proposed im-
provement of that navigation—Further influence of the
harbour and railroad upon the fisheries of the Nymph
Bank—The Shannon superseded by this railroad to the
Irish Channel * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * c s a e s a s 139
CHAPTER XIV.
The growth of tobacco in Ireland considered—Its prohibi-
tion an error—Might be made a great cause of wealth—
The soil, climate, and cheap labour of Ireland all favour-
able to the cultivation of that plant—The prohibition
shewn to have had other unfavourable consequences upon
the progress of the country in wealth......................... 149
xiv CONTENTS.
CHAPTER, XVII. Page.
Influence of railways upon the Irish mines—A railroad
proposed from Kilkenny to the Irish Channel—The
Kilkenny coal field reached by this line—The coal
described—Its advantages for steam navigation—Proba-
bility of an extensive export trade in coal—This fuel
favourable for the smelting of ores—When conveyed
upon railways will cause the re-opening of the Irish mines
—The hot blast and its effects in the manufacture of
iron—Anthracite may be cheapened in its excavation—
Ireland may now become possessed of extensive manu-
factures of iron............. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ... 166
CHAPTER XVIII.
English railways as connected with the Irish trade—Line
from Bristol to London–New harbour upon the Bristol
Channel proposed—Railway from Birmingham to Bristol
proposed—Great importance of such a line—The port of
Liverpool as connected with the Irish trade—Injustice
of the high dock dues—Proposal for deepening the
Menai Strait—The English manufacturing districts in-
terested in the cheap supplies of Irish grain—The general
interests of the two countries the same. ...................... 174
CHAPTER, XIX.
Some of the present political questions of Ireland dis-
cussed—Church reform—Poor rates—Public educa-
tion—Public works —The fisheries—Draining of the
bogs—Taxes upon absentees—All these exaggerated in
their importance—Ireland is possessed of abundant re-
sources without assistance from the state..................... 180
CHAPTER XX.
The railway system in the new world—Railways from
Halifax to Boston, and round the whole circuit of the
sea board of the United States—Line from Quebec to
CONTENTS. XV
Page.
the Bay of Fundy—The St. Lawrence superseded—
Railway across the Peninsula of Florida—Importance of
this work—Line from Baltimore to the Ohio river....... 161
CHAPTER XXI.
Other political consequences of railways in the United
States—Their effect in concentrating the population—
Commerce diverted from the western rivers by railways
to the Atlantic Ocean—Thence the prevention of emi-
gration to the new States, and spread of agriculture in
the New England States—The climate of the New Eng-
land States considered—Its extreme variableness and
low temperature in winter—Proposal for the embank-
ment of the lakes................................... ........ . . . . . . . 20]
CHAPTER, XXII. .
Pass across the Isthmus of Suez considered—A canal the
best mode of effecting the communication between the
Red and Mediterranean seas—An iron canal proposed—
A marine railway—Calculations of revenue from the
work—Steam navigation to the East Indies favoured by
circumstances—Railroad from Bombay to Calcutta–
From Calcutta to Canton—Great results to be expected
from this work. . . . . . . © 2 * * * 0 tº us tº e s e . & e s e a . . . . . . . . . . 209
CHAPTER, XXIII.
Railroads as connected with the general question of free
trade—Will be useless if monopolies be not previously
abolished—Over-legislation the principal cause of na-
tional poverty and distress—Governments must be
limited in their powers—The Post Office an instance of
the bad consequences of monopolies—The Corn Laws
discussed with reference to railroads—Shewn to be a
great evil—Produce great derangements of trade, both
at home and abroad—The importance of the landed in-
terest over-rated—Manufactures the great source of
xvi . CONTENTS.
e g * tº Page
national wealth—Probability that railways will transfer
the ascendancy to France—The landed interest short-
sighted in opposing the progress of manufactures........ . 217
CHAPTER XXIV.
The currency considered—Great importance of the question
—The Bank of England a dangerous institution—Le-
gislative errors committed with regard to it—The panic
occasioned by the errors of the government and the
Bank—Suppression of the one and two pound notes a
great injury to the commerce of the country—The trade
in money should be free—Free trade will always pro-
duce an abundance of the precious metals—No legisla-
tion required with regard to gold.............................. 229.
THE
Po1.1TICAL ECONOMY
RAILROADS,
CHAPTER I.
Objects of the present nork—Importance of Railroads—Proper
mode of constructing them considered—The general principles
of joint-stock companies explained—Individual enterprise pre-
Jerred to the operations of great incorporated bodies—Eapenses
of joint-stock companies frequently fatal to their profitable
eaſistence—Superior advantages of private capitalists — All
commercial legislation should be avoided—Companies for the
Jormation of railroads shenyn to be not an eaception to the
general rule. -
THE new mode of locomotion by iron railways
is so remarkable an invention, and promises to
Z bring forth changes so extraordinary in the affairs
of all civilized nations, that contributions to our
knowledge of the principles upon which it has its
foundation will be appreciated by all who are
aware of the importance of giving a just direction
B
2 THE POLITIC A. L ECONOMY
to a system which already is perceived to be
amongst the most magnificent scientific pheno-
mena of modern days.
The present work has, therefore, for its object, —
to go forward to the future, in preference to dwell-
ing upon the past,--to point to the many dangerous
errors which are about to be committed by the
shareholders in the almost innumerable crowds
of joint-stock companies which are daily coming
into existence,—and to explain the commercial
and legislative principles which are applicable to
the system, and without a comprehension of which,
this most valuable invention is in danger of being
smothered in its rise.
The material mechanism of railways has been
so abundantly set forth in the many valuable
works which have appeared since the opening of
the Manchester and Liverpool railway has given
a stimulus to inquiries upon this subject, that it is
proposed, in these remarks, to pass over that por-
tion of the ground, and to proceed to the first step
in our inquiry into the PoliticAL EconoMy of
RAILROADs, by an examination of the principles
upon which joint-stock companies, for any pur-
pose whatsoever, can have any just foundation,
when viewed in connexion with the circum-
stances of the present age. -
Joint-stock companies, when incorporated by
acts of parliament, are usually treated by political
economists as coming under the order of mono-
O F R A I L R O A DS. 3
polies; and the principles of monopoly have been
described, by the author of “The Wealth of
Nations,” in a manner so clear, that it is difficult
to comprehend how the track of legislation has
been lost, as exhibited in the numberless incor-
porated bubbles of recent years. According,
then, to those principles of legislation, which
are derived from the order of all natural justice,
each subject of a state is entitled to an equal
opportunity of employing to his own advantage,
and consequently to the advantage of the state,
his own labour, enterprise, capital, and skill; and
any violation of the commercial rights of indi-
viduals can be justified only on the ground of
some overwhelming necessity which has arisen
to the state. Following this reasoning, it is found
that monopolies, or acts of incorporation for joint-
stock companies, can only be granted to favoured
individuals, in return for some corresponding
advantage so rendered to the whole community;
and this advantage must be indispensably ne-
cessary to be obtained,—and such as cannot be
achieved by the individual skill, capital, and
labour of the subjects of the state. The only
description of undertakings which the author of
** The Wealth of Nations * could find, in his own
day, to possess these characteristics for incorpo-
ration, he describes as limited to three:–compa-
nies for the formation of roads, harbours, canals,
—for banking institutions, --and for insurance
B 2
4 THE PO-L ITICAL ECON O MY
against fire and death. But, limited as this num-
ber of just incorporations may appear to be, it is
not to be altogether surrendered that even those,
in the times of our illustrious economist, were in
reality well-founded exceptions to the general rule;
for the roads, harbours, canals, banking institu-
tions, and offices of insurance, in an age of less
extended commerce than the present, were only
required upon a scale which corresponded to the
wealth existing in the hands of individuals; nor
has there ever wanted a Duke of Bridgewater to
construct canals from the resources of his own
fortune; nor private bankers, with a sufficiency of
capital for the accommodation of all the purposes
of trade; nor individual underwriters, who could
pay for the most valuable cargo that ever has been
lost upon the sea. But whatever the necessities
of former times may have rendered expedient with
regard to the incorporation of joint-stock compa-
nies, it is at least certain that the modern immense
accumulations of capital render the efforts of
individuals quite equal to the accomplishment of
the grandest designs which have arisen with the
extending commerce of the present day.
And not only upon principles of equity and
equality, but upon those of expediency and eco-
nomy of management, it is for the benefit of states
that privileges and acts of incorporation should
be very sparingly dealt out. For great incorpo-
rated institutions are more complicated, unma-
O F R. A. I L ROADS. 5
nageable, and expensive in the machinery re-
quired for their direction, and more subject to the
losses which arise from waste, indifference, and
fraud, than the smaller establishments carried on
by individual subjects of the state. This arises
out of the principle of self-interest and self-preser-
vation; since an individual,—whose whole fortune
is embarked in his occupation, and from the well
management of which he must derive his subsist-
ence, or from the ill-management of which that
subsistence will be endangered or destroyed,—will
usually conduct his affairs with more economy,
vigilance, and skill, than any great incorporated
body of proprietors, whose numbers are too large,
and whose individual interests are too small, for
the requisite attention which is wanted for success.
Indeed, great numbers of subscribers to joint-
stock companies engage in such speculations,
not for the fair indemnification to arise in the
shape of interest for their capital employed, but
for the plunder of the rest of the subscribers, in
the shape of the unduly salaried idleness of direc-
tors, secretaries, solicitors, contractors, parliament-
ary agents, and the whole supernumerary rabble
who clog the operations of all such great incorpo-
rated jobs. This natural tendency of such insti-
tutions to mismanagement, waste, and early anni-
hilation of the capital of unsuspecting speculators
has been seen in the melancholy history of the
bubble institutions of the year 1825. Had the le-
6 'I H E POLITICA L ECON O MY
gislature borne in mind the very alphabet of poli-
tical economy, scarcely one of all those schemes
would have ever been allowed to see the day, for
no other purpose than to send thousands of inno-
cent speculators, in the words of a celebrated
writer of the time, to the gaol, the workhouse,
and the grave. For these companies were incor-
porated for purposes which could be abundantly
well achieved by the capital of individuals, and
were not indispensable to the welfare of the state;
since many of them were companies for washing,
baking, milking, and almost all the very simplest
operations of ordinary life.
et us examine the operation of such institu-
tions, in the history of the Steam Washing Com-
pany, which established itself upon the Isle of
Dogs.
Here it is seen, that all the privileges and powers
of the company could not prevent them from being
underwashed and ruined by the individual wash-
erwoman, at her own unincorporated tub. For the
washerwoman at Kensington had no directors,
secretaries, engineers, and other supernumeraries
to employ; she had no large annual sum to lay
aside for the payment of the costs of passing a bill
through the houses of parliament; no house in a
conspicuous situation, and at an enormous annual
rent; no Ottoman sofas, silver candlesticks, and
Turkey carpets, for the furniture of this house ;
and no dinners for the directors, consisting of turtle
OF R A J LRO A DS. 7
and champagne. Thence the individual washer-
woman could achieve clean linen at a much
cheaper rate than a company, which could only
act under such loads of superfluous expense: and
thence the annihilation of the capital, and ruin of
the happiness of thousands of speculators, in that
and the numberless other similar institutions which
went down after the bulk of the capital had been
swallowed up by the projectors of the schemes,
was attributable only to the error of a government,
which, in endowing them with privileges, immu-
nities, and irresponsibility beyond all other sub-
jects, was guilty of a broad violation of the clearest
principles of all commercial law.
Having thus cleared the way to the subject
more immediately before us, and having seen the
disastrous consequences of the errors of former
years, it is next to be discovered whether railroad
companies are not liable to similar objections as
the companies for washing, milking, and baking
the bread of the subjects of the state.
That railroads are of the greatest importance to
the welfare of the community, and indispensable
to be possessed by this country for the purpose of
maintaining an equality of advantages with the
neighbouring nations, is certainly most true; but
it is not a consequence, that private individuals
cannot undertake the construction of such works.
The canals of the Duke of Bridgewater were com-
pleted from one fortune, at a time when that for-
8 THE POLITIC AIL ECON O MY
tune was not of one half of the value of such pro-
ºperties in the present day; and, not to confine
ourselves to the ranks of the aristocracy, there are
numbers of individuals who have been able to in-
vest such sums as 100,000l. in the railroad, now in
the act of construction, from London to Birming-
ham alone. Let us, therefore, suppose that a pri-
vate company of such capitalists should determine
upon forming a new line of railroad from Man-
chester to Liverpool, in opposition to the present
joint-stock line. The distance is thirty-two miles,
and allowing that the land could be obtained by
private purchase, or even that a circuit of some
miles were rendered necessary by the opposition of
some of the proprietors upon the route, still this
private company, by avoiding the great outlay for
parliamentary expenses, and for the salaries of
directors and other officers, and availing them-
selves of the improved method of constructing rail-
roads which have arisen out of the experience of
those whom they would be about to oppose,
would probably be enabled to complete their un-
dertaking at less than one quarter of the cost of
the joint-stock line. By the purchase of portions
of the old turnpike road, and the avoidance of
superfluous expenses for Ionic columns and other
ornamental pieces of workmanship in the bridges,
viaducts, and warehouses required, with that
general attention to economy which individuals
will always exercise in these speculations,—it is
O F RAI L ROADS. 9
probable that a private company of three capital-
ists could complete a sufficient railway communi-
cation of thirty-two miles, at 4,000l. per mile, or
less than a sum of 128,000l. for the whole distance
of thirty-two miles. Our knowledge of the costs
of the private railways at the collieries in the
north and still more that the canals of the Duke
of Bridgewater were all executed at a cost of little
more than 1,000l. per mile, renders a sum of 4,000l.
per mile an abundant allowance for the construc-
tion of a railroad through even a very expensive
portion of the kingdom. But, on the other hand,
the railroad of the joint-stock company already in
existence was constructed at a cost of not less than
800,000l., or 25,000l. per mile, which is more
than five times the sum that a company of private
adventurers would probably require for the com-
struction of a railroad thirty-two miles long. The
private company would, moreover, be managed at
one half of the annual cost for the joint-stock line;
and, with all these advantages, would be enabled
to convey merchandise and passengers from Man-
chester to Liverpool at one-sixth of the charge.
The consequence of this change would be, that
total ruin would fall upon the joint-stock line:
nearly one million, originally invested in it, and
another million, which has been added in the
purchase of shares, which have risen to about one
hundred per cent. above par, all would be wasted
and destroyed, and grass would grow upon a road
1() TIH E POLITIC A. L ECONOMY
which now is apparently in the full tide of pros-
perity, and the pride and glory of the world.
In this conjuncture, the government would be
implored, by the shareholders in the joint-stock
line, to interfere, to prevent the construction of
the private line. But this prevention of the for-
mation of a cheaper road from Manchester to
Liverpool, would virtually amount to an addition
of four hundred per cent. upon the cost of trans-
portation between these two great mercantile
towns; and, as other manufacturing districts and
nations would possess railways and locomotion at
the cheaper rate, the advantages of cheap transit
would be lost to the manufacturers of Manchester
and the merchants of Liverpool, through this
violent upholding of a monopoly of the carrying
trade. It would, therefore, be a cheaper method
of overcoming the consequences of the first mis-
take, -not to commit a greater, by taking away ten
times more capital in forced resistance to the pros-
perity of Manchester and Liverpool, which such
a measure would create, but rather to purchase,
out of the treasury of the country, the whole of the
stock of a company which will thus have fallen
into ruin through the want of foresight in the go-
vernment alone.
Nor is there any doubt that individual enter-
prise will soon be directed to the formation of
such works. Though no one capitalist should
possess the means of forming a line of railroad of
O F R A II, R O AIDS. | 1
hundreds of miles in length, yet a chain of such
capitalists would very easily complete such an
undertaking, by dividing the line into individual
proprietorships of the road from town to town.
The opposition to the sale of the required land
would also very rapidly disappear; for amidst the
falling of rents, and general agricultural distress,
the self-interest of the landed proprietor will
very soon turn his opposition into the most ardent
support of undertakings which would double the
value of his estate.—With a better knowledge of
the advantages of the system, the opponents of
railways will become few and far between.
From these principles and calculations, it is
seen that all commercial legislation is an evil
that ought to be avoided ; that no act of Parlia-
ment, for the furtherance of any enterprise, trade,
or commercial purpose whatsoever, should be
allowed to be passed; and that railroad projects
are not an exception to the general rule.
12 THE POLITIC A. L ECON O M Y
CHAPTER II.
The common turnpike roads the true sites for the formation of
railroads—Practicability of constructing them on the present
roads—The traffic not impeded during the formation of the
tracks—Suspension railways proposed—Plates exhibiting the
proposed men system—Saving of property by the use of the
present roads—Costs of parliamentary bills—Surveys and other
expenses saved—Saving of property in inns—Mortgages upon
tolls and other investments on the present roads prevented from
being lost—The sites of the turnpike roads in every respect to
be preferred.
As joint-stock companies are not an approved
method of bringing the railroad system to that
perfection which the national economist must
desire, it is proposed, as the next step in this
inquiry, to point to the existing common turn-
pike roads, as the most eligible lines upon which
the foundation of the system should be laid.
It has not been sufficiently considered, that the
improvements in road-making, during recent years,
have caused the levelling of hills and shortening
of distances, almost to the most direct lines and
levels that possibly can be found. Upon these
ready-made lines of road, it would therefore be
the most obvious policy to commence the inter-
section of the kingdom with the railways; for the
OF RAILROADS. 13
laying down tracks of iron is not comparatively a
much greater improvement upon the present Mac-
adamized roads, than Macadamized roads were
upon the rude roads of former times; and, indeed,
the substitution of iron tracks would appear to be
the next and most natural and gradual improve-
ment of common turnpike roads. Thus there is
abundance of room for the construction of single
tracks upon either of the sides of the present wide
and magnificent North road; and waggons might
travel to and fro, and yet not impede, for the
present, the travelling of carriages, mails, and
waggons, upon the centre of the road. Or, if the
roads were required to be widened for the trial of
the new system, and for the avoidance of inter-
ruption to the traffic during the progress of the
work, still the turnpike roads present immeasur-
ably the cheapest lines of road. -
For here would be no new purchases of land,
and no parliamentary expenses; no invasion of
estates, and destruction of immense masses of
property in the inns and other appurtenances of a
great mercantile road. Were the commissioners
of the turnpike roads to commence by laying
down one track upon either side of the road,
then, not only would the cost for new land and
for parliamentary proceedings be avoided,—but no
engineers, consulting-engineers, secretaries, assist-
ant-secretaries, with solicitors, directors, standing
counsel, and takers of gradients, termini, and
14 THE POLITIC A. L ECONOMY
levels, would be required; and thence, the various
lines would be constructed at one-tenth of the ex-
pense, and the price of locomotion be in a corres-
ponding degree reduced to the people at large,
by the nullification of the joint-stock schemes.
Indeed, the incalculable waste of property
which is threatened upon the present turnpike
roads, is a very powerful reason why parliament
should pause upon the entertainment of all joint-
stock schemes. . .
An individual possessor of property cannot
certainly be protected in its enjoyment against
the experience, enterprise, capital, and skill of
another individual of the same community; and,
therefore, if individuals construct railroads which
shall destroy the property of other individuals
upon turnpike roads, it is one of the ordinary
misfortunes of an age of rapid progression in
inventive science; but the advantages to the
nation must be shewn to be very overwhelming
indeed, before a just government would endow
bodies of other individuals with privileges and
powers which should operate to the destruction
of the livelihood of individuals who possess inns,
farms, and establishments for coaches and wag-
gons upon an old-established line of turnpike
road. Upon this ground, it is difficult to be seen
how landed proprietors, whose property is taken
away for the construction of new lines of road,
should be more entitled to compensation than the
{} F R A I L R O AD S. 15
owners of inns and farms, whose properties are
equally taken away, in being rendered valueless
by the new railroad line. If it be for the benefit
of trade, and therefore for the benefit of the state,
that bills should be passed for the formation of
lines of road through the lands of individuals, so
the same benefit derived by the state should,
upon just principles, direct that compensation
should be made for the equally forced loss of pro-
perty in inns, farms, and other appurtenances of
the road, which the law, for the benefit of the
state, has compelled to be destroyed.
This is, then, the most economical plan
upon which the railway system can be allowed
to unfold itself. The land is already purchased ;
and where not already levelled, levels may be
made at a comparatively small cost; and the
labour of our ancestors having given to us the
sites, it would be folly to lay void these roads
for the purchase of new land, for purposes which
the old will serve equally as well. Then the
debts upon the present roads would be saved
from being lost by the diversion of the trade to
the proposed new lines; to which being added
the salvation of the inns, and other valuable ap-
purtenances of the present lines, with the saving
of the capital which must be invested in new inns
upon the new lines, and the saving of the pro-
perty in the new railroads, inns, and appurte-
nances, which will be in danger of being again
16 THE POLITICAL ECONOMIY
laid waste by future private competition,--the
hazard of all this massacre of property is so immi-
nent, as to lead to the necessity of a pause in
legislation upon the subject, if not to the closing
of the doors of parliament upon all seekers of
bills for the various joint-stock schemes.
Having, then, established the true sites for rail-
ways to be upon the present turnpike roads, it
is proposed, in the following engravings, to ex-
hibit new views of the construction of the works.
In PLATE I, is a view of the present great North
road, and upon either of the sides is a single
track of iron road—the waggons drawn by horses
and confined to the proper side of the road, whether
travelling to or fro. In the centre is seen a mail
coach and horses travelling without interruption
upon the present turnpike road, and in the act of
being passed by another with equal facility as at
the present time. The average width of the great
North road and of the other principal roads of
the kingdom is about thirty-five yards, and the
width of two mail coaches abreast is about six-
teen or eighteen feet; and thence coaches or
waggons and horses could pass and yet abundance
of space be allowed for either of the tracks of iron
road to be taken from the present width. Thus
no interruption of the usual traffic would take
place during the construction or after the opening
of the railway tracks; or, if the present width of
the turnpike be not sufficient for these purposes,
OF R. A. I LROADS. 17
PLATE I.
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18 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
the throwing down of the hedges upon only one
side of the road would yield the required breadth,
and be attended with but very inconsiderable
cost. By this means we lay the first foundation
of the system upon any common turnpike road.
In PLATE II., the same road is exhibited, but
with the addition of the suspension railway above.
This superincumbent structure is shewn to rest
upon a series of iron pillars and braces, imme-
diately upon which the rail is made to rest; and
the carriages being constructed with wheels upon
the principle which throws the weight upon the
axle, the chief weight of the waggon and load is
thrown upon the centre of strength in the iron
pillars. The track upon which the horse moves
is constructed of wood, as upon suspension
bridges, that being the lightest material to be
be used, where the economy of weight is to be
sought. The distribution of the weight upon the
suspension railway is, therefore, such as to produce
the minimum of pressure, and therefore, the mi-
nimum of strength and of expense for the work of
which it is composed. Thus two railways are
obtained upon the same quantity of land, and the
railway above covers in and protects from the rain,
dust and snow, the track beneath it; whilst its
own elevation secures it from dust, and allows the
rain to flow off by spouts to be placed at intervals,
similar to the scuppers of a ship. Projecting from
either side of the upper railway is a walk or sort
of balcony for foot-passengers. This widens
OF RAI LROADS, 19
into a stage at an interval of each seven or eight
miles, for the purpose of changing the horse, and
of lighting, tending, and repairing the general
body of the work. For foot-passengers this
walk will be at all times dry. The waggons are
seen passing at a speed of twelve or thirteen miles
an hour, conveying passengers, mails, and light
articles of merchandise. This portion of the road
is to remain upon the present plan, since the
carriage of passengers and goods at the rate of
twelve miles an hour, and at a charge of less than
one quarter of the cost for locomotive steam-
engines, will probably be sufficient to continue
to that department of the work a large portion of
support. When passengers shall be enabled to
travel at the rate of thirteen miles an hour, or from
London to York in fourteen hours, it is probable
that the saving of three quarters of the fare will
more than counterbalance the saving of one-half of
the time, by a steam locomotive engine at twenty-
six miles an hour, or double the speed of the
horse. But though this portion of the work
should be deserted for the steam-track which is
about to be constructed, yet its utility will remain
for the conveyance of merchandise alone.
In PLATE III. is seen the completion of the sys-
tem by the covering of the whole site of the road
with railroad-tracks; for the completion of the
first suspension-railway, in the preceding plate,
allowed the mail-coaches, private carriages, and
C 2 -
20 THE POLITICA L ECONOMY
other rapidly moving vehicles to be transferred to
that line; and thence the centre of the road no
longer being required, the workmen were seen in
the act of constructing the central works, which
appear in the present plate. The tracks here
consist of a double line of horse railroads below,
with a double track suspended upon arches above,
for the use of steam power. Locomotive engines
are seen passing to and fro, and this portion of
the work is supposed to rest upon a series of light
elliptic iron arches, because a greater degree of
strength is required for the support of a steam lo-
comotive engine than for a single horse.
Here is gradually completed a series of lines
which afford every degree of speed, the transit on
no one track being impeded by that of another.
The stream of trade is flowing continuously upon
one track from, and upon the opposite one to, any
given place. A double number of lines upon the
ground is afforded, since the bulk of the traffic upon
any road must consist of the carriage of goods; and
those also travelling at the slower rate will oc-
cupy more time, and thence the road being more
continuously filled, a greater space for that species
of traffic is seen to be required.
What the cost of the suspension or arched rail-
ways would be, must depend upon local circum-
stances, and upon the cost of iron at the time and
place of their construction. The expense would
be very greatly diminished by the cheap trans-
OF R A I LROADS. 21
port upon the first completed track, of the iron-
work required for the whole of the railroads
above. The arches, it is to be obscrved, arc not
the wide arches of a cast-iron bridge, but only,
perhaps, one twentieth part of such width and
expense ; since arches of one foot in width would
be sufficient for the foundation upon which the
sleeper and rail are to rest, the whole weight
of the locomotive engines and trains being thrown
upon the axles and rails—the transverse flooring
being also of wood, as in the former case. The
centre arch will support two sets of sleepers and
rails, and as the pressure upon an elliptic arch may
be increased to any extent without injury to that
most indestructible of all the positions of matter,
the work would endure to the end of time. Per-
haps, therefore, we may estimate the cost of such
a work as being about one tenth part of a cast-
iron bridge fifty feet wide; or, with the advan-
tage of the cheap carriage of the iron-work, about
3,000l. per mile.
Should the traffic upon the line of railroad not
render necessary a quadruple track for the con-
veyance of goods, then the centre of the road—
upon the ground-plan—may be occupied for the
purposes of steam locomotive power. The arched
railway may then be added at any future time,
when increased trade, and decreased expense in
the price of iron-work, or other local circum-
stances shall lead to an extension and completion
22 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
of the work. The advances in the value of iron-
work—which will probably be the consequence
for a long time—upon the great demand for the
materials of the new iron roads, may lead to a
more cconomical construction of the arches by
stone or other materials, which may abound or
be readily conveyed upon the lines of road.
Here, then, we complete the introduction of
the system of railways, without hindrance to the
present traffic upon turnpikes—without the loss
of the sites of the present roads—without the
purchase of new land—without parliamentary
costs—without the general machinery of joint-
stock companies—in one quarter of the time, and
at one quarter of the expense, since the sites
have been provided by the labour of our ancestors,
and therefore come to us without cost. It is pro-
bable, therefore, that no private railroad could be
formed upon terms which would supersede the
public railroads then formed at the minimum of
expense. The double economy of the preservation
of the present turnpike roads, is thus seen to be
conclusive against the opposition of all joint-stock
lines; and though the commissioners of the turnpike
roads should not proceed to the formation of iron
tracks, yet, as the Macadamized roads could not
compete with railroads in cheapness of transport,
even though the latter were encumbered with the
expenses of joint-stock operations, and the trade
and the tolls would thus be lost to the present
OF RAILROADS. 23
lines, the incumbrancers of the turnpikes would
then be entitled to the property in the road. For
the extensive improvements in road-making which
have been produced in recent years, as seen in the
levelling of hills, and shortening of distances, have
caused very extensive debts to be incurred upon
almost all the great turnpike roads; and though
mortgagees have a security upon only the tolls of
the respective roads, yet would equity compel the
commissioners to use every exertion in their
power to prevent the annihilation of the capital
thus loaned. Therefore the sites of the then de-
serted roads would be compulsorily sold for the
benefit of the creditors, and thus passing into the
hands of individual speculators, the rails would
in that manner be laid in opposition to the joint-
stock line. -
Perhaps the sale of the present lines would be
the most truly economical mode of commencing
the new operations in iron roads. For though
the subdivision of turnpike trusts into distances
of only a few miles in length, is a less evil than
the system of centralization, which impedes all
improvement in the roads of foreign nations, ye
the utmost economy of transport could best be
obtained by the operations of private individuals,
and the whole of the turnpike roads of the
kingdom would be very advantageously sold. As
national property, the conditions of the sale might
limit the toll to the minimum required for the
24 THE POLITICAL ECON O MY
benefit of trade, though even that condition would
probably be rendered needless by the competi-
tion of opposing lines. Were the tolls exor-
bitant upon the road to Manchester through Bir-
mingham, the railroad through Oxford would be
simultaneously open for the conveyance of passen-
gers and merchandise; and therefore the principle
of free competition would reduce to a fair level
the average of all toll. Individual proprietors
would also more zealously follow out the improve-
ments in the construction of railroads, than would
any unsalaried commissioners, whose self-interest
is not engaged in the most economical manage-
ment of the roads; and therefore the introduction
of the system of private proprietorships in roads
would produce, first, an immense amount of mo-
ney, to the extent of many millions, in the sale of
the fee, and afterwards in the more economical
management of individuals, the utmost reduction
in the cost of locomotion, and, therefore, the
utmost benefit to the state.
Thus it appears, that the joint-stock schemes in
the expenses required for their incorporation, for
the complicated machinery indispensable to their
management, and in the fear from the more econo-
mical effects of individual competition, are beset
with difficulties and dangers upon every side.
of RAILROADS. .* 25
CHAPTER III.
Some of the lines non in the act of construction ea'amined as to
their probability of success—The Greennich and London rail-
way—Its expensive construction, and little probability of its
success—The Southampton and London railway investigated—
Shenyn to be premature, and not a beneficial line—The Bir-
mingham and London, and Great Western railways liable to
similar objections—Great losses anticipated from the many
proposed joint-stock schemes.
As these remarks are intended for the preven-
tion of future loss, it may be well that a few of
the existing joint-stock companies in railroads
should be next examined as to their individual
claims upon the capital of the subjects of the
State. º
First, in order of time, is the Greenwich and
London railway. This work is computed by its
projectors to require an expenditure of 400,000l.
for six miles of railway, or a sum of 85,000l. per
mile. Without alluding to the expensive con-
struction of arches of brick, or asserting that light
iron work would have been of equal strength and
greater durability, and one third cheaper in ex-
pense, it is apparent that under any circumstances
whatever, no such a work can have the slightest
chance to succeed. For the calculations as to the
26 THE POLITIC AI, ECONOMY
number of passengers to be carried upon this line
will be found to be very short-sighted in every de-
partment of the scheme. Were there to be in future
this one railway alone from the metropolis as a
holiday plaything for the people, then the ex-
penses of such a work might probably be borne;
but when railroads will at the same time be in
existence from all the other entrances to London,
the novelty will be divided amongst them upon
equal terms; or rather the others not passing
through so much expensive property, and there-
fore having been completed for one quarter of the
cost of the railway from London to Greenwich,
and having locomotive power upon equal terms
will be enabled to carry passengers and mer-
chandise at one quarter of the rate ; for the
Liverpool and Manchester railroad has been con-
structed at 25,000l. per mile, and the South-
ampton, Great Western, and Birmingham railroads
are all estimated at a similar rate, and therefore
passengers could travel nearly four times the dis
tance upon any of these lines as upon a road which
has been constructed at a cost of 85,000l. per
mile. Passengers could be conveyed to Windsor
upon the Western road, a distance of twenty-one
miles at the same expense which must be incurred
for only six miles of transport upon the Green-
wich line. Therefore Greenwich will not only be
not improved in attractions for passengers through
the construction of its railway, but its present
O F RAILROADS. 27
advantages will be absolutely annihilated, when
locomotion shall be more than 300 per cent.
dearer upon its railroad than upon the other roads
leading out of town. The calculations that the
passengers would be diverted from the present
turnpike road, have therefore no reference what-
ever to a future state of things, when other rail-
roads shall be in existence and in superior advan-
tages of competition for the trade. That the mass
of the community will prefer those roads which
are the cheapest in expense is certainly quite
clear; for the desertion of the Waterloo-bridge for
more circuitously placed bridges which procure
the salvation of one penny, makes an unanswer-
able instance that negligence of small sums is not
the characteristic of the great body of the people.
These calculations are founded, however, upon
the supposition that the turnpike roads should not
be converted into iron ways, for should that system
be introduced, the present road from London to
Greenwich, from Westminster-bridge, is almost a
direct line, and almost a perfect level, and could
be covered with rails at one fortieth part of the
whole cost of the present joint-stock line. More-
over, the estimate of passengers to be derived from
the Thames has been totally annulled by the pro-
ject of a railway to Blackwall, if even the whole
stream of passengers from abroad does not centre
at Dover or Gravesend; for all will avoid the ex-
28 THE POLITIC A. L ECONOMIY
pense and delay of water conveyance when rail-
roads shall afford a conveyance at one-third of the
expense, and with a saving of two-thirds of the
time. Neither can the Greenwich railroad be a por-
tion of the future line from Dover and Gravesend,
since a cheaper mode of approaching the metropolis
must be found than one which has been formed at
a cost of 85,000l. per mile. Under all this accu-
mulation of disadvantages and misfortunes, it is
clear that this railway is amongst the most mon-
strous abortions that folly ever yet has caused to
be brought into the financial world.
The Southampton and London railroad is esti-
mated at a cost of 25,000l. per mile. Passengers
from and to England and France would appear to
be the chief dependence for its profitable support.
But as lines of railway will soon be constructed
from Paris to Calais, and from Dover to London,
and the distance from Dover to London will be less
than that to Southampton, with the advantage of
a line to be constructed at one quarter of the cost
of the present too early railway to Southampton,
it is certain that there is little chance for a subsis-
tence for the latter line. The passage from Havre
de Grace to Southampton occupies usually a period
of twelve hours, whilst that from Calais to Dover
not more than about three hours, and though the
difference of distance between Havre de Grace
and Calais is now so considerable as to give
() # RAILROAI)S. 29
Southampton some opportunity as a thorough-
fare from France, yet when a railway shall convey
passengers from Havre de Grace to Calais at five
times the present speed, and at one fifth of the
present cost, it is probable that the saving of nine
hours in time and the corresponding expense of
the passage by steam, with the general aversion to
the water by passengers of pleasure, will bring the
whole of the intercourse between England and
the continental states to centre at Dover alone.
Thus the railroad to Southampton will be re-
duced for its livelihood to depend upon the trade
of that watering-place alone, subject also to the
hazard of opposition from future private compe-
tition at one quarter of its cost, or the covering of
the turnpike road with rails, at, perhaps, one-
twentieth portion of the expense of this joint-
stock line.
Of the Birmingham and London, and the Great
Western railroads, it is only required to remark
that the expenses which have been incurred in
the passing of the bills, and other preliminary ar-
rangements for their construction, amount to a
sum which would cover the whole length of the
turnpike roads to those places, with two tracks of
rails.
There are of other schemes which propose
themselves for acts of incorporation in the ensuing
session of parliament, altogether, a number
30 THE POLITIC AI, ECONOMY
whose aggregate capital stock would amount to
about fifty millions of money, of which great por-
tion of the wealth of the country it is probable
that were all the petitioning companies incorpo-
rated, about forty millions would be lost.
OF RAI LROADS. 31
CHAPTER IV.
Steam locomotive ponyer considered nith reference to its expense—
Shenºn to be too ea pensive for use in conveying merchandise—
The cause of its eapense, and comparative cost of locomotive and
stationary steam-engine—Cheapness of horse ponyer, and its
speed sufficiently great for the transit of goods—Horse ponyer
discussed in a statistical point of vien'.
HAVING thus obtained some views of the legis-
lative economy of railways, it is proposed to ex-
amine next the material economy of the new
system—and first, the propelling power.
The great disadvantage now experienced by the
railroad companies is the difficulty of reconciling
economy with speed, through the enormous outlay
for the cost and repairs of the steam locomotive
engines, the returns; of the Liverpool and Man-
chester company being found to exhibit the sum
of 80,000l. per annum as required for the steam
power, without including the damage and de-
rangement of the road, through the pressure of
those moving mountains of iron, water, and coals,
of which the steam-drags and their appurtenanc-
es are composed. This great annual outlay for
steam power is required almost for the conveyance
of passengers alone; for the cost of transport by
steam is so very expensive that little merchandise
32 THE POLI'FIC AI, ECONOMY
is carried upon the railroad; and excepting for
the rapid transport of passengers, the work may
be said to be of no benefit to trade.
The Manchester and Liverpool railroad com.
pany have persevered in the use of locomotive en-
gines up to the present time, although by that
mode of conveyance the goods which, by horse
power, are carried upon the Stockton and Darling-
ton and other railroads, at one penny per ton, per
mile, are not carried at less than 8s. per ton
from Liverpool and Manchester, a distance of
thirty-two miles: the consequent charge being
about 3d. per ton, per mile, or two hundred
per cent. higher than the usual charge where the
horse has been substituted for the power of steam.
In consequence of this charge for the conveyance
of goods, the Liverpool and Manchester company
have not succeeded in abstracting any very consi-
derable portion of the trade from the canal, since
out of nearly two millions of tons of goods which
regularly pass between those two great commer-
cial towns, the railway company has yet obtained
only about 200,000 tons, or one tenth part of the
whole; although the canal is about sixty miles long,
and the goods three days upon the way. Indeed,
it is asserted, that at this great charge of 8s. per
ton from Manchester to Liverpool no profit arises
to the company upon the conveyance of goods,
but that a positive loss is sustained, and this loss
is made up from their profits upon the conveyance
OF RAILROADS. 33.
of passengers alone. Since, therefore, the charge
for the conveyance of goods cannot be reduced
without loss, below 3d. pcr ton, per mile, for steam
power; and that charge is so much higher than the
rate at which goods can be conveyed upon canals,
it follows that if the utmost advantage be intended
to be taken of the capabilities of the system,
some cheaper power must be found.
Stationary engines have been fully proved to
have no advantage over locomotive engines, by
reason of the great loss of power in the distance
from the load and other disadvantages; and,
though a steam cngine, when stafionary, is cer-
tainly acting advantageously in not being bur-
thened with the propulsion of its own weight, and
of water, fuel, and attendants—yet the above
counteracting circumstance has been found equally
fatal to its profitable use. -
Air engines, of various kinds, though promising
to be a light and highly suitable contrivance, have
not yet been brought into a perfect or practica-
ble shape—and therefore the horse alone remains
to be considered as the agent again to be employed.
First, to meet the objection,--that the slow
motion of the horse, when drawing loads of mer-
chandise upon a railroad, which does not admit
the passing of faster travelling vehicles as upon
a turnpike road, it has already been proposed
to remove the locomotive engines to a peculiar de-
partment of the work, either upon arches above,
D
34 THE POLITIC A. L ECONOMY
or upon the ground in the centre of the road.
By these means the necessity of conveying goods
at a rate of twenty-five miles an hour, as upon the
Manchester and Liverpool railroad, in order that
passengers and mails shall not be obstructed in the
rapid motion which is required, will be effectually
removed; and the removal of this impediment
will be next seen to convert the carrying of mer-
chandise into an extensive source of profit, though
now it is attended with a positive loss.
Having therefore removed the passengers, mails,
and light articles of merchandise to the suspension
road, the next step is to organize the system of
horse transport upon the track below.
It has been seen that upon the Manchester and
Liverpool line, the charge for the conveyance of
goods by steam is not capable of being reduced be-
low 8s. per ton, and that a loss is probably sus-
tained even at that high charge, whereas, by
horses, the same merchandise could be conveyed
at 1s. per ton from Manchester to Liverpool, or
only an eighth part of the charge by steam
locomotive power. Experiment has shewn that
the daily performance of a horse upon a level
railway is equal to twelve tons conveyed a distance
of twenty miles at the rate of two miles an hour.
But without referring to the extensive improve-
ments in the construction of the works, and the
consequent great increase of the propelling power
of the horse, which are undoubtedly at hand, let
OF R A H L R O AIDS. 35
us content ourselves with supposing that the daily
task of the horse shall be not more than twelve
tons, to be conveyed for a distance of twenty miles.
At this charge of 1s. perton, one horse will earn a
sum of 12s. per day, or, at the rate of six working
days, the sum of 31. 12s. per week. The expense
of the support of each horse in feeding, stabling,
and attendance, would not be more than about
12s. per week, or less than one-third of its earnings,
when engaged in the business of conveying goods
at the rate of Is. per ton for a distance of thirty-
two miles. There is, accordingly, a profit of two
thirds of the earnings of the horse, which profit
will amount to 6d. per ton from Manchester to
Liverpool; and if two millions of tons were an-
nually conveyed by horse power (the canal being
then closed) the profit would amount to 50,000l.
per annum : whereas, at the rate of even 8s. per
ton for steam power, a positive loss has been seen
to be sustained. To this is to be added the
great saving in the annual expenditure for the re-
pairs of the road, when locomotive engines, weigh-
ing each about ten tons, and pressing fully upon
the rail, shall be superseded by horses, whose
weight will rest altogether upon the centre of the
road.
Nor would the diminution of speed in the con-
veyance of merchandise be attended with the
slightest injury to trade. At the rate of three
miles an hour merchandise may be transported
D 2
36 THE POLITIC A. L ECON O MY
by horses from Manchester to Liverpool in a period
of ten hours, or from Birmingham to London in a
period of fifty-six hours, or at full speed upon the
suspension railway, in two hours from Manches-
ter to Liverpool, or nine hours from Birmingham
to London, and at a cost very far indeed below
that for conveyance by steam. Then the imme-
diate delivery of goods is not at all times a very
material consideration, for at present the goods
which pass from Manchester to Liverpool at 8s.
per ton very frequently remain for hours in the
warehouses of the company, although that time
might have been employed in a slower motion by
horse power at one eighth part of the charge for
transport by this most unnecessary steam. Thus,
under this system, the speed of conveying passen-
gers and mails would not be decreased if the steam
power were employed upon the suspension railway
above, whilst the rate of conveying the goods by
horse power below would not be inconveniently
slow, and seven eighths of the amount of carriage
would be saved by the change. The dividend
upon the capital invested in the railway would
therefore be increased, when 50,000l. per annum
would be the profit upon the labour of horses where
now an extensive loss is sustained, and a reduction
of 7s. per ton would take place upon the two
millions of tons of goods which would be annually
carried upon the Manchester and Liverpool line.
This would amount to the sum of 700,000l. per
O F It A I ILROAD S. 37
annum, by which amount the consumers of the
goods would be benefited in the consequent re-
duction of the price.
Next let us examine the advantages and dis-
advantages of the use of horses in a statistical
point of view. -
It has been reckoned amongst the most valuable
consequences of the introduction of railroads, that
horses would become disused, and that more food
would accordingly be in existence for the human
mouth. The keep of one horse is equal to the
support of a labouring family of four persons; and
if the whole number of horses be estimated at only
four millions, the cost of their support will be equal
to that of one half of the population of the land.
To remove this animal would therefore make room
for human beings to a very considerable extent;
and the capacity for maintaining a double number
of human souls is certainly much to be desired in
a statistical point of view. But if the removal of
the horse can only be effected by the substitution
of steam power, which is ten times more expensive,
or requires ten times more money than would
suffice for the purchase of the provender of the
horse, whether from our own farmers, or from the
farmers of foreign nations, it follows that it would
become folly to substitute the dearer for the
cheaper power. Unless all the lands of the old and
the new world were so covered with population
that no subsistence remained for the quadruped
38 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
part of the creation, there would be no necessity
for the banishment of the horse In China, an em-
pire which is overflowing with a starving popula-
tion, and which is too far removed from other
agricultural nations to receive foreign grain, unless
at an expense which would enhance its price
beyond the reach of the great mass of the people,
quadrupeds are very properly prohibited to exist.
But when in England our corn laws shut out the
superabundance of the corn of Poland, Belgium,
Germany, the American States, and other agricul-
tural nations, it is apparent that a change of
policy alone, through the abolition of the corn
laws, is required for the removal of our anxiety
for superseding the labour of the horse. If in-
animate power would, in reality, be cheaper than
that of this animal, it would certainly be the true
economy to adopt it upon railroads; but if the
amount of provision which is consumed by the
makers and attendants upon steam locomotive
engines, from the commencement of the extraction
from the mine of the iron of which they are com-
posed, to the time when they are moving upon the
road would be ten times more in amount than that
consumed by the horses which can effect the same
amount of work, it follows that the disuse of horses
becomes an extensive waste of the very resources
of the land. -
Horse power, in the present state of our know-
ledge of the principles of motion, is, therefore,
OF RA ILROADS. 39
much cheaper than any of which we are possessed.
But even upon returning to its use upon railroads,
the numbers will be reduced to one twelfth of the
number now required upon a turnpike road; and
therefore eleven twelfths of the land now required
for the growth of animal provender will be con
vertible into the cultivation of the food of a popu-
tion, which, though rapidly increasing, is yet
more rapidly supplied by science, with extended
means of support.
40 THE POI, I'TICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER V.
Further improvements proposed—The rails should be narron,
hard, and smooth—Facings of polished steel proposed—Rail-
roads should be straight—Tunnels considered, and the levelling
of the hills generally to be preferred—Eacavation of hills
lessened in eapense by the sale of the materials—Cheap trans-
port mill favour the formation of levels—Many extensive results
of the system anticipated—Agriculture eatended and improved—
Mountains levelled, and climate improved—Great influence of
the system upon the future prospects of mankind.
HA v ING thus obtained the utmost economy of
the general construction and moving power, it is
proposed to offer other considerations for the im-
provement of this new system of roads.
First, of the rails. Facility of draught depends
upon the diminution of resistance, and the mini-
mum of resistance is obtained by the utmost ac-
quirement of a surface which is narrow, hard, and
smooth. Therefore the rails should be diminished
to the smallest extent of horizontal surface which
would support a given load, and should also be
faced with polished steel. This substance is much
harder, smoother, more durable, and less liable
to rust than the rails of common iron which are
now in general use. The circumference of the
wheels of the waggons should also be similarly
O F R A II, fl. O A D.S. 41
faced with steel, and by these means a resistance
so slight might be obtained, as to be little greater
than the mere resistance of the air. Substances
for procuring anti-attrition, might also be used.
Railroads, at whatever expense, should be
formed in straight lines. Circuits increase ex-
pense for land, rails, and motive power, and for
the perpetual support and repair of such need-
lessly increased distance: they also deaden im-
petus, and, consequently, speed.
Tunnels, however, should seldom be the mode
of procuring a direct line of road. The expense
of their construction, lighting, ventilation and re-
pair, outweighs in general the saving of the rough
labour which would be required for cutting direct
through a hill. An important diminution of the
expense of cutting through hills may be also
pointed out in the storing of the material, and its
sale at a future time, when the cheap transport
upon the railroad shall enable it to be carried at a
small comparative expense. Almost any descrip-
tion of stone, metal, or earth, will probably now
become an article of sale. For the opening of
railroads will give rise to the extensive forma-
tion of artificial soils in places along the lines,
which will be raised in value by their contiguity
to the work; and whether hills be found to consist
of clay for brick-making, limestone for manure, or
of coals, or ores of any kinds or even of stone or
sand, all these will now become saleable materials.
42 THE POLITICAL Eco NoMy
During the progress of the excavations the mate-
rial should be hoisted upon cranes, and deposited
in the vicinity until the opening of the railroad
shall enable it to be sold. It is probable that
the sale of the material would frequently be
more than equal to the expense of quarrying
through a hill; and it is certain that in some situa-
tions immense profits would be found from that
source. Tunnels, therefore, unless the mountains
be of an unusual height, will probably become
disused. . -
Railroads should be wide. Increased width of
the track would bring the horse, or locomotive
steam engine, nearer to the load, and thence would
extensively increase the power. Single horses
and waggons are the most effectual means of ob-
taining the utmost power of propulsion, because
the load is then brought nearer to the centre
of effort, whereas, by teams, the diffusion of the
force occasions it to be proportionally lost. This
principle is most strangely neglected by the far-
mers of England, in the use of the horse in the
waggons and ploughs of the southern districts of
the country, for more coals or corn can be carried
in two one horse carts than in one waggon drawn
by four horses in a row. Two horses abreast, and
one man, in Scotland, plough more land and in a
better manner in the same given time,” than four
* Read Arthur Young on this subject.
OF RAI LROADS. 43
horses and two men in the counties of Middlesex
or Kent. Thence one half of the horses of England
and one half of the labour of the attendants upon
them, and one half of the capital invested in the
horses, harness, stabling, and repairs, all in reality
are lost. This has an extensive influence in pro-
ducing what is termed agricultural distress; but
which is probably little more than another name
for agricultural stupidity and waste.
Upon the above principle railroads should be
increased to any width which will allow the saving
of power to be superior to the value of the land. In
the tracks to be devoted to steam locomotive engines,
this will be of more importance than upon those
whereon horses are intended to be used, because
steam power being so much more expensive, is con-
sequently required to be more economically used.
Therefore the central track, which in PLATE III.,
page 17, is seen to be devoted to steam power,
is more than double the width of the side tracks,
upon which horses alone are to be used. Upon
the Liverpool and Manchester railroad the waste
of steam-power is very considerable in this respect,
for the line of carriages, with the intervening space
occupied by the tender to the engine, reaching
frequently to a very extended distance from the
power. The widening of the tracks for steam
locomotive engines is, therefore, of much import-
ance; and, further, this increase of width would
allow the carriages to be constructed in a more
44 THE PoliticAL EconoMY
comfortable form, even with the conveniences of
houses flying through the air.
The tracks of the principal lines of railways
should be of an exact uniform width throughout
England, Scotland and Ireland, and even through
France and the neighbouring continental states.
This will save the cost of unloading and reloading
the waggons, which then may travel without im-
pediment throughout the whole length of the
kingdom; and the same waggons may be shipped
with their loads, at the seaports; and in the same
state unshipped, and placed upon the railways to
pass through Ireland, Scotland, France, or the
neighbouring continental states. To economise
space and diminish weight in the sea-transport of
waggons, the material of their construction should
be studied to combine the utmost weight and
strength; the wheels being taken off at the port
of their shipment, and wheels of the same dimen-
sions being supplied at the port of discharge.
The tracks upon which private carriages and
common carts, and other vehicles are to be con-
veyed, should also be light. Then each farmer
arriving at the railway will place his cart upon
the track—and, using his own horse, or hiring his
power from the commissioners of the railroad, will
carry twenty times more hay, corn, or potatoes
to market, and will return with twenty times more
provisions, coals, or lime, than can be drawn by
the same horse upon the present turnpike road.
O F R.A.. I LROADS. 45
Then the wear and tear of an iron road being not
one quarter of that of a road made of stones, the toll
will be reduced to about one quarter of the pre-
sent rate, the full result being, that the expenses
of transport will be reduced to one nineteenth, and
that of tolls to one quarter, of the present average
expense. But this is limiting the saving to that
which has been ascertained at the present time:
but allowing that great improvements in the for-
mation of levels and rails to be at hand, and the
minimum of resistance to be obtained,—it is not
improbable that one horse shall ultimately draw,
not twenty, but fifty, or one, two, or more hun-
dreds of tons. The resistance of the surface of
the rail being reduced to the smallest extent, and
the impetus of the load counterbalancing the re-
sistance of the air, the propelling power of the
horse would seem to be almost without bounds.
Perhaps even horse power may become disused,
and waggons be ultimately propelled by cranks
and the human hand.
In national economy these changes will pro-
duce the most important results: for each farm-
house communicating with the main railroad, by
another small railroad down the lane which forms
the present communication with the turnpike
road, the whole object of horses in the business of
transport will be entirely at an end. And as the
carriage of corn, coals, lime, manure, building
46 THE POLITIC A. L ECON O M Y
materials, and other heavy commodities, form one
half of the labour of the horses upon a farm, their
support will be attended with a double expense
when required only for the plough ; and though
at the present prices of human and of horse labour,
the spade, through its increased productiveness,
employment of manual labour, and consequent
saving of poor-rates, is already considerably
cheaper than the plough, yet, when the cost of
animal labour shall be comparatively doubled, it is
certain that human hands alone will be employed
in agriculture, and that this will occasion the
universal introduction of garden cultivation, and
the entire disappearance of the horse. Thence
double the number of men will be employed; and
yet there will be more than three times the present
amount of food for their support. Thence manu-
factures will be extended, through the existence of
this surplus of food, and almost boundless fields
will be found for expanding population, revenue,
and wealth. -
But further results present themselves. The
cheap carriage of manure, lime, clay, sand,
marl, and other substances will occasion an
extensive manufacture of new soils. The science
of chemical agriculture will become of the most
extensive benefit to nations; for the carriage of the
materials no longer interposing the difficulty of
expense, the land may be rendered of equal fer-
() F RAI LRO A D.S. 47
tility all over the world. The soils now useless
to man, will be cured of their sterility, when the
requisite material for combination can be pur-
chased at a distance, and conveyed at a cost of
probably one farthing per ten tons, per mile. Then
the mountains will be levelled for the value of the
soil, stones, ores, or other materials of which they
are composed, and for the acquisition of the land
now covered with their bases, which will then be
covered with a cultivable soil. Improvement of
climate will then rapidly follow the removal of
elevated ranges from the high latitudes, and the
air of these islands will be rendered more genial,
warm, and dry. The bogs, locks, and estuaries,
will be drained and converted into land, by
the diminished expense of such undertakings
through tramways and railroads, and the surface
of the British islands be even doubled in extent,
and all capable of being brought into a state of
garden cultivation; whilst the fisheries will be ex-
tended, and millions of people be employed in
drawing a now neglected abundance from the
sea. Then these changes will be carried to all
surrounding nations —the interests of countries
will become embedded so firmly that war will
be rendered impossible, and the ancient balance
of military power will become thought of no
more. The public health, intellect, and man-
ners will be improved by this rapid intercom-
48 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
munication of the people, liberty and science will
become universally diffused,—and the mind be-
comes, indeed, lost in the attempt to follow after
the immeasurable results which this annihilation
of time and space will produce upon the future
destinies of mankind.
OF R A J L R O A D.S. . . . 49.
CHAPTER VI.
Railways and canals compared—The superior advantages of
railroads nhen economically managed—The present advan-
tages of canals oning to the misuse of steam-pomer upon rail-
ways—Canals inferior to railnays in economy and speed—
Render great tracks of country damp—Have a humid influ-
ence upon climate——In every respect a rude mode of convey-
ance—Their disappearance a great advantage in a national
point of vien'.
THE next division of the system which it is
proposed to examine, is, the relative advantages
and disadvantages of railways and canals.
The threatened destruction of much valuable
property in canals, has induced many of the
proprietors of those works to entertain a desire,
that through their economy in charge, the disad-
vantages of slowness may be outweighed, and the
contest with railways be maintained. It is said,
by these persons, that though the new railroads
may appear to be certainly more magnificent
and eagle-winged than the ancient and more
unpretending mode of conveyance by canal;
yet that experience has shewn, and will con-
tinue still further to establish, that the dearness
of the construction and repairs of the railroads
will be found to raise the cost of transit to
E
50 THE POLITIC A. L ECONOMY
a rate which will much more than counter-
balance the advantages in the saving of time,
and that this consideration will at length prove
fatal to their use. The fact is alluded to,
of the confident predictions of the Manchester
and Liverpool Railway Company, that the canal
should be annihilated forthwith, and that rushes
and weeds should cover the bottom of it in a
single year, –yet, notwithstanding that experience
has shewn that the canal has not only maintained
the contest with the railway, but may now very
safely set at defiance all future railway opposition.
The railway, though only one-half the length of
the canal, yet is so expensive a work in its con-
struction and repair, that goods cannot be carried
upon it at a less price than upon a canal which is
sixty miles long, and therefore contending with it
under the disadvantage of a line of twofold cost
for construction, repair, motive power, and all
other sources of expense. If, they say, the canal
from Liverpool to Manchester were only thirty
miles long, and therefore its expenses one-half of
the present amount, it would be totally impossible
for the railway, which now does not take away one-
tenth portion of the trade, to continue in existence
when the charge per ton were reduced one-half
by the canal. How, they say, could a railway,
which already derives no profit, if not a loss, from
the carrying of goods at 8s. per ton, continue to
rival a canal, which, if constructed of equal length
A->
O E I: A I H. R O A I) S. 5 |
and at an equal expense, would then be enabled
to reduce the rate of carriage to one-half of the
present rate :
To all this, however, the reply may very con-
fidently be made,--that the amount of experience,
from the effects of the Liverpool and Manchester
railroad, is totally insufficient for proof of the
superior cheapness of canals. We have seen,
already, that the horse system has never yet been
attempted upon that railroad; and it is the vast and
wasteful expense for steam locomotive power that
has occasioned the nonfulfilment of the threats to
close the canal. By the previous calculations en-
tered into with reference to the comparative ex-
pense of steam and of horse power, we have seen
that the one is seven times more expensive than
the other, —the goods which are now conveyed
for SS. per ton from Liverpool to Manchester by
steam locomotive engines, being capable of being
carried at 1s. per ton by horses, a profit of one half
of even that low rate of tonnage remaining to the
company. Now, if the proprietors of the canals, at
the present time, charge 8s. per ton for carrying
goods from Manchester to Liverpool, and the same
kind of motive power were resorted to by the
railway company, the former would forthwith
be compelled to reduce their rates of carriage to
one eighth of the present price. This they could
not, by any means whatever, afford; for a canal,
—with its extensive excavations, locks, reser-
E 2
52 T H E POLITIC AI, ECON O M Y
voirs, and the other great works attached to
its first construction, with the great cost for
clearing out, and annual loss from stoppages by
drought in summer, and the ice in winter, in all
these things considered, is an infinitely dearer
work in its construction and repair, than any
judiciously constructed railroad possibly could be.
For, if horse power be used upon railroads, it
has been shewn, from the example of the collie-
ries, where they have been in use for so many
years, that the expense of their repair is almost
too trifling to be named. A canal, however, is
subject to very extensive expenses, for repairs of
locks, banks, and reservoirs, motive power, atten-
dance, and numberless other charges, and, there-
fore, canals would not be enabled to compete with
the railway, if the expense of the motive power
were the same. •
Perhaps a fair mode of viewing the compa-
rison between railroads and canals, is to suppose
that steam locomotive engines should be used
for drawing the barges and packet-boats which
now pass along the canals. If this power were
introduced, the expense of engines, with their
wear and tear, and the wear and tear of the
banks of the canal, would be found so great that
passengers and goods could not be conveyed
upon them at the rate of twenty-five miles an
hour, under an infinitely higher rate than is now
charged by the iron road. -
O F R A II, R O A D.S. 53
That canals will be totally unable to compete
with horse power upon railroads, will be abund-
antly shewn from the present charge upon the
Birmingham and London canal, which is usually
3!. per ton for the carriage of goods from the
metropolis to Birmingham. This charge amounts
to no less than 6d. per ton per mile, estimating the
length of the canal to be about one hundred and
twenty miles; and though it may be true that the
rates of tonnage could be very considerably low-
ered in the event of rivalry from railroad com-
panies, yet it is not to be supposed that the
reduction could extend to one sixth of the pre-
sent rate, or one halfpenny per ton per mile,
which, by the estimate of the result of horse-
power on the Liverpool and Manchester railway,
is the rate at which goods can be conveyed, even
without further improvements in their construc-
tion, as seen at the present time.
It has, however, been asserted, that the new
mode of using the power of the horse upon canals,
will come in very seasonably to revive the hopes
of the proprietors of canals. This is the intro-
duction of the system of conveying boats upon
canals at the utmost speed of the horse. This,
upon some of the canals in Scotland, has been
found to be a most valuable discovery in canal
navigation, and one which, unfortunately, has
come only a century too late. From the ex-
periments upon the Ardrossan canal, it is proved,
54 THE POLITIC A L ECON U M1 1
in the words of Mr. Graham, that “two horses
on the Paisley canal draw with ease a pas-
sage-boat, with a complement of seventy-five or
ninety passengers, at the rate of ten miles an
hour, -whilst it would take even double that num-
ber of horses to draw the same load along the
canal at the rate of six miles an hour; and it
would be decidedly easier to draw the load at
the velocity of fifteen miles an hour than of
six miles. The ordinary speed for the convey-
ance of passengers along the Ardrossan canal has,
for several years, been from mine to ten miles an
hour.” Now the introduction of this practice of
travelling at the higher rate of speed, is supposed
by Mr. Graham to be an important means of
enabling canals to compete with the railroads
through the amendment of the speed to a rate
equal to the reasonable wishes of the public, -
and that too being accompanied by so exten-
sive a saving of horse power as materially to
lessen the expense of transport upon canals. It
seems, moreover, that this increased speed has not
raised so great a commotion in the water of the
canal—nor have its banks been more worn than
though the slower rate of passing along its banks;
the boat gliding over the water, and raising up a
less volume of resistance at the stem. But all
these advantages are derived very obviously from
the common principle of increased impetus with
increased weight and speed. The boat upon the
OF Tº A I Lik. O AIDS. 55
canal is propelled with more ease at the rate of
ten than of six miles, because the impetus and
power of self-propulsion become greater at one rate
of motion than another; and though this is undoubt-
edly a great advantage in canal-navigation, it is
apparent that the same principle will act equally
in favour of the railroad, increase of speed in-
creasing the expedition of the horse as much
upon a railroad as upon a canal; and as the prin-
ciple will be taken advantage of upon railroads,
all its comparative advantage towards the proprie-
tors of canals will be thenceforth lost.
Moreover, this rapidity of motion can only be
obtained upon the small number of canals which
pass through level districts of country, and are
therefore without locks. Where these obstruc-
tions occur, the delay would not only form a great
deduction from the advantages of the former
speed, but the impetus would be lost, and be
required to be regained upon passing each of the
locks. Upon railways, however, there cannot
exist any such impediments to the impetus and
speed; for if the lower road be not a perfect
level, the suspension works, by lengthening the
pillars, may be constructed upon a perfect plain,
and thence the utmost advantage of the impetus
may be obtained upon a railroad, though it is
subject to be perpetually impeded and lost upon
a canal.
But though the contest is certainly hopeless
56 T H E POLI'I'ICA L E CONOMY
against well-constructed lines of iron road, sites
of canals cannot be without their value, since the
alluvial deposits upon their bottoms would appear
to render them the most fertile of land; or
some of these lines of canals may pass with
sufficient directness from town to town to admit
of their being constructed into railroads; and as
the chief expense of railroads will probably be in
future in the purchase of the land, it will be a
paramount advantage that canal companies will
have in their possession the ready-levelled land.
In some situations, the sites may perhaps be con-
verted into aqueducts from town to town ; and
many other modes of applying the property will
undoubtedly arise.
In some of the individual proprietorships, the
loss of the property is less to be regretted,
from the remembrance of the enormous wealth
which has been derived from the canals; as
those of the Duke of Bridgewater, upon which
the charges for transport have been usually lower
than the expense of carriage upon the turnpike
road only by the smallest amount which would
draw the trade to the canals for the benefit of the
proprietors, and without any reference whatever
to the general benefit of trade. Though Acts of
Parliament were granted for the whole of the
canals of the Duke of Bridgewater, yet the tolls
have always been most enormous in amount, and
the general benefit to the commerce of the coun-
O F R. A. I L ROA D.S. - 57
try has been infinitely less than has been usually
supposed.
With reference to their influence upon climate
also, the disappearance of canals is much to be
desired. In these islands they add undoubt-
edly in a very extensive degree to the humidity
of a country already humid to excess; for not
only are the surfaces of canals and their reservoirs
exposed to the influence of evaporation, but the
adjoining lands are also in many situations ren-
dered marshy and unwholesome to a very consi-
derable extent. .
It is, therefore, apparent, that canals are now
to be classed amongst the rude inventions of a
former age ; and that there is not the smallest
probability of their continuance in existence in
opposition to the more modern invention of iron
roads. -
58 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER VII.
.* Proposal for one great line from Dover to Glasgon–Through
the centre of the manufacturing districts of the kingdom—First
division of the nork from Dover to London—The navigation of
the Thames superseded—Consequences to dock property not
disadvantageous—The trade of London mill be increased by
railway transit—Calculations of the general saving by the su-
percession in the Thames—The line from Dover to be carried to
the Thames Tunnel–Proceeds due north to Birmingham,
Manchester, Glasgon, and Carlisle,
HAviNG thus discussed the principles of the
economy of the legislation, construction, and
moving power of railroads, I propose to pass next
to the more immediate results of the system, as
seen in the formation of lines of road through the
centre and to the Eastern and Western portions
of the kingdom, for the purpose of connecting all
Ol] I’ SCà.S.
The first great line is proposed to be constructed
from Dover to London, and thence without inter-
ruption to Birmingham, Manchester, and Carlisle,
and through Scotland to Glasgow ; thus passing
through the whole of the great manufacturing
districts of the kingdom, and measuring a dis-
tance of four hundred and forty miles. This line
O F RAILROADS. 59
will comprehend so wide a stream of trade, and
will be the grand artery from which so many
smalier branches will be carried to the east and
to the west, that its construction may be under-
taken upon a very extensive scale.
Let us, then, take our departure from Dover to
London, between which places the distance, in
the nearest line, will be little more than about
sixty miles. Now, supposing a vessel to discharge
its cargo at Dover, and the goods to be conveyed
at the rate of 1d. per ton, per mile, upon the rail-
road to London, the whole amount of the expense
of conveyance for this distance of sixty miles will
be 5s. per ton; the time occupied in the passage
being not more than about seventeen hours. On
the other hand, the present expense of sailing
from Dover to London, including pilotage, light-
money, dock dues, and the other countless charges
of the Thames, cannot be estimated at less than
25s. per ton; the passage also occupying more than
an average of five days, through the expensive,
intricate, and dangerous navigation of the Downs
and the Thames. Thus, in addition to a saving
of about 20s. per ton in the carriage of goods will
be the saving of the interest upon the value of the
cargo and the ship for a period of four days, with
the saving of insurance, wages, victualling, and
the whole of the expenses of the vessel for the
same period of time. It is, therefore, quite appa-
rent, that upon the opening of a railway from the
(30 THE PO LITIC A. L E CONOMI Y
English Channel to the metropolis, the expense or
navigation will be so much greater than that of
transportion by land, that the whole trade of the
metropolis will be withdrawn to a port or ports
upon the southern coast; unless, indeed, the bar-
barous system of impeding the progress of im-
provement be resorted to by the goverment, for
the purpose of preserving the property in docks,
warehouses, and other commercial appurtenances
of the Thames. -
But let us examine this matter, in anticipation
of the closing of the docks. -
First,--though the East and West India and
London Docks were abandoned by the shipping,
still the sites of them would not be lost. These
docks cover an area of miles; and were the water
let off, the soil would be found to be of the
richest alluvial kind, in consequence of the de-
posits which are perpetually accumulating in all
such spots. If the water of the Thames were
built out by a wall at the present entrance
to the docks, and the surface were covered
with mould, turf, or other vegetable matter,
then so much ground for gardens would suc-
ceed to the present body of water contained in
the docks. Considering that these docks are
already too numerous, that the dividends upon
the stock of the West India and London Docks
do not average more than about two and a half per
cent. per annum, that millions of capital have
O F. R A J L ROADS. 6 |
been lost through the decline of the value of the
shares, and that the loss of undue monopolies is
now causing London to decline rapidly to its na-
tural dimensions—it is to be doubted whether these
properties would not already be made more profit-
able by employing the sites in laying out gardens
with ranges of dwelling-houses above, or in con-
verting the ground into manufactories, warehouses,
vaults, and the numberless other valuable modes
for the employment of land in the heart of the me.
tropolis of the world. Then the whole of the
outbuildings can be converted into manufactories,
warehouses, and dwelling-houses; since the car-
riage of coal, iron ore, cotton, and other raw ma-
terials will be reduced to so low a rate upon the
railroads as to allow manufactories to be esta-
blished in all situations where there is a population
to menuſacture and consume the products; and
therefore the average trade of the metropolis will
be probably increased by the abandonment of the
navigation of the Thames. When coal shall be
conveyed from Staffordshire to London at a charge
of 5s. per ton, and iron ore at the same low
charge, the metropolis, from its dense popula-
tion, and greater vicinity to the sea, will have
some advantage over the more inland districts, in
the diminished distance of the carriage for expor-
tation of the finished articles of cutlery, cotton,
silk, and other departments of manufacturing in-
dustry which undoubtedly would arise. The ge-
62 THE POLITIC A. L ECON O MY
neral trade of the metropolis being then not likely-
to decrease, but very greatly to increase, by the
cheap rates of conveyance upon the railroad from
Dover to the metropolis, it becomes less required
that the economist should be anxious about the
destruction of the property in the docks, ware-
houses, and other mercantile property upon the
banks of the Thames. Moreover, the property for
miles along the banks of the river consists of streets
so ancient, filthy, and of value so small, that the
formation of the modern ranges of buildings which
would arise upon their ruins, would become an
ultimate source of extensive gain.
Having brought the railway from Dover to Lon-
don, let us pause to examine the effects which
this direct land communication from the metropo-
lis to the English channel will have upon the
general commerce of the nation.
It has been shewn already, that the charge for
conveying one ton of merchandise from Dover to
London will amount to not more than 5s. per ton,
at 1d. per ton, per mile. Now the number of
vessels of all descriptions which enter the Thames
may be averaged at about twenty thousand in each
year; and, at an average burden of two hundred
tons each, it would appear that the total amount
of goods carried upon the Thames may be esti-
mated at about two millions of tons per year. If,
therefore, this immense quantity of merchandise
can be carried in one day, and at a charge of 20s.
O F R A I LRO A D.S. 63
- perton less upon a railway than upon the Thames,
a direct saving of 2,000,000l. per annum will result
to the general trade of the metropolis from the
carriage of merchandise alone. If it be added
to this that passengers will be conveyed at a
quarter of the present charge to Dover, and that
that port will become the great outlet from Eng-
land to the continental states, and to all quarters
of the world,—and therefore the number of passen-
gers will be many millions in the year, it is no
exaggeration to suppose that a well-constructed
railroad from the metropolis to Dover would pro-
duce a saving in the expense of transporting
passengers, merchandise and mails, of upwards of
five millions a year.
All this time the commerce and manufactures
of London would have a tendency to increase,
whilst the docks, warehouses, and other mercan-
tile property of the Thames would not be ulti-
mately reduced in value by the change.
Some other advantages would be obtained, as
that the Thames, when no longer disturbed by the
annual passing and repassing of about twenty
thousand steam-boats and ships, would resume
its natural beauty of appearance, the fisheries
would be re-established, and the water of the
metropolis become more pure.
The towns of Greenwich, Gravesend, and other
places upon its banks would be visited by means
of railways, and therefore would experience
64 T H E POLITIC A. L. ECON () MY
no loss through the trade being diverted from the
Thames. - - -
Railways being carried from the Thames Tunnel
to all parts of the metropolis upon both sides of
the river, there is every reason to suppose that
very great advantages would ultimately arise to all
the districts now depending upon the Thames.
But though all these advantages should not be
realized, and the docks, wharfs, warehouses, and
other property upon the river be depreciated in
value, there is at least ample room for the pay-
ment of some compensation, and even for the
purchase of the whole of the property, out of the
profits of a road, which will realize a profit of five
millions a year, by cutting off the expensive, cir-
cuitous, and dangerous navigation of the Downs
and the Thames. The general interest of the
inhabitants of London is not concerned in the
preservation of the navigation of the Thames; and
as other districts and towns will have the advan-
tages of railways, it would be placing the metro-
polis in a position of decline, to refuse to adopt a
system which otherwise will cause the present
commerce of the Thames to be extensively with-
drawn to Liverpool, Bristol, and other ports
to which the expense of transit will be less. For
if no railway be carried from London to the En-
glish channel, yet a railway, of one hundred and
twenty miles from Bristol to the metropolis, would
enable a ton of goods to be conveyed at consider-
OF R A ILROADS. 65.
ably less cost than by the navigation of the
Thames. As the trade would even be withdrawn
by a railway of a length of one hundred and
twenty miles, it would be folly not to proceed to
the extremity of the advantages of the system,
by passing direct to the sea, by a road only of
one half of the length of that which could not
be prevented from being executed, and which
would equally cause all the losses apprehended
through the abandonment of the Thames. In-
deed, navigable rivers, canals, and all other modes
of conveyance by water, will now be utterly laid
void. For, not the Thames alone, but the
Shannon, the Mississippi, the St. Lawrence, and
all the other great navigable streams will now be
deserted for the land. Let father Thames then die.
Thus we have brought the railroad from
Dover to London, at the Thames Tunnel, a work,
which the inspection of a map of the metropolis
will show to be most fortunately situated for car-
rying the line forward to the North. This line
would not only be the most direct that could be
constructed from Dover to Birmingham, but it is at
the same time the cheapest route that can be found.
The expense of purchasing metropolitan property
is so great in any situation upon the Thames,
and the line from Dover to Birmingham through
the Thames Tunnel is seen to touch so much
less of that property than any other point through
which the railroad could be carried, that the very
F
66 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
expense of passing the metropolis will be exten-
sively diminished by carrying the great line to that
most economical, central, and direct of all the
passes of the Thames. The dimensions of the
Tunnel are sufficient for the passage of waggons
upon two tracks of moderate width, being eighteen
feet in height, and thirty-four feet wide. But
should the completion of the Tunnel itself not be
found practicable, or its use for a railroad-track be
not, for any other reason desirable,_it is at least
apparent, that the same spot is the most desirable
one for the erection of a steam ferry for the pas-
sage of the Thames.
Thus, then, we have passed from Dover to
London at the Thames Tunnel, and thence to
Watford, and upon the present track of the rail-
way, or upon the turnpike road through the inter-
vening counties to the iron districts of Birming-
ham, and thence to the potteries of Staffordshire,
the distance from Dover being an average of
about one hundred and eighty miles. There-
fore, at a charge of 1d. per ton, per mile, the
cost of conveying goods from Dover to Birming-
ham will be about 15s. 6d. per ton, the distance
being accomplished by horses in about forty-
eight hours, whilst at present the charge for
the conveyance of goods by canal from Birming-
ham to the metropolis is usually about 3/. per
ton, and the porterage to the warehouse of the
merchant, and thence to the dock, with the loss
OF RAILROADS. 67
of time upon the repeated unloadings of the
goods, cannot be estimated at less than an addi-
tional ll, per ton. The expense of the commission
agent and of the porterage to the ship will cer-
tainly not be saved, because these two branches
of expenditure must be undergone at Dover itself,
and so also must the harbour charges, though
those will be comparatively slight, since the
waggon may pass from Birmingham to Dover,
and for the first time be unloaded upon the rail-
way terminating at the dock. Estimating, then,
the real saving by the railway from Birmingham
to Dover to be only 2l. per ton, as contrasted with
the present charge by the canal and the Thames,
yet immense will be the saving of capital from a
reduction of 21. per ton upon all the iron and
earthenware exported from the iron districts of
Birmingham, and the potteries of Staffordshire,
with a corresponding economy in the transit of the
colonial and other imported commodities required
for those hundreds of thousands of souls engaged
in that great scene of industry and skill.
From Birmingham the line will proceed on-
wards to Manchester, from which great manu-
facturing town to Dover will be a distance of two
hundred and forty miles, and the charge of con-
veyance to the sea, at 1d. per ton, per mile, will
amount to 20s. per ton. Whether, therefore, the
export and import trade of Manchester and its
surrounding towns will centre upon this line, or
F 2
68 THE POLITICAL ECON O MY
be divided by the Manchester and Liverpool
railway on the west, and a railway through York-
shire to Hull upon the east, may perhaps remain
to be determined; but the cotton, silk, woollen,
and other manufactures consumed by the mil-
lions of the population of Birmingham, London,
and all other southern districts of England, with
the whole of the exports from Lancashire to the
European states, will certainly be conveyed upon
the line. - -
From Manchester, the work is to be carried
northward to Carlisle; and at that city a railroad to
the eastward already is in existence to Newcastle
and the German Ocean, at Shields,--by which
line the coals, lead, and other mineral productions
of Northumberland, and the general imports from
the Baltic to Newcastle, will be conveyed across
the island to the Irish Channel, to Liverpool,
Glasgow, and all our western shores.
From Carlisle the work then branches west-
ward to Portpatrick, in Scotland, a distance of
ninety miles. This port is the nearest to Ireland
of any in this division of the kingdom; and there-
fore the branch proposed from Carlisle is to be
the principle line for the Irish trade.
From Carlisle, the main line then proceeds
north, through the manufacturing districts of Scot-
land, to the city of Glasgow, a further distance of
ninety miles, thus forming one complete chain of
road from Dover to Glasgow, in a distance of four
OF R A ILROADS. * 69
hundred and fifty miles; and in a similar dis-
tance from Dover to Portpatrick, on the western
branch ; and to Newcastle, on the east; the line
thus passing through the heart of the manufac-
turing districts of the kingdom, and being of
uniform width and general arrangement, enabling
a waggon to pass, without being unloaded, from
the English channel to the eastern and the western
SeaS.
Here it is to be observed, that the calculations
of the rate of transport are founded upon the
general rate of 1d. per ton, per mile ; not because
that rate is the minimum of toll,—for it has
already appeared that the rate may be reduced
to one tenth, or perhaps even a much smaller
toll; but as this work is intended less for the
examination of the minuter details than for the
exposition of the general principles, and the broad
outlines of a system which is yet only in the
dawn, it is preferred to take that which already
has been established as an abundant toll.
70 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER VIII.
The norks non in progress at the harbour of Dover considered—
Its improvement shenyn to be difficult from natural causes—
Proposed men, harbour upon that part of the English Channel
—Mode of constructing it—Its expense repaid by the shipping
drawn from the Thames—Proposed land communication nith
France—Shallonness of the sea, and facility of constructing a
pass—Several modes proposed, a bridge, causenay, tunnel, steam
ferry, or floating bridge—Great revenue and international con-
sequences to arise from the pass.
THUs, then, we have traced out a great line
from north to south, and from east to west; and
now it will be necessary to return to the starting-
place at Dover, to examine into the possibility of
providing a harbour of sufficient capacity for all
this great stream of trade.
For the harbour of Dover, in its present condi-
tion, has not convenience, extent, or depth, for
the purpose of containing the whole of the ship-
ping which it is supposed will be withdrawn
from the Thames. It is, indeed, what is termed
a dry harbour, having only a few feet of water,
and perpetually changing in its depth,-the
beach, with which it is habitually liable to be
choked, through its exposure to the south-west
wind of the English Channel, causing an enor-
mous and repeated expenditure of the public
money to keep clear this harbour for the pur-
of RAILROADS. 7]
pose of the packet-service between England and
France. Some hundreds of thousands of pounds
of the national money have been, at sundry
times, expended in the works necessary for
the scouring of the harbour, as the process is
termed by the engineers, and yet the entrance
remains to this time more obstructed by the
beach than at any former time. This process of
scouring is effected by the erection of flood-gates,
within which the water is enclosed when the tide
is full, and let off when the harbour is dry, for the
purpose of sweeping away by its impetus the
beach which is collected at the mouth. This
operation has, however, been always found to
give a very temporary relief, for the beach, which
has been thus expelled by the water from the
flood-gates, has been usually thrown back to its
old position upon the first gale, from the south-
west or south. Thence all former attempts having
failed to keep away the beach; and the port, as
the nearest to France, being obliged to be kept
open, at whatever expense,_and the accumula-
tions of beach being now so great as to threaten
the entire annihilation of the port, -the scouring
system has again been commenced during the
recent year. The works now in course of con-
struction are upon the former plan, but greatly
increased in their dimensions; the arches and
flood-gates now being upon a scale which will
pour out a much greater volume of water, than the
72 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
similar works which formerly were found to be
insufficient in their force for the purpose of keep-
ing the harbour clear. From appearances, some
hundreds of thousands of the public money is
about to be expended in the attempt; and this
enormous sum, in addition to the many other
hundreds of thousands which have been already
expended in similar operations at this port, will
be totally wasted, should the experiment not suc-
ceed in finally clearing away the beach. For it
appears that the quantities of beach thrown up by
the south-west wind exceeds almost all belief,
beds of it of many feet in depth, and many thou-
sands of tons in weight being said to be sometimes
thrown up in the course of a single night; and
thence it is considerably to be doubted whether
any opposing force sent out from flood-gates will
have any permanent effect in carrying away the
beach.
For it is to be observed that the natural cause of
this accumulation of beach in our southern har-
bours is the increasing prevalence of the west and
south-west winds, and, whether owing to the
clearing of the forests of America, or to other
natural causes, it is certain that the west is now
assuming almost the permanence and regularity
of a trade-wind.
It is this increasing prevalence of the westerly
wind which has caused the rapid inroads which
the sea has been making in recent years upon
of RAILROADs. . 73
all our shores; for the weight of the Atlantic
Ocean is thus thrown with a perpetually increasing
impetus upon these islands, whilst the Gulf
Stream is also forced annually further to the
eastward; and the melting of the icebergs, which
descend from the Polar seas, and are arrested in
the stream at the southern edge of the Banks of
Newfoundland, also tends to throw the Atlantic
Ocean with an annually increasing force against
these shores. * .
Indeed, the chalky cliffs of the southern coast
oppose so little resistance to the inroads of the
sea, falling annually in bodies of acres in extent
along the whole coasts of the English Channel,
—that it becomes a conjecture whether in the
course of a few ages the whole of these islands
will not be swallowed up by the waves, if walls
or other artificial means of defence be not opposed
to the advances of the sea.
It is, then, the falling of the cliffs which occa-
sions the accumulations of beach in the harbour
of Dover, and against which no system of scour-
ing will, in any probability, have the smallest per-
manent effect.
For these reasons, then, it is proposed to com-
mence operations at the harbour of Dover upon
a much more extensive scale: by constructing
indeed a new port, by building into the sea to the
deep water, which is at a distance of about three
miles, where a clear bottom, with five fathoms of
74 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
water, may at all times be obtained. For this
purpose it is proposed to take down the cliffs, and,
by the agency of rough labour alone, to fill up
the sea for an area of several miles. The ma-
terial of the cliffs presents itself in mountains,
and is of a texture neither too hard nor too soft
for the purpose of a well-consolidated work;
whilst the labour of convicts, with tramways, and
other modern machinery for facilitating such un-
dertakings, would render the covering of a few
miles of sea an object of no very considerable
expense. By building upon the present beds of
beach, the harbour would be freed from the
possibility of all future accumulation, since the
bed of the channel is there worn clear by the
operation of driving the beach forward upon the
land; and as no more material would afterwards
fall from the cliffs, which would no longer be
washed by the sea, a clear harbour, and the cer-
tainty of its remaining unobstructed, would thus
be obtained by the accomplishment of the work
which is proposed.
The spot at which to commence these opera-
tions is between Dover and Folkstone, the nearest
point by about three miles to the coast of France.
Here, then, I would cover the sea for an area of
several miles with the material from the cliffs;
and, having arrived at the deep water, thence
would build walls of hewn stone or of rough ma-
terial, with external surfaces of iron, forming in
OF RA II, ROADS. 75
the interior the docks and other appurtenances of
a harbour of great extent. As it will not be
doubted that a harbour may be formed in any
situation where labour and money can be found,
it remains only to be proved, that the revenue to
be derived from this new port would superabun-
dantly repay the expense of its formation.
Allowing that the rough labour of taking down
the cliffs, and depositing the materials as pro-
posed, would, by the employment of convicts, be
comparatively slight; yet the hewn stone-work,
and the building of the docks, warehouses, and
other appurtenances of so great a port as that
which is proposed for the supercession of the
Thames, may be estimated at little less than five
millions of money. But then to repay this great
expenditure of capital we shall have the whole of
the shipping which now navigates the Thames.
These, from official returns, have been shewn to
be about twenty thousand per annum, of all sizes
and kinds, and may be estimated at an average
burthen of two hundred tons. Then, without
estimating the enormous increase of our foreign
trade which the railway system, and the gene-
ral increase of the wealth and population of
the country are undoubtedly destined to bring
forth,-let us take the whole number of ship-
ping which may fairly be calculated upon as
entering the future harbour of Dover at twenty
thousand, of an average burden of two hun-
76 THE POLITIC AI, ECONOMY
dred tons, and the consequent whole annual
tonnage paying to the port is thus shewn to
be about four millions of tons. This amount
of tonnage, at a charge of only 2s. 6d., per ton,
(which is not a quarter of the present charges
of the London Docks,) would realize the sum of
500,000l. per annum, or an annual dividend of
five per cent. upon 10,000,000l. should so immense
a sum be required for the completion of the work.
That so great an expenditure would be required
in these days when labour abounds, and when
machinery has even been invented for hewing
stones at one-quarter of the former expense,
cannot for a moment be supposed. And as the
present harbour of Dover cannot be permanently
kept open by the scouring system; and the money
which is now in the act of being expended will,
in every probability, be virtually thrown into the
sea; and many more hundreds of thousands must
be thrown after it, in a repetition of similar at-
tempts; it becomes certainly worthy of consi-
deration whether one grand harbour should not be
carried into the sea, at a spot which is situated by
nature for so happy a point of communication with
the whole of these islands by railways and by
navigation with the whole continent of Europe,
—and, indeed with the whole of the modern
world.
But, in these days we should not content
ourselves with a mere harbour at Dover, but pro-
OF RAILROADS. 77
ceed to carry forward a land communication with
the coast of France.
It has been shewn that the distance from the
land to the southward of Dover to the opposite
shore, is about three miles less than from Dover
to Calais; or about eighteen miles at the nearest
position between England to France. But the
very works which have been proposed for the new
harbour, will cover about three miles of the dis-
tance, and another mile would also be gained upon
the wall which would thence project for the enclo-
sure of the new port. We, therefore, at the ex-
tremity of this wall,—which would be built in
the form, and with the width and strength of a
breakwater,-shall stand within fourteen miles of
the coast of France, and as a similar new harbour
will be required at Cape Blacknez to the extre-
mity of the opposite works will be only a distance
of ten miles from land to land.
Here, then, I propose the continuation of the
land communication, and of the railway passage,
from England to France, by the construction of
a chain-bridge, a causeway, a tunnel, a floating-
bridge, a bridge of ships, or any other, the
cheaper and most practicable mode.
The sea between England and France is ex-
tremely shallow, the Channel here carrying
soundings—nine, ten, eleven, and nowhere more
than about twenty-five fathoms, and the average
*
78 THE POLITICAL ECONOMIY
being about ten fathoms, or a sea sixty feet deep
from England to France.
Now, there is nothing in water sixty feet deep
to present any insuperable obstacle or even extra-
ordinary difficulty in the formation of a bridge.
The foundations of very many bridges over
rivers have been laid by the diving-bell, and
coffer-dams at a depth much greater than that of
sixty feet, and there is no difference, of course,
between operating in a river and in the sea.
Let us, then, examine the cost of constructing
such a bridge, ten miles in length.
It is to be observed, that, by the railway from
Birminghams to Dover, the iron-work required,
could be conveyed, at an extremely small expense
from the districts where it must of necessity be
prepared ; and by the new invention of machinery,
stones can be hewn at one-quarter of the former
cost,--from which two causes the expense of
this undertaking would be most considerably de-
creased. The buttresses must be, not only sixty
feet under water, but sixty feet above the surface,
for the purpose of a due elevation above the
waves of the sea; but these may be diminished
in size to an extraordinary extent, by adopting
the system for bridges and viaducts referred to in
plate 2, page 17. Indeed, the diminution of the size
of the buttresses will not only greatly diminish the
expense of bridges for railways, but by the corre-
OF RAILROADS. 79
sponding diminution of the resisting surface, add
greatly to their durability and strength.
This bridge, then, from the extremity of the
works of the newly-proposed harbour, to the ex-
tremity of the similar works at the harbour of
Blacknez, upon the coast of France, will measure
in reality only about ten miles. Its construction
being proposed to resemble the arched work of
cast-iron or hewn stone described in a former
portion of this work, the expense will be reduced
to about one-twentieth portion of the cost of a
solid cast-iron bridge of the usual form ; for the
arches being only of one or two feet in width,
and the centre arch supporting a double sleeper
and rail, and the intermediate work consisting
only of wood, the real width of the iron-work
will be only about six feet, for a bridge fifty, or
more, feet wide; and the cost of ten miles of
elliptic arches, of one hundred and twenty feet
in span, at a moderate price of iron or of stone,
would be equal to one mile of bridge-work of the
usual solid form. Estimating this at five millions
of money, and that two nations, or the individual
subjects of two nations, are concerned in dividing
the undertaking into two parts of five miles each,
the difficulties and expense of the undertaking
become diminished to an immense extent. Thus,
with soundings only sixty feet deep, and the
power of rendering arches, of only one-fifth of
the usual width, equal for the support of a rail-
80 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
way, to the arches of the common bridge, it is no
longer to be doubted that the labour, capital, and
science of two great nations must be equal to the
accomplishment of this most valuable pass.
Next it is proposed to consider the mode of
constructing this communication by a causeway,
from England to France. We have supposed,
previously, that eight miles of the distance would
be covered by the two harbours, to be formed
at Dover and Blacknez, and that the intervening
ten miles are alone to be converted into solid
land. Now, in the great natural advantages which
present themselves in the abundance of material
upon the shores of both countries in those soli-
tary cliffs, which, now are without value, and in
the immensity of convict labour which we are annu-
ally wasting in a six months voyage to the op-
posite extremity of the world, the inducements
to undertake the formation of a causeway, are
probably greater than any other mode that could
be proposed.
Supposing, therefore, that ten thousand con-
victs, instead of being sent, at a cost of 100l.
each, to Van Diemen's Land, should be brought
from London to Dover, at an expense of only
2s. 6d. each, and that the 100l. which is expended
in wasting their labour in a voyage of six months
in the passage to New Holland, should be suffi-
cient to victual, clothe, and superintend this
number of convicts at Dover for a period of more
OF RAILROADS. 81
than five years. The same system being adopted
upon the French shore, and ten thousand convicts
and galley-slaves, whose labour is now totally
wasted in dredging in the harbours of France, being
brought to the hulks to be stationed at Blacknez,
the work would be proceeding simultaneously
from the shores of England and France—and five
miles of the causeway would, therefore, be all
that each nation would have to complete, till
the works should meet in the centre of the sea.
Ten thousand convicts, at a cost of 10l. each man,
a full allowance for clothing, victualling, and beds,
would cost the nations, or individuals, or com-
panies to whom they might be hired, no more
than the sum of 100,000l. per annum, which is
not more than the sum which is annually expended
in sending only one tenth portion of that number
to Van Diemen's Land. The convicts upon the
French shore, from the cheaper rate of provisions
in France, might even be maintained at a some-
what cheaper rate than upon the English side, for
it appears that about three thousand convicts,
which is the usual number employed in the har-
bour of Brest, are supported at an expense of 4s.
per week each, which even includes a small allow-
ance of money to the convict himself; and even
this expense would be diminished by the lower
rate at which contracts could be taken for
the clothing, victualling, and beds, for a great
and concentrated body of ten thousand men.
G
82 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
Thus, then, we have ten thousand labourers at
work on either side of the channel, and the cliffs
which are to be taken down lie immediately upon
the shore, are easy of excavation, and, in their pre-
sent state, mere solitary mountains, and therefore,
not required to be purchased at the value of cul-
tivated land. With all these advantages, let us
suppose that the pass shall be formed at the rate
of only one mile in the year from either shore,
and thus occupy a period of five years, and
to be completed by the labour of ten thousand
convicts, in one hundred gangs, of one hundred
men each, with one hundred lines of tramway
upon a pass one mile wide. The whole expense,
therefore, of completing the English portion of
the work would be about 500,000l. for the sup-
port of ten thousand convicts for a period of
five years; but allowing that one million or two
millions were required for superintendence, tools,
and the facings of the causeway by metal or
hewn stone, and that a similar expenditure were
incurred by the people of France, and that the
whole undertaking could even be completed for
a sum of 5,000,000l., still we shall presently
perceive how trifling a sum even that would be
for the purchase of the countless advantages which
would arise from the pass.
Having brought our convict labour into opera-
tion at home, it follows that, though the whole of
the works should be destroyed by the sea there
OF RAILROADS. 83
would be no loss in the mere labour of convicts,
who are now sent to a country, the great distance
of which from the country at home, renders our
system of transportation little other than one un-
qualified waste of human labour, health, happiness,
and life.
That the tide flows with great force in this part
of the channel is, not a disadvantage, for the ma-
terial would be more perfectly embedded by the
flux and reflux of the tide, and the extremity of
the causeway would be defended by floating hulls,
which could be moored at the exterior edges of
the work. That there is no difficulty whatever in
forming such an embankment is proved by the
fortifications called rip raps, which exist in se-
veral of the harbours of America, and are islands
of stone, formed by throwing the material in rough
masses into the sea; the stones becoming so
firmly consolidated by the action of the tide, that
some of these fortifications mount many hundred
guns.
If a passage be required to remain open for the
navigation of the channel, openings may be left,
or afterwards formed at the required intervals,
with drawbridges attached; or the vessels passing
up or down channel may pass through the har-
bours of Dover and Blacknez. Less inconvenience
would be felt from the obstruction of the naviga-
tion, inasmuch as this land communication, if
G 2
84 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
completed, would terminate the whole coasting
trade
In order to diminish the apparent magnitude of
such an undertaking, let us now reflect upon the
works which have been left to us by barbarous
nations and from ages when money, machinery,
and men were not so abounding as in this, the
most wealthy, populous, and scientific nation that
ever has flourished in the world. The pyramids
of Egypt, or the Chinese wall, were undertakings
of ten-fold greater labour than the formation of
a land passage over the narrow sea which divides
England from France. If the causeway of Caligula
is directly such a work as that which is proposed ;
for this Emperor constructed a clear land passage
across the Bay of Naples from the Bay of Baiae,
to the Mole of Puteoli, where the remains of it
are visible to the present day. The work is de-
scribed by Suetonius as a bridge which formed
a complete land passage across the whole Bay
of Naples; that senseless tyrant having con-
structed this gigantic work for the purpose of
defeating the prediction of soothsayers, that he
should reign no longer than he could drive his
chariot and horses over the sea. The work was
constructed by chaining ships together two
abreast, and these were sunk, , and afterwards
covered over with soil, and thus the whole was
converted into a solid road across the Bay. Now
this is the precise description of causeway which
OF RAILROADS. 85
it is proposed to erect between England and
France, and some useful hints may even be taken
from the description which Suetonius has given of
the work. Thus the sinking of the hulls of ships
might be adopted here where old hulls are infi-
nitely more plentiful than in ancient Rome, and
even old boats, barges, and craft of any other
description might be bought or even made of
slight materials for the purpose of being filled
with soil and sunk at the edges of the work. If,
then, such works have been seen in barbarous
times, and if China possesses canals three thou-
sand miles long, and a wall of solid masonry of
one hundred feet wide, and fifteen hundred miles
long, what is there that the English nation may
not attempt? Though the sea from England to
France were a hundred miles wide, the work
would be a molehill to a nation possessed of ad-
vantages in labour, capital, and science, such as
never were accumulated in any nation of the
world. -
Indeed, there is not only no difficulty in
forming a causeway of a single mile wide be-
tween England to France, but labour, capital,
and material so abound, that a very great portion
of the English channel might undoubtedly, under
the new system of transporting the material, be
converted into solid land. The regular employ-
ment of convicts in such operations would, in
time, not only level the present useless Downs of
86 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
the coast, but would also redouble the quantity
of land in the portion which thus would be gained
from the sea. Thus, if the present site of the
Downs for five miles inland, and twenty miles
along the coast, were taken down by convicts and
transferred into the sea, this, in the average triple
height of the cliffs to the depth of the sea, would
cover the entire channel for a distance of twenty
miles wide and twenty miles long, and thus an
area of five hundred miles of land might be gained
from the sea. This isthmus could then be covered
with soil, mud, or manure, at a very reduced ex-
pense by the railways from England, Belgium, or
France, and would be situated in the mildest cli-
mate of England, and rendered valuable by its
contiguity to Belgium and France.
But to those who do not perceive that England
is yet only in the dawn of its prosperity, that in
a hundred years, a hundred millions of people will
be inhabiting these islands, that the hundreds of
millions of money which formerly were wanted in
war, will now expand into thousands and tens of
thousands of millions through the cultivation of
the acts of peace, it is visionary to foretel that
our posterity will enlarge their domains by the
conquest of kingdoms from the sea,
A tunnel could be constructed from the extre-
mities of the two harbours proposed, and would
be therefore only ten miles long. Also buildings
similar to lighthouses might be erected in the
OF RAILROADS. - 87
channel, through which shafts might be opened
for the purpose of proceeding with the excavation
from a number of points simultaneously, and
these also might be left permanently open to
light and ventilate the work. It is to be observed
in favour of this mode, that the chalk of which
the substratum is composed is soft of excavation,
and would be at all times dry, no springs being
ever found by the geologists below the superior
surface of the chalk.
Whether a floating bridge could be advanta-
geously contrived, or a steam ferry-boat upon a
great scale, moved by many engines, and from its
power able to pass with regularity in all conditions
of the weather and the sea, may also be ranked
amongst the suggestions not unworthy to be
made.
Thus, then, for the present, we sum up the
calculations and arguments already set forth as
proving, first, that a harbour is now, and upon the
completion of the railway to Dover, will be infi-
nitely more required at any cost whatsoever to be
found; secondly, that from natural causes no
such harbour now exists, or without reaching the
clear bottom and deep sea, can be permanently
made ; thirdly, that the great streams of trade
which the railways through France and from the
northern states will bring to the vicinity of Calais,
render the construction of a similar harbour to
be equally required upon the opposite shore;
88 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
fourthly, that these harbours and works will cover
the channel for a distance of eight miles, and
leave only ten miles of sea between England and
France, and that in the abundance of material in
the cliffs upon both shores, and accumulation of
convict labour in the prisons of both nations, the
further proper land communication may be formed.
at a very inconsiderable cost.
OF RAILROADS. . . 89
CHAPTER IX.
Central position of the pass amidst the European states— Rail-
nays from Calais to Paris, and the Mediterranean sea—
Another great line from Calais through Belgium, Holland, and
the Hanse Tonyms to the Baltic Sea—Calculations of revenue—
Bridges betneen nations more required, if practicable, than
bridges betneen tonns—Objections to the effect upon the coast-
ing trade removed—Importance of the reciprocity of nations.
IT is next intended to shew the commercial and
political changes which would result from the
formation of this land communication between
England and France. ~
Upon arriving at Calais, the extremely fortunate
position of that point engages our attention, since
we stand at that place, in the very centre of the
great European nations, and at an equal distance
from the Baltic and the Mediterranean Seas.
Here, then, the sites of two great lines of rail-
ways present themselves to the view, to the north
and to the south, the first passing through Bel-
gium, Holland, and the Hanse Towns, to Ham-
burgh, and Lubeck on the Baltic Sea. The dis-
tance from Calais to Lubeck is about four hun-
dred and eighty miles, and this line would take
in the whole intervening trade of that great com-
mercial quarter of Europe, with the whole trade
90 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
of Belgium, Holland, the Hanse Towns, and even
Russia, Sweden, and the nations upon the Baltic
Sea, would pass upon this road from Lubeck to
all parts of England, Scotland, and Wales, and to
the French harbour, for all quarters of the world.
The entire coasting trade of Europe would be
annihilated, the whole of the iron-bound coasts of
the northern seas avoided, and iron, timber,
and grain of the Baltic nations conveyed in one
quarter of the time and one quarter of the expense.
The toll from the extreme distance at Lubeck at
one penny per ton, per mile, would amount to 64s.
per ton, from the Baltic to the place of export in
France, and the annual losses of merchandise by
shipwreck along the coasts of our own islands
and the whole of the Baltic and the northern seas
would thenceforward be saved by the change.
Here, then alone, and without estimating the
saving in the cost of the conveyance of passengers
and mails, and the general extension of com-
merce and its attendant civilization throughout
the northern nations, is an amount of tonnage
which would repay the construction of a line of
railroad from the Baltic to the English Channel,
and of the land-passage into England, although
fifty millions of money should be expended upon
the work.
But this is only one of the numerous streams of
trade which here would flow into England across
this pass. For Calais is also equi-distant from
OF RAILROADS. 91
the Mediterranean, to which sea at Marseilles is
precisely four hundred and eighty miles, and al-
ready lines of railways have been projected,
from Calais to Paris; and throughout the whole
length of France. This would create a clear
passage for waggons from Marseilles, Paris, and
all quarters of France, to London, Birmingham,
Manchester, and to the eastern and western seas.
The extreme distance from the Mediterranean, at
Marseilles, to London, will then be about five hun-
dred and eighty miles, and at Id. per ton, per mile,
the charge will be less than 3!, for conveying the
fruits, wines, and silks of Turkey, Spain, Italy,
and Greece, our manufactured exports being also
conveyed to all those nations at a corresponding
rate ; and thus a navigation of two thousand miles
being cut off from the Mediterranean to England,
the tonnage will be conveyed in one tenth portion
of the time, and with further improvements in
railroads at one quarter of the cost of navigation,
whilst not another ton of merchandise will be in
future lost upon the sea
Let us then, return to estimate the revenue which
would result from this railroad from England to
France. +.
All the lines of railways to meet and concentrate
at Calais may be estimated from certain calcula-
tions upon the trade and population of the various
countries through which they will pass, at about
nine millions of tons per year, but as several mil-
92 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
lions of this amount will probably consist of ex-
ports and imports from Holland, Belgium, and
France, to the East and West Indies, and various
other quarters of the world; and as this portion
of the trade will not proceed beyond the harbour
of Blacknez, the whole amount of tonnage which
will pass and repass upon the railway from
Dover to Blacknez, may be taken at about five
millions of tons. This does not include the foreign
trade of England to the East and West Indies, and
North and South America, which will not proceed
beyond the harbour of Dover; nor does it include
the supposition that the extension of commerce
and population, through the rising up of those
works, and the accumulation of capital through
the abandonment of war, will probably double
the amount of the trade in the course of a very few
years. Estimating, then, the entire tonnage which
would pass upon the railroad from England to
France at five millions of tons per annum, exclusive
of passengers and mails, the conveyance of these
five millions of tons of goods would require about
one hundred steam boats of a burthen of two hun-
dred tons each; allowing each vessel to load, sail,
discharge its number of waggons, and to return with
another such cargo within the average, in all wea-
thers, of a single day. The cost of building and
upholding these one hundred steam boats, at a
cost of 100l. per diem for each vessel, would amount
to the sum of 3,000,000l. per annum; or should the
OF RAILROADS. 93
system of steam ferry boats be adopted, the ex-
pense would be not very extensively diminished,
and a toll of about 15s. per ton upon five millions
of tons of merchandise would be required for the
expenses of conveyance by steam. On the other
hand, we have seen that the land-passage may be
constructed for a sum of perhaps less than five mil-
lions of money, and therefore a toll of 1s, per ton
upon five millions of tons of goods will provide a
revenue of 250,000l. per annum, or a dividend of
5l. per cent. upon the capital employed in the
formation of the pass; and this, without including
the conveyance of many millions of passengers to
every quarter of the European states. Thus, the
land communication will be 1,500l. per cent.
cheaper than steam navigation, and will be the
most secure, pleasant, rapid, and direct method
of travelling over the sea.
Indeed, the advantages of a bridge upon a great
scale across the sea, are precisely similar to the
greater advantages derived from bridges than by
ferry boats over rivers, excepting that the connexion
of nations is infinitely more profitable than the con-
nexion of towns; and, indeed, the necessity is not
so great of constructing roads, bridges, and canals,
between the cities or districts of England itself,
which from similarity of productions in agricul-
ture and manufactures are not so dependent upon
an interchange of commodities, as two nations,
such as England and France, each excelling in
94 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
the arts, luxuries, and food, unattainable to the other
by reason of the diversities of climate, and different
habits of trade. Though no bridge should exist
between two of the agricultural counties of Eng-
land, the loss would be less where each could pro-
duce corn, than though no bridge should exist to
convey, at a cheap rate, the wine, silk, and other
agricultural luxuries of France, which in England
are forbidden by the climate to be produced, and
yet are required to the comfortable enjoyment of
our lives. Indeed, it is the glory of the present
age that these truths are at length acknowledged
by the world. The disappearance of the ancient
vulgarity of our views towards foreign nations, and
the repentance with which so many hundreds of
millions of money are now seen to have been
employed not in feeding, educating, and refining
our own population, but making one vast slaughter-
house of the neighhouring states, render no longer
doubtful the beneficial consequences of removing
the barrier between these islands and France, and
the conversion of the whole of the European states
into one uninterrupted chain of solid land.
It may be objected to the removal of the
the sea-passage between England and France,
that this will throw out of employment the
many thousands of seamen and vessels employed
in the coasting and general European trade,
which will become the undoubted result ; of trans-
ferring to the railroads the whole of the present
OF RAILROADS. 95
traffic upon the sea. But the seamen now engaged
in conveying the commodites by sea will find em-
ployment in the almost unbounded new channels of
commerce, which this change will have a tendency
to create in our inland and our foreign trade. Be-
sides the fields of employment which the construc-
ting, repairing, and conducting the lines of railways
which are about to come into existence, there is
the rapid extension of manufactures, and conse-
quent great multiplication of exports to those fo-
reign nations to which we must still be compelled
to travel by the sea. The iron, cotton, and earth-
enware exports from Lancashire and Staffordshire
will be so cheapened in production by the cheap-
ness of transit, that ten times the present number
of persons will be employed in England by this
extension of these manufactories. New fields of
labour through the carrying of railways through
districts of iron, copper, coal, lead, clay, and other
elements of manufactures, now inaccessible by
reason of the absence of roads and dearness of
transit, will also furnish employment for future
millions of the people of these islands. Agricul-
ture, also, will be extended by the covering of now
barren situations with lime, soil, and manure,
which will be carried at so small a cost by the
railways; and we have also seen the probability
that the horse will be banished from all employ-
ment in agriculture, and that the gross produce of
96 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
the soil will be doubled by garden cultivation
when all England shall be cultivated by the
spade. The land upon which the timber now
grows for the building of ships, and that which
is occupied for the growth of the flax for cor-
dage, cables, and sails, all will come into cul-
tivation for the food of man; whilst the corn,
the coals, and the cloth, now annually wrecked
upon our coasts, would suffice for the subsistence
of whole millions of men. If, therefore, there
promises to be no deficiency of employment in
manufactures, agriculture, and other profitable
occupations, it would surely be more desirable
that our population should be withdrawn from
the very dangerous, useless, and uncomfortable
occupation of the sea. Navigation is an employ
ment of constant privation, hazard of existence,
and sighing after home, and the sea is an element
which, in the words of the enlightened Colling-
wood, “is not natural to man.” Indeed, if it were
required that a part of the population should be
provided with employment upon the water, it
would be more economical and humane that the
requisite number of bridges over the rivers of the
country should be demolished, that the seamen
be employed in the ferrying of passengers and
merchandise, as a more secure and comfortable
mode of providing them with a subsistence,
without the hazard of their lives in carrying pas-
sengers and goods across the sea. It is only,
OF RAILROADS. 97
however, through our ignoble views, and the mis-
management of governments in the changing cir-
cumstances of the world, which occasions us to talk
about the danger of over-production, over-trading,
and over-population. Were the enterprise and
industry of states not obstructed by the existence
of monopolies, there would be no such grovelling
fears about the possibility of too many people
coming into the world. The time will arrive when
human life will be valued more highly than in this
generation; when time spent upon the sea will be
considered a mere waste of the existence of man,
and when policy will direct to the abandonment,
to the utmost of our power, of an element upon
which capital is annually wasted in millions,
through the sinking of cargoes of money, fuel,
clothing, and food; and, that when goods can be
conveyed by waggons at one-tenth portion of the
expense of navigation, the very building of vessels
will be viewed as a waste of the timber and iron
of the world.
98. THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER X.
Return to the main line of British railroads to Portpatrick in
Scotland—Land communication with Ireland proposed—The
soundings and islands between Portpatrick and Donaghadee
described—Circumstances favourable to the formation of a
causenay—Proposal to employ the army in the construction of
the nork. -
HAVING now traced out an uninterrupted line
of railways from Glasgow to Manchester, Bir-
mingham, London, Dover, and the Baltic and
the Mediterranean Seas, I propose next to com-
plete this great chain by a railway across the Irish
Channel, which shall join Ireland to England, and
thus form one line from the Atlantic to the Irish
Channel and the German Ocean, completing the
connexion of all the European seas.
The mode of constructing this pass, after the
description of the mode of constructing the pas-
sage from Dover to Calais, can be given in a very
few words. 4.
We have seen that the line of railways already
described as passing from Manchester to Carlisle;
and from Carlisle a branch was proposed to be
carried westward to Portpatrick, a distance of
about ninety miles. * -
From Portpatrick to the Irish shore, above
OF RAII, ROADS. 99
Donaghadee, and direct across the cluster of
islands called the Copelands, is a distance of
about fifteen miles; and here it is proposed to
station bodies of convicts, paupers, or regiments
of soldiers, upon both shores, and upon the Cope-
land Islands, for the formation of a causeway of
rough stone, from shore to shore. Though the
distance from land to land is about fifteen miles,
yet the water is so shallow from the Irish shore to
the Copeland Islands, that the labour of filling up
that portion of the sea will be comparatively
slight; and the extreme point towards Scot-
land being about five miles from the Irish shore,
and the average depth not more than about four
fathoms, the difficulty and expense of forming
that portion of the work becomes so small, that
we may almost consider the causeway as being
only ten miles in length, from the Copeland
Islands to the coast of Scotland. The material
contained in the Copeland Islands will more than
suffice to carry the causeway from the Irish shore
to their extreme eastern side, and the remaining
ten miles are to be covered from the opposite
shore. The soundings here are, from the coast of
Scotland, eight, ten, twenty, thirty, and forty-
five fathoms into mid-channel, where the depth
for about one mile descends to ninety-eight, and
thence becomes gradually shallower again towards
the Irish shore, in thirty-five, twenty-five, and
twelve fathoms, to about eight at the eastern ex-
H 2
100 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
tremity of the Copeland Isles, and thirty-five
fathoms being the average depth of these nine
miles. - .
At Portpatrick the mountains overhang the sea
for miles along the coast, and material is thus to
be procured to any extent, whilst tramways may
be laid upon both sides of the causeway, and also
bank into the country, -thus diminishing the dis-
tance of transporting the material to the extremity
of the works as they are carried into the sea.
With this great advantage in the reduction of
the expense of transport, which the iron roads
now create, added to the abundance of material
in a solitary and valueless situation amongst the
mountains of Scotland,- and the probability of
ores, coal, or valuable beds of stone being found
in the excavation of those peculiarly promising
hills, with the value of the sites so gained to be
afterwards converted into cultivated land,-and
the gaining of a railway across the sea without the
expense of purchasing the land for its foundation,
—and the whole work from Ireland to Scotland
thus executed by rough labour alone,—these
present a sum of advantages, without reference to
the political consequences of the formation of
these islands into one body of land. Estimating
its completion at five millions of money, and that
no toll whatever should be levied at the pass,
yet that sum would, in a single year, be repaid
by the saving of the expenses of the navigation
OF RAILROADS. 101
between England, Scotland, and Ireland,-and
the prevention of the loss of millions of property,
which then would be transported in security upon
railways by land, but which is now annually lost
upon the shores of that iron-bound sea.
As the distance is only ten miles from the ex-
tremity of the land at Portpatrick to the Cope-
land Islands, and only about seven miles from the
soundings in eight fathoms up, on either side,
to which a wall could be made with compara-
tively small expense, it is probable that a bridge
of seven miles could be formed. The depth
is too great for the use of coffer-dams ; but,
buttresses could be constructed upon the prin-
ciple of rip-raps, by throwing the loose stones
into the sea, and thus raising up islands equally
durable as rocks, whereupon to rest the works of
the bridge. It is to be observed, that the bridge
might be then carried from the first buttress
without other support than projecting scaffolds
from the extremity of the work, and thus a rail-
way would be formed for the waggons of stone to
be emptied at the spot where the succeeding but-
tresses were required to be formed. It must befully
borne in mind, in these operations, that the tram-
ways to be used, have all the advantages of the
system in the diminution of the cost of transport-
ing the material to the sea. To propose the level-
ling of mountains, and throwing their volumes
into the sea, without a cheaper power than com-
1 O2 THE POLTICAL ECONOMY
mon horses and carts, would be an utterly imprac-
ticable scheme; but, as iron rails will enable one
horse and one driver to carry a load which can
now only be carried by twenty horses and men,
that grand cause of the expense of these under-
takings is thus seen to be diminished to one-
twentieth part of the amount upon the former
scale.
Should the construction of a tunnel be worthy
of consideration there is the obstacle, that the
work must be carried almost six hundred feet
below the level of the sea, in order to avoid the
extreme depth of ninety-eight fathoms, which
exists in mid-channel as before described. But
still the expense of constructing the work would
be the same at whatever depth it might be carried,
with the exception of the expense of the ap-
proaches, which would increase with the depth.
The real distance to be excavated might be re-
duced to about seven miles, from openings at the
extremity of the shallow soundings, to be filled
over at a slight expense from either shore. At
the Copeland Islands, the railway would emerge
and be carried upon the embankment to the Irish
land. The lowering and elevating the waggons
might be effected by a stationary steam-engine at
either extremity of the work.
Should these proposals be upon too large a
scale, at least the shallows from Donaghadee to
the eastern side of the Copeland Islands, and from
OF RAILROADS. 103
Portpatrick to the deep soundings may be covered
as proposed, and the distance between Ireland,
Scotland, and England, thus be reduced to about
seven miles. Then, with steam-ferries of great
power, waggons may be transported from shore
to shore; and the railway-tracks being of uniform
width in all quarters of the kingdom, may proceed
upon their destination, without the expenses of
unloading, reshipment, and delay.
The celebrated Mr. Brindley, for years, had
his eye fixed upon this pass from Portpatrick to
Donaghadee. He proposed to connect the islands
here by a kind of floating canal, but it cannot be
discovered that he has left his project behind him
in a regular or demonstrable shape. It seems,
however, that he perceived no difficulty in con-
structing his work, in a manner which should
defy the resistance of the sea.
Before passing on to the political consequences
of this junction of the kingdoms, it may be well to
point to the economy of employing the troops in
this or similar national designs. Soldiers, from their
physical capabilities, habits of subordination and
uniformity of co-operation, are peculiarly well
fitted for employment in works upon an extended
scale. Officers, also, from the portion of their
education which relates to military engineering,
are well qualified for the superintendence of such
works. For twenty years scarcely a shot has
been fired, whilst daily the prospect of employ-
104. THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
ment in military operations becomes more distant,
by reason of the ascendency of the commercial
principle amongst the nations; and the military
occupation may be said to be almost gone. This
change would render the troops more popular
with their fellow-countrymen, and increased pay,
both to officers and men, could be afforded
through this employment of the army in the pur-
suits of peace amidst the intervals of war.
OF RAILROADS. 105
CHAPTER XI.
Review of the present commercial relations of England and Ire-
land—True causes of the poverty of Ireland and the nealth of
England—Manufactures the principal source of English nealth
and national ponyer—They are founded upon steam-ponyer
—Ireland cannot have steam-poner because destitute of coal
—Agriculture shenyn to be not the great source of national
nealth. •
HAviNG thus seen that the junction of the three
kingdoms is not only practicable, but through
the extraordinary accumulation of money and of
labour, which we possess in this nation, a work
in reality of very easy execution, it will be good
to dwell for a time upon the general relative
condition of England and Ireland, and the man-
ner in which these two nations are rendered so
dissimilar in circumstances, that each is to the
other as a foreign land.
England is a very rich nation, and Ireland is a
very poor one. This comparative wealth upon
one side of the Irish Channel and poverty upon the
other, is not attributed, by economists, in more
than a very small degree, to the causes which are
usually assigned for it—the tyranny of England,
and the ages of misrule to which the Irish politi-
cians are accustomed to say that the emerald isle
106 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
owes all her blemishes and sores. In former
times, when the policy of prohibition of foreign
trade was more customary with the government
of England than in the present day, much tyran-
nical legislation most undoubtedly was practised
against the woollen, linen, and other staple manu-
factured exports of Ireland, in order to their ex-
clusion from the markets of England, and of the
foreign states to which similar English exports
were sent. But this very barbarous policy has
long since been abandoned, and since the period
of the Union, the exports of Ireland not only come
freely and without duty into the harbours of Eng-
land, but, through the corn laws, Ireland has
obtained a direct participation in the monopoly
which the landed interest of England has esta-
blished for itself against the agricultural imports
from the surrounding European states. Nay,
more, the policy of commercial prohibition has
not only been abandoned with regard to Ireland,
but many important commmodities are subject to
a much less excise duty in Ireland than in Eng-
land, and every attempt that financial indulgence
could offer for a reconciliation with the once in-
jured people of Ireland, would certainly appear
to have been made.
And yet Ireland remains poor, deserted, and
unhappy, whilst England grows daily more con-
tented, luxurious, powerful, and rich. Whence,
then, comes this condition of things?
OF RAILROADS. 107
It is because England has manufactures and
Ireland has none; because England has millions
of people working in the foundries and mills of
Birmingham, Manchester, and Leeds, whilst in
all Ireland there is not a single manufacturing
to Wn. -
This state of things has arisen in consequence
of the invention of the steam-engine, a power
which has entirely overthrown the ancient system
of manufacturing by hand, and which has not
only ruined the manufacturers of Ireland, but is
daily ruining the manufactories of Belgium,
France, and all other European nations, and even
has thrown out of employment the silk weavers
of the East Indies, although labour is so low in
that country that the wages of a hand loom weaver
are not much more than 3d. per day. Even in the
Empire of China, this effect of the steam engines
of England will now rapidly be felt, for the
abolition of the monopoly of the East India Com-
pany will occasion the fabrics of England to be
introduced at a price which will throw out of
employment the manufacturers of that country,
and bring on great disasters in an empire already
overflowing with a discontented population. The
insurrectionary movements at Lyons have not
been occasioned by political animosity towards
the ruling power so much as by the low wages,
want of employment, and general overwhelming
distress of the hand-loom silk-weavers of France,
108 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
since the trade has been drawn, by the alteration
of the silk duties of England, towards the mills
and the power-looms of Macclesfield and Leeds.
Therefore the people of Ireland may perceive that
they are not alone in their sufferings, for the
same cause which impoverishes their country
impoverishes neighbouring states still more; and
the whole world is now subjected to English in-
fluence through the ascendancy of English steam.
But whence has England the advantage in this
respect, and why cannot Ireland and other
nations have steam-engines as well ? Because
England alone has the elements of steam-power,
iron ore and coal; for coals are the food of the
steam-engine, and in countries where this fuel
does not exist, the steam-engine cannot be brought
into any extended use. So great are the advan-
tages of England in this respect, that not only
coal and iron ore abound, but exist in the same
veins, and are taken up upon the same spot. Then
coal is so bulky a commodity, so much of it is
required for the consumption of steam-engines,
and the expense of its carriage is so great, that
the manufactures of iron, cotton, wool, silk and all
other articles which are produced by steam-power,
are seen to be concentrated at Birmingham, Man-
chester, and Leeds; all of which great manufac-
turing towns are placed over beds of coal.
The manufactures of Ireland have not only
been abolished by the steam-engines of England,
OF RAILROADS. 109
but the manufactures of England itself have been
withdrawn from their former seats, where, as at
Norwich, coal does not abound, but must be
brought from the northern counties, at an expense
which gives the advantage to the districts of Eng-
land which have coal directly under foot. -
Thus it is that the steam-engine has sur-
passed all manual competition, and England alone.
having iron and coal, a favourable climate, and
easy transit to the sea, in that country alone can
this all-powerful steam-engine be brought into
profitable use. - -
Then, this steam-engine is the maker of almost
every thing that is valuable in the world—the
clothing, blankets, tools, all the ten thousand
commodities which are desirable to the comfort-
able enjoyment of our lives. In every thing ex-
cepting agriculture the steam-engine abbreviates
the labour of man, in a manner so very magnifi-
cent, that every valuable commodity, excepting
food, is made cheaper in England than in any
other nation in the world. The country, then,
which can do this for other nations, is possessed
of very superior advantages for the acquisition of
wealth, since food alone, which is all that other
nations can produce, is not the only thing which
is requisite to man; for warmth must be procured
by clothing, and agriculture cannot be practised
without plough-irons, pickaxes, and spades, nor
armies maintained, without clothing, and swords,
1 10 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
and guns; and as man shall not live by bread
alone, so all nations must have stockings, and
blankets, and gowns, and England clothes the
globe.
It is, then, the possession of her mines of coal,
iron, tin, copper, and lead, but, above all, the
abundance of coal, which confers upon England
all her power and supereminence amongst the
nations of the world, producing, by the excess of
exports and imports, a favourable balance of
trade with all other nations, and drawing to
one misty island, the tributary gold of every
foreign land. From a participation of these
advantages, Ireland is debarred, by the absence
of the useful metals, and the impracticability of
their profitable conveyance by the sea ; and,
therefore, in the absence of manufactures, the
whole population must of necessity be employed
to overflowing upon the land, accumulated num-
bers contending for the soil, amidst all the horrors
of men who are struggling for existence like
shipwrecked seamen upon an over-crowded
wreck. -
And in the absence of war, and the conse-
quent cessation of the former drains of the able-
bodied population, the population of Ireland
must now very rapidly increase ; and if the
source of the evil be not cut off, the destitution,
disaffection, and the present long catalogue of
evils, must very rapidly extend.
OF RAILROADS. - 111
That it is not, however, to the misgovernment
of England alone, that the poverty of Ireland is
to be attributed, is manifested in the condition of
Scotland, a country very considerably less fertile
than Ireland, and which yet, since the establish-
ment of manufactures, has been advancing with
the rapidity of England herself, in wealth, popu-
lation, and abundance; possessed of an extend-
ing trade to all foreign nations, the results of the
foundries and the mills of Carron, Glasgow, Kil-
marnock, and Dundee. Had not the steam-en-
gine been invented, and Scotland been supplied
by nature with iron ore and coal, the people of
that country would now have been equally poor
and discontented, as are those of Galway or of
Clare ; and on the other hand, if the steam-en.
gine could have been introduced into Galway and
into Clare, there would have been no Terries in
Ireland to-day. -
For a long train of evils will be seen to arise
from the absence of the materials of the manu-
factures of modern times. First, there is no mode
of employing the population other than upon the
land, the surplus supplies of labour thence car-
rying down the wages of the peasant to the
lowest point at which existence can be sustained.
Then the income of Ireland is reduced immensely
by the expenses of sending to the markets of
England the corn, cattle, and other agricultural
productions of the country; and by the second
expense of bringing back from England the whole
1 12 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
manufactures which the Irish population consume,
Thus the price of corn in Ireland being at all times
regulated by the demand for it in England, is
reduced by the cost of carrying it to that market
by the sea; for a bushel of wheat which has been
transported to Liverpool, through the many por-
terages, shipments, and landings, which it has to
undergo before its final sale to the dealer in
England, yet then produces only the same price
with a bushel of wheat grown in Lancashire or
Cheshire, and which has been conveyed to Man-
chester, Liverpool, or Preston, at a merely no-
minal expense. By this means the whole ex-
ports of Ireland are lowered in value by about
fifty per cent. in the cost of transportation to the
only market which exists; but were there manu-
facturing towns in Ireland, and did such masses
of population as those of Manchester and Leeds
require to be supplied in that country, then the
corn of Ireland, being sold upon the spot, would
be equal in price to the corn of England, and the
cost of transportation being thenceforth saved,
the corn which is now obliged to be conveyed to
England would be consumed at a double price at
home, and the agricultural income of Ireland be-
come therefore doubled by the change. -
But not only is the corn of Ireland rendered
less productive of money, by reason of the ex-
penses of its transportation, depreciation in quality
in shipment, and the loss of great quantities of it
OF RAILROADS. 113
annually upon the sea; but the whole of the re-
turn cargoes of hardware, woollens, cottons, and
other manufactured commodities, Inust be loaded
with the expenses of transport, insurance, and
other charges of conveyance between England and
Ireland; since in England alone manufactures can
be bought. The consequence of this is, that the
Irishman purchases his spade at a price higher
than the Englishman, though earning only one
half of the wages of the labourer of Kent, and the
English farmer purchases his plough-irons, cart-
wheels, tools, furniture, and clothing, at a lower
cost than the farmer of Ireland, and yet obtains
a double price for the produce of his land. There-
fore in England, all is accumulation; and in Ire-
land, accumulation there is none ; because every
Irishman must have clothing and tools, and yet in
all Ireland there is not manufactured a coat, a
blanket, or a spade.
These, then, are the causes why Ireland is
possessed of so unhappy a population; and here
also is seen the fallacy of that doctrine which our
modern economists have derived from the author
of the “Wealth of Nations,” that the true riches
of a country are contained in its land. Though
England were one vast rock, where not an acre of
corn had ever waved, still those four hundred mil-
lions of men, whose labour is represented by the
achinery of the country, would extort an abun-
dance of corn from all the surrounding states. As
I
114 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
we raise neither tea, nor wine, nor gold in En-
gland, yet is the country overflowing with all these
luxurious imports from foreign nations, and En-
gland is a land of gold. Since the days of the il-
lustrious author of the “Wealth of Nations,” the
steam-engine has been invented, and this has
raised up the immense fabric of our manufactures,
has caused a favourable balance of trade with all
nations, levelled the then commercial supremacy
of the Dutch, and brought into the hands of the
merchants of England the regulation of the ex-
changes of the world.
Ireland, from natural disadvantageous circum-
stances, is therefore drained of her gross agricul-
tural productions for the purchase in England
of the manufactures which are indispensable to
existence; and thus it is, that notwithstanding
the fertility of the soil, the population of Ireland
are virtually a nation of slaves, who reap that
others may enjoy.
OF RAILROADS. - 115
CHAPTER XII.
Remedies for the deficiency of fuel pointed out—Coal of good
quality may probably be found in Ireland—The coals of Scot-
land may be brought across the land pass—The steam-engine
may be superseded, and coals no longer required—English su-
periority in manufactures then mould decline—Probability that
the railway system mill equalize the advantages of all nations.
ALLowING then, that this train of reasoning
be well-founded, and that Ireland is impover-
ished by the absence of manufactures, and that
the absence of manufactures is caused principally
by the absence of coal, where are we to search for
the remedy for this condition of affairs?
The remedies would appear to be these : either
to discover that coals do, contrary to the general
supposition, exist, and of the quality suitable
for the steam-engine; or next, by railways, to
bring in the coals of England or of Scotland at a
cost which will allow them to be profitably used,
or third, the discovery of some machine for the
supercession of steam power. -
With regard to the first, the discovery of coal
in Ireland, it does not appear that there is
much present prospect of so desirable an event.
It is not that no coals have been nominally dis-
I 2
a-d
116 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
covered in that country, for there are many well-
known coal-fields in existence, but all are attended
with some disadvantage for general and profitable
use. The coals of Ballycastle in the north, are of a
quality so inferior, that English coal is in use
within a very few miles from the pits; the coals of
Arigna are almost equally inferior in quality;
whilst the anthracite or stone-coal of Kilkenny,
from its deficiency of flame, can only be partially
used, and from its weight and density of texture
is three times more expensive in excavation than
the bituminous coals of the English fields. There-
fore, coals, being subject to the expense of sea-
carriage from Whitehaven, Swansea, or the Clyde,
are at all times two hundred per cent. dearer in
Ireland than in the average of England, Scotland,
or Wales.
Then that this high price of coals is fatal to all
manufactures by steam power will be proved by
the following calculation of expense. The supply
of fuel for a steam-engine of sixty horse power is
about one hundred bushels for a day of twelve
hours, and this quantity of coal in the manufac-
turing districts of England is of an average value
of 21. 10s., but in the average of Ireland, its value
would be very considerably more than double that
amount; and thence the daily difference of ex-
pense for a moderate sized steam-engine would
be at least ll. 5s. per day, or about 400l. per
annum, for a working year of three hundred and
OF RAILROADS, - 117
ten days. Withoutreckoning the further expense
of importing the very steam-engine itself, and all
the machinery of a manufactory from England,
with other disadvantages, it is clear that a differ-
ence of 400l. per annum, or the interest of a capital
of 8,000l. would be totally fatal to the use of a
steam-engine of sixty horse power, amidst the
grinding competition of modern trade.
And though the absence of steam power is the
principal, it is by no means the only disadvantage
which is experienced from the absence of coals.
For the mines cannot be worked without fuel at
a price which shall correspond with the prices in
England, Scotland, or Wales. Eight tons of coal
are, or up to a recent period, have been, required
for the smelting of one ton of iron; and this greater
expense in the fuel upon the Irish side, would be
more than one half of the value of the iron pro-
duced. Even the copper mines of Kilkenny were
abandoned through the dearness of coals, though
that metal is so much more valuable than iron.
Then no potteries can exist in such a country;
not even bricks can be burnt for exportation; and
the very burning of the limestone for manure adds
greatly to its comparative expense. The whole
domestic fuel of Ireland is also doubly dearer
than the firing of the English population; for turf
is a very dear material when considered with
reference to the labour required for its production
and the rental of the bogs. “The peasantry in
118 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
Wicklow,” observes Mr. Wakefield, “informed me
that 4d. expended in English coals, goes farther
than 1s. 4d. in the purchase of turf.” Therefore the
whole labour bestowed upon the cutting, drying,
carting, and stacking the fuel derived from the
bogs, forms an immense annual waste of the
labour of the Irish population; and the mass of
all the sufferings of that most unfortunate nation
is clearly to be traced to the absence of the cheap
elements of fire.
That this will always continue to be the state
of things, cannot certainly be supposed ; for be-
sides the contiguity of Ireland to Scotland, upon
the western coasts of which country extensive
beds of superior coals have been found, and the
little probability that so abounding a material
should suddenly stop short upon the Irish shore,
it is probable that coal may be found in almost
any country; for geological research has shewn,
that this substance is of an almost universal ex-
istence, the depth and quality of the seams being
the considerations as to profitable mining opera-
tions in coal. Hitherto, certainly, nothing has
been found in Ireland which can compete with
the bituminous fields of England, Scotland, or
Wales; and, therefore, we only can direct the
attention of the people of Ireland to the disadvan-
tages arising from this absence of coal, that the
geologists and capitalists may employ their pow-
ers in search of a mineral, the possession of which
OF RAILROADS. 119
would be the most effectual remedy to be found
for all their national poverty, disorganization, and
distress.
The next method of causing manufactures to
rise up in Ireland, would be to convey the coals
of Scotland across the channel by the railway
which has been proposed over the causeway from
Portpatrick to Donaghadee. Supposing the rail-
way across the channel to be constructed by the
labour of convicts, and not subject to a toll, then
fifteen miles of the distance would be virtually
saved, and the real distance from the coal-fields
of Scotland to the counties which compose the
province of Ulster would be an average of fifty
miles. The cost of conveying coals, at 1d. per ton,
per mile, would be about 4s. 2d. per ton, and the
price at the pit being usually about 3s.6d. per
ton, the whole north of Ireland could be supplied
with that mineral at a price of about 8s. per ton.
This cost of transport might therefore be sustained
and the steam-engine brought into profitable use;
for Ireland is most admirably placed by nature for
an export trade to the western world, and the voy-
age to America from the western coast of Ireland
being one third shorter than from the harbours
of Liverpool or Glasgow, with a clear sea from
the ports, and not subject to the intricate naviga-
tion of the Irish Channel, the saving in the time, in-
terest of money and insurance, which would arise
from shipping manufactured goods from the
120 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
western harbours of Ireland to the United States,
West Indies, and other quarters of the world,
would fully counterbalance a charge of 4s. 2d. per
ton upon the carriage of the coal. Indeed, the ex-
ports of Liverpool; Glasgow, and other English
towns, must then be carried by the railways
to the west of Ireland, an average distance of two
hundred and forty miles, at a cost of 20s. per ton,
or be subjected to one third longer passage to
America, which will probably be more expensive
than the cost of conveying merchandise upon
railways through Ireland to the Atlantic Ocean,
at a charge of 20s. per ton. There is, therefore,
reason to suppose that the western position of
Ireland would become an immense advantage
in future trade, if the channel could be crossed
without the expenses of the present navigation.
Iron ore abounds in the northern and central
districts of Ireland, and the calculation follows,
whether the sister material of coal cannot be con-
joined for the foundation of a manufacturing sys-
tem in the Irish part of these dominions. It is
certain, however, that no very extensive advan-
tage will arise if the channel be not passable by
land, and if the expenses of loading, freight, and
unloading the heavy raw materials of manufac-
tures, be not overcome by the land junction of the
kingdoms which here has been proposed. -
The other method by which Ireland might be
converted into a manufacturing nation, is through
OF RAILROADS. 121
the discovery of some cheaper and yet equally
powerful machine with the steam-engine, as an
air-engine, a hydraulic-machine, or such other
power which should act without fuel, by the
mere compression of water or of air, or by
some other mode of conveying motive power.
Many experiments have been attempted for this
great purpose, but hitherto in vain; though in
the general scientific movement which is going
on around us, it is probable that some power
less complex and expensive than the steam-
engine is yet to come to light. Then the ad-
vantages which England and Scotland have had
over Ireland, and indeed over all other nations,
since the invention of the steam-engine, would be
annihilated when coals, upon which that advantage
has had its principal foundation, shall no longer be
required. An engine which should take its power
from so simple a source as the compression of
water or of air, could be brought into operation in
any nation, or could even some cheaper fuel than
that of coals be discovered, the manufacturing ad-
vantages of England and Scotland would then
be probably at an end. The turf of Ireland,
though a hot substance, is too unsubstantial and
evanescent to be profitably employed in furnaces
upon an extended scale, though what may be
done with mineral tar, and a number of other
substances, is yet to be ascertained.
Thus we perceive that the commercial great-
122 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
ness of England is not altogether founded upon a
rock; for the same science which gave her the
steam engine, and with it the profit upon the la-
bours of hundreds of millions of inanimate men,
may yet confer upon some other nation, or upon
the great community of nations, a power which
may level all the advantages of this land of coal.
That this should occur, and a consequent more
equal distribution of wealth should result from
such a change in the operations of commerce, is
an event apparently much to be desired. For
England, through its overwhelming manufacturing
advantages has acquired too great a share of the
wealth of the modern world. Through a favour-
able balance of trade with all nations, the whole
money of the world has a tendency to flow into
England, to the draining and impoverishment
of the remainder of the less fortunate states.
Though, certainly, this wealth is again distri-
buted by England in the shape of foreign loans,
and foreign enterprises of various kinds—and
though this concentration of wealth upon a single
island has given to its population the knowledge,
liberality, and enterprise which again are diffused
over the surrounding nations, yet have science,
intelligence, and the principle of the reciprocity
of nations, now taken so unconquerable a stand in
the world, and war and retrogradation are in
future so little to be feared; that it now would be
OF RAILROADS. 193
well that the distribution of capital should be more
equal through the world, and that the mountains
of English wealth should be seen to subside.
Ireland, amongst other nations, may then have
a larger share of prosperity, through the not im-
probable decline of the empire of steam. -
124 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER XIII.
Effect of the land communication upon the agriculture of Ireland
—General improvement of that country through the opening of
the English markets—Prices of produce mill be raised, the bogs
reclaimed, and fisheries revived—A land communication myith
Scotland and England mill have other extensive consequences—
Steam navigation shenyn to be insufficient for these purposes—
The union, considered in its importance to England, shemn to be
over-rated—General observations upon Irish politics and trade.
BUT upon the supposition that Ireland shall not
be destined to become a manufacturing nation, let
us then see what would become its condition as
an agricultural country, by the formation of a
railway-pass across the sea.
First, the corn and the cattle of Ireland would
then be carried across the causeway to the manu-
facturing districts of Scotland, in an average dis-
tance of one hundred and fifty miles. Then a ton
of corn, at 1d. per ton, per mile, could be carried
by the same waggon from the centre of Ireland
to the manufacturing city of Glasgow in a single
day, at an expense of 12s. per ton, whereas by the
sea this corn cannot be conveyed from the centre
of Ireland to the sea-port, and then be subjected
to the expenses of warehousing, agency, ship-
ment, freight to the Clyde, unloading there, and
all the costs of delay, insurance, depreciation in
OF RAILROADS. 125
quality by the dampness and want of ventilation
in the ship, under a cost of more than three times
the charge of conveyance by the railway over land,
even at the extreme toll of 1d. per ton, per mile.
Neither can the cattle—the other great staple
production of Ireland—be first driven to the
port of embarkation, then subjected to the ex-
pense of shipment and freight, provender for a
voyage of uncertain duration by sailing vessels, or
of enormous expense by steam, with the insurance
upon that precarious cargo, and the final expense
of disembarkation upon the English shore, under
four times the cost at which the same animals
could be conveyed to the market in England or
Scotland, by the same waggon from the centre of
Ireland to the centre of Lancashire, or even to the
metropolis itself. Then estimating the whole aver-
age weight of the corn, cattle, potatoes, pork, flax,
and all other commodities exported from Ireland
to England and Scotland to be annually five mil-
lions of tons, and a charge of more than 30s. per
ton, being a difference of time upon the freight,
insurance, and interest of money upon all this
amount of exports, the full saving is thus about
seven millions per annum, which would be added
to the annual gains of the agriculturists of Ireland,
through the rise of prices, the result of the dimi-
nution of the cost of carrying these five millions of
tons across the sea. - -
Then, the expense of bringing back to Ireland
196 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
the return cargoes of manufactures, colonial pro-
duce, and every other foreign article of import,
would also be reduced in a corresponding rate.
Allowing the imports of Ireland be only two mil-
lions per annum, and Ireland being almost entirely
supplied with foreign commodities from Liver-
pool, Bristol, and the Clyde, a further saving of
about 30s. per ton would be effected upon the
import trade. Here, then, is a total saving of ten
millions per annum, allowing the rate of rail-
way transit to be la per ton per mile; but as we
have formerly seen that the toll, in the further
development of the powers of the system, will
probably be reduced to one farthing, or perhaps
one sixteenth part of 1d. per ton, per mile, it fol-
lows, that million rises upon million in the
future economy of communication between Ire-
land, Scotland, and England, by the proposed su-
percession of the sea.
Then this accumulation of the capital of Ire-
land, through the increased price of exports, and
decreased price of imports, would cause cultiva-
tion to extend, the bogs to be drained, and the
rich mountain lands to be converted from pasture
into tillage; when the increased price of the pro-
ductions of the soil shall cause them no longer
to lie dormant by reason of their unworthiness of
the cost of reclamation, which is the true reason
why so large a portion of the surface of Ireland
now remains in a state of waste.
of RAILROADs. 127
Then the fisheries of the western coast would
rise into life, when railways should enable their
produce to be carried with rapidity and economy
over Ireland, Scotland, and England; then, also,
many thousands of visitors would annually pass
towards the romantic mountains and fine climate
of the western shores of Ireland: this interming-
ling of the people will cause ancient prejudices,
differences of religion, and even difference of
name, at last to disappear; for England would be
Ireland, and Ireland England ; and where now
eight millions of people are pining in poverty and
discontent, would exist in a single century a ten-
fold number of the most wealthy, enlightened, in-
dustrious, refined, and prosperous population in
the world.
Then all these changes are to be effected by
the simplest means. By carrying a road across
the sea, we invade no land, and obtain the site
without expense; whilst the rough labour required
for the formation of the work could be obtained
by the employment of the troops now standing
idle all the day long, or by the cessation of our
folly in sending our convicts to be lost in the
regions at the other extremity of the earth.
Here it will probably be observed, that steam-
navigation has already done much in facilitating
the economy of communication, and that a land
passage between England and Ireland would not
very extensively accelerate the movement, if rail-
128 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
ways were in waiting upon either shore. But
this is not a well-founded view of the operation
of steam navigation upon modern trade; for the
steam-engine upon the sea, as upon railways in
the form of locomotive drags, is a most expensive
power, and not in use for the conveyance of the
general heavy commodities of trade. The steam
engine when moving upon the sea, is burthened
with its own great weight, and with the weight
of water, fuel, wheels, and other appurtenances
which do not encumber its operations when in a
stationary state. Steam navigation is indeed so ex-
pensive, that neither cattle, corn, nor any other of
the usual agricultural productions of Ireland are
conveyed to England by the steam-packets except-
ing when some rise in the markets or other extra-
ordinary circumstances may have rendered the
saving of time equivalent to the difference of ex-
pense between sailing vessels and navigation by
steam. Steam-boats are, therefore, used almost
for passengers alone, and though the saving of the
time, and diminution of the hazard and fatigue of
the travelling part of the community are consider-
able objects in national economy, yet these advan-
tages are obtained at a greatly increased cost by
the power of steam. That future improvements in
steam navigation will considerably decrease its
expense, is certainly a very probable event, but
in the present state of that mode of transport, the
disadvantages under which the steam engine
OF RAILROADS. - 129
moves, render it, with steam locomotive engines
upon railways, of not any very extensive benefit
for the general purposes of trade. -
But if no remedy can be found for the present
miseries of Ireland, let us next inquire what our
future prospects are, should that nation be allowed
to remain in its present state. - -
Here is a population of eight millions of human
beings, the poverty and sorrow of the great ma-
jority of whom is so very overwhelming, that no
man of ordinary benevolence of mind can look
towards them without pain. If in their present
numbers, there is the utmost difficulty in the sup-
pression of this people by military force, what will
become the condition of such a population when
their numbers shall be doubled, which so soon
must come to pass, through the termination of the
wars which formerly drained them away, the in-
troduction of vaccination, and other scientific dis-
coveries which now tend to the prolongation of
human life 2 The increase of population increases
the numbers of the starving and the consequent
muſubels to be conteuded with by ſorce, and
thence the most extensive convulsions must ensue
from the accumulation of millions of people with-
out bread. The wars which have ceased for the
last twenty years, have left the population at their
natural home; that home, from the absence of
capital, is without the means of extending the
provision for the multitude; even the very minute
IK
130 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
sum for which they can be allowed to trust them-
selves in worn-out vessels to escape to the new
world, can be afforded only by a very small por-
tion of so destitute a people; the gates of an im-
mense field for employment are closed by the corn
laws of England, which forbid our manufactures
to expand, and thus these unfortunate people seek
here for employment in vain, and are forced back
upon the horrors of Ireland again.
What, then, again and again is to be their con-
dition when the population of Ireland shall be
doubled, and the means of subsistence at a stand
or decreased by the internal distractions of a
starving population ? . .
Either we must find the materials of food, or
withdraw our armies and abandon Ireland to its
fate.
Nor will the latter, if the present condition of
affairs shall remain, be any loss to England, but,
perhaps an immeasurable gain. For the union
with Ireland has effected no real benefit to Eng-
land, but has caused a great drain of our re-
sources for the support of the armies required to
keep down a hostile population. Neither has the
union with England been injurious to Ireland,
although the population of that country are so
enthusiastic for its repeal; but on the other hand,
the very armies which have been stationed in
Ireland have been consumers of the provisions
and forage, which are all that an agricultural
nation has to sell. The withdrawal of the manu-
OF RAILROADS. 131
factures of Ireland, we have seen to have been
not owing to the passing of the act of union, but
to the simultaneous invention of the steam engine;
those two events having been confounded in their
consequences, because they occurred about the
same period of time. Were the union repealed,
still Ireland would remain in its present state;
impoverished by the drains of its agricultural pro-
duce for the purchase in England of the manu-
factured commodities without which a population
cannot comfortably exist. To what other country
could the corn and the cattle of Ireland be ex-
ported excepting to England, the only nation
where a surplus of food does not exist? The
wheat of Ireland could not be exported to France,
Belgium, Holland, or any of the Baltic States,
all themselves agricultural nations, and possessing
an accumulation of corn so great that in some of
those countries it is seen in the act of rotting upon
the ground. And not only could Ireland find
no market beyond England for her corn, but in
no country could the return cargoes of clothing,
blankets, pottery, and spades, be purchased at
less than fifty per cent. higher than at Manchester,
Birmingham, and Leeds. But on the other hand,
England could obtain from France, Belgium, or
America, the grain which is now purchased from
Ireland alone; the corresponding increase of manu-
factured exports to those agricultural nations being
then substituted for the loss of the Irish trade.
- K. 2
132 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
Ireland, then, is a loss, a millstone, and a dead
weight to its English partner in politics and
trade; and the dread of a dissolution of the union,
the dismemberment of the empire, and the other
magnificent horrors with which this subject is
usually invested, to the ear of the political eco-
nomist, are mere sound and fury, signifying
nothing. -
The fear that Ireland should join hostile nations
is now also perceived to have little real founda-
tion; so rapid are the changes in the disposition
of mankind, who no longer exist for the pur-
pose of slaughtering one another, England, from
her wealth and naval ascendancy, can forbid
all war in the European quarter of the world;
having, by the mere cessation of commercial in-
tercourse, the power to destroy the revenues and
create insurrectionary movements in the hearts of
foreign states. Moreover, the northern nations
would be directly benefited in trade by sending
the supplies of grain which Ireland had then lost;
and therefore it is seen that the balance of trade
has become the true balance of power; that
swords and staves are no longer the weapons with
which the battles of the world are to be fought ;
and that nations must now conquer one another
by the anvil and the loom ;-for the age of the
sword is gone. .
Ireland has always been virtually a colony of
England, and still is governed by that military
force, which the prejudices of conquered nations
OF RAILROADS. 133
render the only means by which governments can
be forced upon them from abroad. The expense
of such possessions invariably outweighs a thou-
sand-fold the benefits derived from them by the
parent state. The colonies of England are an in-
cumbrance of enormous weight, and only the
country of the steam-engine could have so long
supported those drains of the resources of the
parent state, which all such excrescences create.
The independence of the United States of Ame-
rica, though mourned over at the time as the
death-bell of England, has in reality been one of
the most valuable additions to our wealth and
power; for the Americans have been subjected to
taxation for the government of themselves, whilst
this expenditure has been saved to the people of
England, and the commerce of both nations has
increased through the similarity of language,
habits, and desires, and by the more ready reci-
procity of a people, who now view the people of
England no longer as conquerors from abroad.
If Ireland were rendered independent, similar
consequences would probably ensue; for it cer-
tainly is a maxim, that the worst government at
home is better than the best from abroad; and
were it not that Ireland is sufficiently contiguous
to our shores to be embedded into England, it
would become the undoubted policy of England
to cut the cable of the union, and leave that
island to its fate. At present, however, the con-
junction of the interests of these islands promises
H 34. THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
to become so completed by the rising up of the
new system of roads, that it soon will only be in-
quired whether the expenditure for two govern-
ments is required for two islands, the surfaces
of which are not equal to a tenth portion of many
of the other nations of the earth. -
Here, then, let us retrace and arrange these
views.
England, through the possession of machinery,
has a balance of trade against all nations, and
thence the prices of all other nations must be
below the prices of England, by the difference of
the expense of conveying the commodities across
the sea. Ireland is separated by the sea, and
thence, with other nations, is subject to the loss
of this difference in the expense of carrying over
corn, and returning with English manufactured
goods; to remedy this disadvantage, Ireland must
manufacture at home the goods which she is now
compelled to purchase with her corn; but these
home manufactures cannot exist without coal,
and of coal she is not possessed. This coal cannot
be imported for that purpose, because the cost
of navigation renders it immeasurably dearer than
in England, Scotland, or Wales, though railway
carriage would reduce its expense to a rate at
which this difference might be fully overcome ;
this railway can only be constructed upon a land
communication ; and the construction of such a
work is as nothing to the nation which commands
the whole wealth, science, and labour of the globe.
OF RAILROADS. 135
CHAPTER xiv.
Lines of railroads required through Ireland—Line to the Atlantic
Ocean on the Bay of Donegal—Nen harbour proposed—Lines
jrom the Clyde to Donaghadee and the Bay of Donegal—Line
jrom Dublin to Donaghadee, and thence to Scotland and En-
gland—Project of a railway from Valentia to Dublin con-
sidered—Central position of the Isle of Man pointed out—The
intervening sea shallow, and this a favourable position for a
land pass betnyeen England and Ireland,
THE various lines of railroads that then would
be formed through Ireland, would probably cause
that country to exhibit as busy a scene as any of
the counties of England itself.
A new harbour, would be required upon the
Bay of Donegal, at a point due west from Dona-
ghadee, in a distance of ninety miles, and com-
municating with the Atlantic Ocean through the
Bay of Donegal. From the Atlantic by this rail-
way to Donaghadee, Port Patrick, Carlisle, and,
the German Ocean, at South Shields, would be
a clear distance by railways of two hundred and
forty miles. Across this line it is probable that a
great stream of trade would pass through England,
Scotland, and Ireland; for this pass would cut
off a navigation of two thousand miles round the
English Channel to the northern European states :
136 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
and should the vessels themselves, at a future
time, be conveyed upon marine railways at I d. per
ton per mile, or 20s, per ton from the Atlantic
to the German Ocean, there is no doubt that
the whole of the trade to and from the Baltic
nations, and from the western coasts of England,
and all Scotland and Ireland, would here be con-
veyed across the land. For this pass is in the
centre of the three kingdoms, and the land is at
the narrowest point. -
Railways would then be carried from Glas-
gow, and all the manufacturing districts of Scot-
land, to Portpatrick, and thence the exports and
imports of Scotland, from the West Indies, and
North and South America, would be conveyed,
at 10s. per ton, to and from the new port upon
the Bay of Donegal; thus cutting off one third
of the voyage to America, by a charge of 12s. per
ton, for a distance of one hundred and eighty
miles from the Clyde. This would be productive
of great advantages to the manufacturers and
merchants of Scotland, the trade of which country
would indeed be very considerably extended by
its proximity to the granary which Ireland then
would become. *
From Dublin, a line would be formed to Donag-
hadee, the distance being ninety miles, and one
hundred and eighty miles to Glasgow, two hundred
and forty to Manchester, three hundred and fifty to
Birmingham, and four hundred and eighty to Lon-
OF RAILROADS. 137
don; a direct passage being accomplished from
the capital of Ireland, through all the manu-
facturing districts of England, to the capital of
England itself; the time of conveying passengers
from capital to capital being not more than about
twenty hours, and at a quarter of the present rate
by sea.
The line projected from Valentia to Dublin, is,
perhaps, too enthusiastically urged forward at the
present time. Though the harbour of Valentia is
certainly one third of the voyage nearer to the
continent of America, yet the trade of Ireland
itself to the new world is extremely small; and the
passengers and merchandise from America to
Liverpool, and other parts of England and Scot-
land, could not probably be depended upon, when
again subjected to the expenses of passing
from Dublin to England across a considerable
portion of the same channel which it is proposed
by the railway to avoid. If there be not a direct
passage by the junction of the islands, it is
difficult to perceive that anything of importance
could be gained ; so numerous are the transfers
of passengers from Valentia to the English side.
When a steam vessel could pass with the westerly
wind which usually prevails in about two days
from Cape Clear to Liverpool, it is not to be sup-
posed that this vessel should stand upon a lee
shore, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles
to the harbour of Valentia, without any probable
138 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
saving of time in the passage to an English port.
Moreover, this railway would be a mere road into
England, and would be of no very extensive ser-
vice to the people of Ireland, who are possessed
of so very small a portion of the commerce with
the western world.
Here it may be mentioned, that the Channel,
at the Isle of Man, is not more than forty miles
wide; the soundings being an average of about
twelve fathoms, the utmost depth forty-five, and
the line passing direct across the northern por-
tion of the isle. Though three times the dis-
tance of sea here is to be covered, as from Port-
patrick to Donaghadee, yet the depth is not one
third ; and as there are mountains of material
in the Isle of Man, the construction of a causeway
might proceed simultaneously from four points,
and the difficulty and expense might be not greater
here than from Portpatrick to Donaghadee. This
pass would be more in the centre of Ireland, and
would enter England also at its centre, in Lan-
cashire; and therefore in the event of the more
northern causeway being completed, another
might be formed, across the Isle of Man, at some
future time.
OF RAILROADS. 139
CHAPTER XV.
Proposed railroad from Limerick to the Irish channel—Impor-
tance of this line—A navigation of 1500 miles tomards England
mill be thus cut off—Consequences of this upon the agriculture
and general condition of the population of the centre and
the nest of Ireland—Line to be carried to Dungarvon Bay—
Proposed improvement of that navigation—Further influence of
the harbour and railroad upon the fisheries of the Nymph Bank
—The Shannon superseded by this railroad to the Irish
channel.
THERE is another line of road, of great imme-
diate importance to Ireland, which is dependent
upon no completion of other undertakings, and
which ought not to be postponed. -
This is the long projected line of railroad from
Limerick to the Irish channel at Youhall, Water-
ford, or Cork.
From Limerick, which is the centre of the trade
of the many counties watered by the Shannon, is
not more than a distance of about fifty miles to
the Channel, whereas by the Shannon to the
Atlantic Ocean, and thence round to the same
point, is a distance of about fifteen hundred miles.
Here we perceive the great cause of the distress
of the central and the western counties of Ireland,
and how its remedy may be found in the magic
influence of railway transit to the sea.
140 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
For the whole of the corn of the centre of Ire-
land, of the rich counties of Limerick, Tipperary,
and the surrounding districts, can be sold only at
the port of Limerick, because there alone exists
an open navigation towards England; land car-
riage to Cork, Waterford, or Youhall, being im-
practicable, because more than equivalent to one
half of the value of so cheap and yet heavy a com-
modity as corn. Accordingly this expense of
transporting corn from Limerick to England, which
is the only market to which it can be carried,
must be deducted from the price of the com-
modity; and grain from that cause is at all times
twenty-five per cent. cheaper at Limerick than
at Waterford or Cork, or is only preserved upon
an equality of price by the cessation of tillage
and consequent decrease of the supply. This
state of the markets is very obviously occasioned
by the shipment of corn; first, from Limerick,
which is sixty miles from the Atlantic Ocean,
and thence round the south-western coasts of Ire-
land, with a westerly wind and lee-shore from
Limerick to Cape Clear, and consequently a great
loss of time, damage to the grain by long con-
tinuance at sea, and expenses for insurance in
beating round many hundred miles of that iron-
bound coast. In consequence, then, of this great
cost for freight, damage, and loss of interest of
money for the month which is sometimes spent
in clearing the Atlantic coast, the grain so
OF RAILROADS. 141
shipped from the Shannon can only be sold at Li-
merick at twenty-five per cent. less than the grain
shipped at Waterford or Cork, which can be car-
ried to Liverpool or Bristol in two days with the
fair wind which usually prevails for those ports.
It follows, then, from this low price of corn at the
market of Limerick, tillage is discouraged, and
many hundreds of thousands of acres of the richest
of the soils of Ireland, in the counties of Lime-
rick, Tipperary, and Kilkenny, are devoted to
pasture, because cattle can be driven, although an
inanimate substance such as corn cannot be carried
at a suitable expense to the markets of Youhall,
Waterford, or Cork. This impossibility of profit-
able tillage in the centre and the west of Ireland
by reason of the low price of grain, through the
distance from England, is the real and substantial
source of all the miseries of the Irish population.
For two hundred acres of pasture can be managed
with three labourers, throughout all its depart-
ments, whereas the land sown in wheat, potatoes,
or oats could not be cultivated with less than
treble that number of human hands. Not more
than one labourer in three has a field for employ-
ment, and thence the redundant population, dis-
tress and insurrectionary outrages of the centre
and the west, and by the regurgitation of the un-
employed labourers upon all other parts of Ireland,
the general misery and discontent of the whole
eight millions of the Irish population. For the
142 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
farmer in Tipperary and Limerick not only must
continue his land in pasture, though not one-
quarter of its capabilities is obtained by that
mode, or if it produce corn, must sell that corn at
twenty-five per cent. less than the same would
produce at Waterford on Cork, and fifty per cent.
less than it would produce at Liverpool or Bristol,
but must additionally pay twenty-five per cent.
more for his English manufactured goods, than
the farmer of Cork, and fifty per cent. more than
the farmer of Lancashire pays for his clothing,
blankets, and tools. Then the labourer in Tippe-
rary and Limerick has not employment for more
than one third portion of the year, and out of that
third portion of the wages of a fully employed
labourer in Lancashire or Kent, has to provide his
clothing, tools, salt, fuel and tobacco, at a price
enhanced twenty-five per cent. by the freight, in-
surance, and delay of importing them from Eng-
land to Limerick, a distance of fifteen hundred
miles, and from these plain causes all comfort is
inaccessible to the mass of the people, and the
most fertile districts of Ireland present only one
wide scene of hunger, rags, barbarity, disaffection,
and revenge. -
But were a railway constructed from Limerick
to the Irish Channel, in a distance of fifty miles,
the whole of these disadvantages would at once
be at an end. For a railway might be carried
from Limerick to Dungarvon Bay, at an expense
OF RAILROADS. 143
of 1,000l. per mile, and the distance being fifty
miles, the whole sum would amount to not more
than a capital of 50,000l. and a toll of 1d. per ton,
per mile for horse transport would provide an
abundant return for the capital invested in the
work. If, at 1d. per ton per mile, the wheat, oats,
barley, potatoes, or beets of the district upon the
Shannon could be conveyed in one day from Lime-
rick to Dungarvon, this would be not more than
an expense of 3d. per bushel for conveying one
bushel of oats in perfect condition, and without
the expenses of insurance and delay. But by the
turnpike road the carriage of the same bushel of
oats would be twelve times that sum, or about 3s.
per bushel, an expense at which so cheap a com-
modity could not be profitably conveyed. If, then,
a bushel of oats could be carried at so reduced a
cost by a railway to the Irish Channel, and the
harbour of Dungarvon would be about fifty miles
nearer to England, and might be made more
accessible than either Waterford or Cork, it may
be supposed that these advantages would out-
weigh the slight expense of transit from Limerick
to the sea, and that the prices at Limerick would
settle down to a level with the prices at Water-
ford and Cork. Then, if the difference in the mar-
kets could be equalized by a railway, this would
add twenty-five per cent. to the value of the whole
of the grain brought to market at Limerick, and
would also diminish by about twenty-five per
cent. the value of English commodities, which
144 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
would be brought from Dungarvon at that reduc-
tion of cost. Therefore the scale would be en-
tirely turned by this cutting off a navigation of
fifteen hundred miles from Limerick to the markets
of England and Wales, and consequently tillage
would very rapidly extend in those fertile portions
of Ireland, and with extending tillage, would
arise new fields for the employment of those
crowds of labourers who are starving in the lanes
of Limerick, or dying in the fever houses from
hunger and disease, or ranging the country as
Terry Alts and Whitefeet. This railway presents,
indeed, one of the noblest fields which philan-
thropy and science can possibly explore; for it
will add fifty per cent. to the annual agricultural
revenue of the counties of Ireland where the dis-
tress principally prevails, this will create a ra-
pid accumulation of capital, will find employ-
ment, wages, energy, and content for the now
despairing thousands of the poor; will bring the
Terries from the mountains to the wheat fields
and the barns, and will bring the most distant dis-
tricts of the Shannon into communication with
the markets of England and Wales, and in five
short years this single undertaking will carry its
vivifying influence to the farthest shores of Clare.
The line should be carried from Limerick, not
to Waterford, Youhall, or Cork, but finally to
the channel upon Dungarvon Bay. If two or
three hundred thousand pounds of the public
money were expended in the construction of the
OF RAILROADS. 145
railway, and the enlargenment of the harbour
of Dungarvon, and no return were exacted be-
yond the almost nominal toll that would be re-
quired for the future annual repair and manage-
ment of the works, still this expenditure would
be a warrantable departure from the general rule,
because the changes which it would create in the
centre and the west of Ireland would supersede
the military force, which now is required for the
suppression of everlasting faction and revolt.
Another great benefit to be derived from the
construction of a new harbour upon Dungarvon
Bay, would be found in the improvement of the
fisheries of the channel which a place of refuge
would create. At the present time the Nymph
Bank, which lies opposite to the southern coast
of Ireland, and seems laid down by nature at the
door of the people of the counties upon the chan-
nel, cannot be fished in the winter season by rea-
son of the absence of a harbour in the gales which
arise from the south-west. Neither Youhall, Wa-
terford, or Cork, can be entered at all times, and
from this disadvantage, fish, which is so cheap in
those places in the summer season, is equally
dear in the winter months, although the Nymph
Bank would supply millions of cod, ling, hake,
and other white fish, throughout every season of
the year. The fishermen would then be at all
times employed, and a great market would be
opened for fish to the countries through which the
I.
146 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
line of railroad would pass, causing thereby a most
important addition to the subsistence of the peo-
ple of the southern counties of Ireland in the fish
which now are left and wasted in the sea.
The abandonment of the Shannon, which this
opening, as it were, of a back-door to England
would create, would also be the cause of much
economy of money, which now is required for the
improvement of that in reality most useless stream.
The whole Irish influence in the government has
been exerted in the late Sessions of Parliament,
and committees have been besieged with projects
for the improvement of the navigation of the Shan-
non, though nothing can be done but to throw
more hundreds of thousands of pounds after the
millions which already have been sunk into the
Shannon and those senseless lines of canals which
have been formed through a country without trade.
The fisheries of the west of Ireland are also very
loud in their demands upon the national purse,
although it is apparent that the fisheries, like the
corn fields of Ireland, are in ruins because of their
distance from England, and can only be resusci-
tated when a direct road shall be found to the
only place where fish can be sold. The railway
from Dungarvon to Limerick, by bringing up the
salt of Cheshire at one half of its present price,
would itself cause a greater revival of the salmon
fisheries of the Shannon and the western coast,
than any, however extensive, expenditure of the
OF RAILROADS. . . 147
national wealth. When fresh salmon could be
conveyed to Bristol or Liverpool, in thirty-six
hours, from the Shannon, which are detained by a
navigation of twenty days round the western coast,
it is clear that the fisheries would then rapidly re-
vive, and that the present distance from England
is the true reason why the western fisheries decay.
if Parliament cannot, therefore, cut off this cir-
cuitous navigation of fifteen hundred miles, it can
do nothing effectual by any expenditure whatever
upon the fisheries or the agriculture of the country
watered by the Shannon. The 40,000l. which
has been advanced for the improvement of the
harbour of Limerick will, in all probability, be at-
tended with no benefit to its trade, for no harbour
will be wanted if the railway communication be
carried to the channel, and if such a work be not
undertaken, then 40,000l. expended upon the im-
provement of a harbour will not create a trade, of
which the elements do not exist. Estimating
the waste of time through the drought and the
floods, with the counteraction of the advantage of
the current in one direction by its opposition upon
return, it is considerably to be doubted whether
many of the rivers have not been valued beyond
their deserts, and been, in reality, more expensive
than a common turnpike road. Certainly the
Shannon is not worthy of any further expenditure
of the national money, and notwithstanding the
magnificent praises which have been bestowed
I, 2 .
148 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
upon this river, we soon shall desire only to divert
it from the fertile districts over which it spreads
itself into locks which cover many. thousands of
the finest calcareous soils in the world. Our Irish
friends are, therefore, a century too late in their
proposed further Parliamentary molestation of
the Shannon,
OF RAILROADS. 149
CHAPTER XVI.
The growth of tobacco in Ireland considered—Its prohibition an
error—Might be made a great cause of nealth—The soil, cli-
mate, and cheap labour of Ireland all favourable to the cultiva-
tion of that plant—The prohibition shenyn to have had other un-
favourable consequences upon the progress of the country in
wealth.
THE subject of the waste condition of the centre
of Ireland, through the absence of a market for
grain, leads here to reflections upon a most im-
portant error which has been committed towards
that country, in the prohibition of the growth of
tobacco, by an Act of Parliament which was
passed in the year 1832.
By this measure all planting of tobacco in Great
Britain was prohibited under heavy fines, and
the whole stock of native Irish tobacco was di-
rected to be bought from the cultivators, for the
purpose of being destroyed. This extraordinary
enactment was immediately carried into execu-
tion, and eight hundred thousand pounds of to-
bacco were accordingly purchased from the Irish
growers, and burnt at the Dublin custom-house
in the course of the following year. Whatever
were the causes of this measure, (which passed
without opposition or remark) whether fear for
the revenue, from the greater difficulty of col-
150 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
lecting the duty from the Irish cultivator,
than from the merchant who imports the tobacco
from America, or whether in favour of the
shipping interest the carrying trade in tobacco
was intended to be preserved, or whether the im-
policy of allowing land, which otherwise would
grow food, to be converted into the growth of a
foreign luxury like tobacco, or whatever other of
the ancient mole-eyed motives of the financiers
gave rise to this prohibition of tobacco, at least
it was not required to destroy the crop which
already had been grown. For those eight hun-
dred thousand pounds of tobacco might have
been sold for exportation to Holland, Russia, or
some other of the tobacco buying countries, thus
giving the carrying of the cargoes to the ship-
owners, and brought back 100,000l. in money
to be applied to the purposes of the state, or to
the furtherance of the public works of Ireland, or
even to have purchased a great coat for each of
the peasantry of Ireland would have been better
than to have burnt so valuable a portion of the
products of the earth. By this destruction of the
Irish tobacco, we merely made room for the
tobacco of America in the markets of the Euro-
pean states; and to continue the senseless cha-
racter of the transaction to the last, this tobacco
was burnt at an expense of about 250l., although
it might have been sunk into the sea at an expense
of about 5/.
OF RAILROADS, 151
But this waste of the public money is a trifle
light as air compared to the consequences to the
people of Ireland, from the prohibition of the
growth of one of the most valuable crops, and one
which is peculiarly suited to their air and soil.
For tobacco is a plant which grows in the greatest
luxuriance upon the new soils which abound in
the centre and the west of Ireland, and its culti-
vation in the counties of Tipperary and Limerick,
and upon the inexhaustible soils upon the lower
region of the Shannon, would rapidly have become
a most extensive source of wealth. A crop of
tobacco is more valuable than three crops of
wheat, or five crops of oats, potatoes, or other
agricultural productions, at the prices which usu-
ally are obtained by the Irish cultivators, and
being a plant containing great value in a small
compass, its carriage to the English market, by
the common road to the Irish ports could very
readily have been borne. For if the tobacco of
Kentucky can be conveyed down the streams of
that state to the Ohio river, and thence to the
Mississippi and the port of New Orleans, a dis-
tance of almost two thousand miles, and from
New Orleans can be again shipped round the
circuitous course of the Gulf of Mexico and the
Atlantic Ocean to England, a distance altogether
of eight thousand miles, and at an expense of
about 5/. per ton, with a voyage of about four
months, and a consequent loss of interest of money
152 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
upon so valuable a crop, then it is clear that
the tobacco which could be carried in three
days, and at a cost of 15s. per ton from a farm-
house in Clare to the warehouse of the merchant
in Liverpool, could be sold at a price which, cli-
mate, soil, and expense of labour being equal,
could have given the whole of the supplies of the
English market to the Irish cultivator in preference
to the grower in Virgina or Kentucky. The soils
of Ireland are similar to the best tobacco lands
of the New World, being formed of long accumu-
lations of vegetable matter, and able, in some
portions of the centre of Ireland, to produce more
than twenty crops in succession, with judicious
cultivation. Then labour is fifty per cent. cheaper
in Ireland than in America; for whether the
planter shall hire his slaves at the rate of 20l.
per annum for the time, and about a similar addi-
tional sum for the clothing, food, and superintend-
ance of an able-bodied negro, or whether he be the
owner of his slaves and subject to the loss of in-
terest upon their value, and the additional losses
which all slave-holders sustain from waste, idle-
ness, and theft, it is clear that Is. per day to free
labourers in Ireland is cheaper by fifty per cent.
than the average slave labour of the American
States. The soil and the expense of cultivation
being, therefore, in favour of the Irish grower of
tobacco, the climate alone remains to be consi-
dered. That the plant will ripen regularly in
OF RAILROADS. - - 153
Ireland is proved, first, by the very act of the
suppression of its growth; nor is tobacco a plant
which requires any very extraordinary tempera-
ture for its cultivation. Of all the British islands,
Ireland has, by many degrees, the highest mean
annual heat, being warmer in winter though some-
what cooler in summer than its parallel latitudes
in England or Wales. The mildness of the climate
has long compensated for the deficiency of fuel
and of food to the Irish population, has carried
them through ages of poverty without the slightest
diminution of the stature of the great mass of the
people, and is, indeed, the paramount blessing
which Ireland enjoys. This is owing to its situa-
tion far in the Atlantic Ocean, and its being
sheltered by Scotland from the north-east wind,
that destroyer of the spring and mortal foe to all
vegetable and animated life. The east wind is,
indeed, the curse of the climate of the eastern
portion of these islands, and neither in Scotland,
Wales, nor, indeed, in three quarters of England
itself, is there in reality any such season as the
spring. But the north-east wind is not only
barred out of Ireland by the intervention of Scot-
land, but in its further passage over the Irish chan-
nel it takes up a moisture and warmth with which
the air of that sea is more impregnated than the air
of the German Ocean, and it is the deficiency of
moisture in this wind, as experienced in Scotland
and England, which causes its very highly de-
154 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
leterious influence upon all vegetable and animated
life. Ireland has an earlier summer than any
other portion of these islands, and the mean
annual heat is also very rapidly increasing with
the increasing prevalence and warmth of the
south-west wind through the opening of the forests
of America, which has caused the extraordinary
changes of the seasons which have been witnessed
over all these islands in recent years. This effect
will also continue annually to be increased by the
continued extension of cultivation through the
increasing population of the Canadas, Newfound-
land, and the United States, by the draining of
the bogs, and the embankment of the rivers of
Ireland itself, by the conversion into tillage of
many millions of acres of grazing land, by the
cultivation of the mountains, and by the absorp-
tion of the moisture of the air by the limestone
which is the manure with which Ireland almost
universally abounds. For the lower temperature
of the summer of Ireland is owing to the presence
of the moisture derived from the exhalations of its
many millions of bogs at that season of the year.
In the centre of Ireland there are three millions
of acres of bogs almost in one uninterrupted mass.
The true cause of these bogs being not yet
drained is not the disordered condition of the
country, but the low price of the production of
the soil, which renders the draining of the bogs
and the tillage of the mountains not worthy of
OF RAILROADS. 155
the expense, and thus we perceive the evil
effects of the prohibition of the cultivation of so
valuable a crop as that of tobacco, which the
soil, climate, and cheapness of labour, here would
have allowed to be so profitably grown. Had not
this branch of cultivation been prohibited, the plant
would very rapidly have been seen to be the most
productive crop that the farmer could have
grown, and thus its cultivation would have ex-
tended in a few years over hundreds of thousands
of acres of land in the southern and the western
counties of Ireland. This would have broken up
the fertile soils now devoted to pasture, and thus
employment would have been found for thousands
of the labourers who now are starving in Ireland,
or driving the English labourers to the workhouse
and the hulks. For tobacco is a crop which re-
quires more labour than all others, and is valuable
in proportion to the care which is bestowed upon
its cultivation. In trenching, transplanting, weed-
ing, gathering, drying, packing, carting, and
shipping this crop, great sources of employment
would arise and these all suited to the habits of
the people of Ireland, who excel in cultivation by
the spade. Then the land of the central counties
of Ireland producing three times more valuable
crops than those of grass, potatoes, or grain would
have risen to three times its former value, and
with the increasing value of estates, more capital
would have passed into the hands of the pro-
156 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
prietors for the redemption of encumbrances and
the spread of drainage and tillage to the surround.
ing lands. The best lands being devoted to the
cultivation of tobacco, the inferior soils would
have been continued in pasture or broken up for
the growth of the corn which then would be
raised in price by the consumption of the popu-
lation engaged in the cultivation of tobacco,
and thence tillage would have been pushed up the
mountains and over the bogs to the very rapid
redemption of all the millions of acres which are
now lying in a state of waste. For if the soil,
climate, and expense of cultivation are equal in
Ireland to the same requisites for the cultivation
of the plant in the United States, and 5ſ. per ton,
or twenty-five per cent. should be saved by the
Irish grower in consequence of the contiguity of his
market, it is apparent that Ireland would rapidly
have become the great tobacco field of all the Eu-
ropean states. If, therefore, three hundred thou-
sand hogsheads of tobacco could be annually
exported from Ireland to England, Holland,
Hamburgh, Russia, and the German States, by
removing the prohibition upon the cultivation of
tobacco in Ireland, we should turn the wealth into
the hands of our neighbours in that country which
now, by this erroneous policy we force into the
hands of the people of the United States, to whom,
even upon the the principle of universal benevo-
lence, the growth of tobacco is not a material con-
OF RAILROADS. 157
sideration, since the same land and climate would
grow cotton, Indian corn, or other of the more valu-
able crops. Therefore, it appears that by taking
off this prohibition of the growth of tobacco in Ire-
land, without injuring any other nation, we should
lower the value of that luxury by about twenty-five
per cent. to the people of these islands and of Eu-
rope generally, by the difference of transport from
Ireland as from America, and this by increasing
the consumption would still further extend its cul-
tivation, adding thus to the wealth of Ireland,
and the revenue of England, and spreading em-
ployment and content amongst a now disaffected
population. When it is remembered that the cot-
ton plant which now covers so many millions of
acres of land in the United States, was almost un-
known within a period of about fifty years, it is
not difficult to suppose that five hundred thousand
acres of land, in Ireland, shall be covered with
plantations of tobacco in the next fifty years.
If it be reasoned that land ought not to be de-
voted to the cultivation of a luxurious weed, in a
country which contains millions of Irishmen with-
out a sufficiency of the commonest food, the short-
sightedness of this view of the question will im-
mediately be shewn. For if Ireland, with the pro-
duce of one acre of tobacco can purchase in the
Baltic States the produce of three acres of corn,
it is apparent that three times the food will be in
reality the result of the cultivation of tobacco. If
158 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
the whole of Ireland were covered with tobacco,
and a market existed for its sale, the wealth of the
country would be increased by the entire cessa-
tion of the growth of corn, of which there is abun-
dance in Holland, Germany, and Russia; and Ire-
land cannot be in want of food in exchange for
its tobacco. The southern states of America grow
neither corn, nor animal food, but still purchase
abundance of those supplies from the states of
Massachusetts and New York, which, having a
climate which only will produce corn and the
commoner crops, are compelled to carry their
exports to the three times more wealthy planters
of cotton and tobacco in the southern states. So
Ireland, by the exportation of tobacco, a crop
which the icy springs of the Northern European
nations will not enable them to produce, could be
not only abundantly supplied with food, but would
bring back a very extensive surplus of wealth by
so favourable an exchange.
That tobacco is an exhausting crop, is certainly
very true, but this is the reason of the superior
value of the plant; and as the soils of Ireland are
of such fertility as to be capable of pro-
ducing it, and thus to earn the reward of such
fertility, it is a direct waste of the resources of the
country to force such lands to be confined to the
grazing of bullocks, which could be three times
more profitably employed. If tobacco had been
found too exhausting for a profitable crop, the
OF RAILROADS. 159
self-interest of the grower would have caused
that disadvantage to be discovered without the
interference of the government to direct him in the
management of his farm ; and it is a tyrannical
invasion of all right of property, and a virtual
confiscation of a portion of the soil, to lower its
value, by prohibiting the cultivators of Ireland
from growing what they will upon their own land.
If the protection of the shipping interest, as it is
called, was the object of this prohibition of the
growth of tobacco in Ireland, it is answered that no
tobacco whatever is imported in English bottoms,
and therefore our policy has directly found employ-
ment for the ships of the United States which
carry all the tobacco from America to the Euro-
pean states. Not that this should have any weight
for the removal of the prohibition, for if the Ame-
ricans can convey our supplies at a cheaper rate
than we can carry them ourselves, let us grate-
fully accept their services as carriers, since a profit -
is left us by their ability to travel across the sea
at a cheaper and a swifter rate.
With regard to the employment of our own sea-
men, it is to be borne in mind, that when rail-
ways become generally introduced, the fisheries
will become of ten-fold extent, by the rapid and
cheap carriage of fish, to the inland districts of
the kingdom, thus creating new fields of employ-
ment for the maritime population of the country.
If the seamen perforce are to be employed, it
160 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
would certainly be more profitable for Parliament
to vote a million or two yearly for the purpose of
sending the merchant vessels to travel about the
sea with cargoes of ballast stones, than that Ireland
should be debarred from adding ten times this
number of millions annually to its capital, in order
that tobacco may be needlessly conveyed from a
distance of five thousand miles. -
It being probable that thoughts for the revenue
were the principal inducement to this most unfor-
tunate prohibition, let us, then, examine it in a
financial point of view.
First, there would have been no more diffi-
culty in collecting the duty upon tobacco than the
duty upon hops; or a composition for the duty in
money might have been made with the farmer
according to the known degree of the fertility of
his land. -
Then the illicit distillation of whiskey would
have ceased through the rise in the value of grain
occasioned by the increased consumption of the
population then engaged in the cultivation of to-
bacco. At the present time the low price of corn,
by reason of the distance from the market of
England, occasions quantities of grain to be con-
sumed in the private distillation of whiskey, the
system being universally encouraged by land-
holders, farmers, and all other classes of the
community as the only mode of making a market
for their grain. But when corn should be raised
OF RAILROADS. 161
to a double price, and preserved by means of cheap
conveyance upon railways, and the supplies re-
quired for the cultivators of tobacco, always upon
a level with the prices in England, the whole
system of illicit distillation would be naturally
abolished by the rise in the value of grain. In
England no whiskey is distilled from the cheaper
species of grain, because it can be sold for a remu-
nerating price, nor in Ireland would grain be con-
verted into spirits which then could be profitably
sold for solid food. The increase of the morality
and tranquillity in the country, and the conse-
quent tendency to the diminution of expenditure
for troops, police, and the machinery of justice,
through the cessation of the supplies of brutalizing
whiskey, are all to be considered in relation to
their effect upon the revenue of the country; for
the consumption of tobacco would have been in-
creased by its cheapness, its sedative influence
being also substituted for the exciting influence of
spirits upon a population which derives from the
nature of the climate of Ireland so great an excess
of Italian vehemence and fire. If it was said by
Henry the Fourth of France, that he should die
with satisfaction when he had seen a fowl in the
pot of every peasant in his dominions, let our
legislators now follow the sentiment of that illus-
trious prince, and be assured that soldiers will no
longer be required when employment and wages
shall be found for the population of Ireland, and
M
162 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
when each of the Terries shall be governed by the
milder influence of a cheap, conciliatory pipe.
A statesman is described by the author of “The
Wealth of Nations,” as a cunning and mischievous
animal which is ever on the search for prey; and
those whose ravenousness for revenue could cause
the burning of eight hundred thousand pounds of
the tobacco of Ireland, would seem certainly to
possess the true characteristics of the beasts of
the field.
This unfortunate policy is here dwelt upon
more largely, because the commencement of the
growth of tobacco was an evident effort of the
stamina of Ireland to raise that country from
prostration, and to acquire a superior standing
amongst the nations of the world.
For other improvements would rapidly have fol-
lowed this first introduction of the wedge. The
wealth which the cultivation of tobacco would
have caused to be accumulated, in a few years
would have led to the improvement of agriculture
in various modes. The cultivation of other valu-
able crops would have followed the introduction
of one valuable plant; as Indian corn, the cow-
cabbage, the richest of grasses, the beet-root, and
even the cotton plant, would flourish in the mild
climate of the western coasts; the mulberry-tree,
the live-oak, and the pitch-pine, could be cultivated
in any quarter of Ireland when the climate shall
become less moist through the draining of the
OF RAILROADS, 163
bogs, which would become the result of the in-
creased value of land, by the cultivation of valua-
ble crops. Through the steadiness of the climate,
and the warm and nourishing quality of the air of
Ireland, the finest of animals will also be produced,
when the accumulation of capital, and power of
improvement, shall have commenced the remo-
val of the present stagnation of the agriculture of
the country. The race-horse, the finest of the
English breeds of cattle, sheep, and other animal
productions, all would far surpass in Ireland, the
same breeds in the more changeable climate of the
eastern portions of these islands. That the low
temperature of the summers of Ireland is caused
by the presence of the undrained lands, is seen in
the difference in the quality of the grain now pro-
duced in the western and the eastern districts,
towards which the exhalations are carried by the
prevailing south-west wind. For the oats of Gal-
way, and other counties upon the Atlantic coast,
are the most valuable of all that species of grain
which is brought to the markets of England;
affording a clear proof that it is not the moisture
from the sea which lowers the temperature of the
summer, and decreases the ripening quality of the
air. The improvements in the climate and agri-
culture of Ireland would appear in reality to know
no bounds, for the thermometer here takes so
small an annual range, that the draining of the
waste lands will cause the climate of Ireland to
M 2
164 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
be little inferior to that of the Azores, islands so
celebrated for their salubrity, through the steady
temperature of the air. At Terceira it is known
that the thermometer never rises above seventy
degrees in the summer, and never falls below
fifty degrees in winter; nor ever varies more
than two degrees in twenty-four hours at any
season of the year. And though this is not an
extraordinary mean annual heat, yet all vege-
table life exists in the most luxuriant profusion
in those islands where no violent changes of tem-
perature occur to suspend its development; the
human frame attaining also its utmost perfection
of shape, and utmost period of longevity, in an
atmosphere where the blood is never interrupted
in its course. The climate of Ireland is already
little inferior to that of the Azores in its temper-
ature, and with the extension of tillage it is pro-
bable that frost and snow would become altoge-
ther unknown upon the northern and the western
coasts. This advantage England, Scotland, and
Wales, cannot be expected to possess for a long
series of time until the levelling of the forests of
Norway, Russia, and the Baltic States, shall let
in the sun upon the thousands of millions of acres
of forests now lying in a state of shade. The dry-
ness and insalubrity of the north-east wind is de-
rived from its passing over those northern wastes,
where neither warmth, nor the due proportion of
moisture which is derived from evaporation, can
OF RAILROADS. 165
exist, whilst the sun is excluded from depositing
its influence in the earth. Ireland, from its west-
ern position, and consequent freedom from the
shocks which are given to vegetation by the in-
fluence of the north-east wind is destined to be-
come the garden of these islands, and Goldsmith
has described the climate of his native country
without much poetic exaggeration in the cele-
brated lines:–
“Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid,
And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed.”
166 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER XVII.
Influence of railways upon the Irish mines—A railroad proposed
from Kilkenny to the Irish Channel—The Kilkenny coal field
reached by this line—The coal described—Its advantages for
steam navigation—Probability of an eatensive eaſport trade in
coal—This fuel favourable for the smelting of ores—When con-
veyed upon railways mill cause the re-opening of the Irish mines
—The hot blast and its effects in the manufacture of iron—
Anthracite may be cheapened in its eacavation—Ireland may
non, become possessed of extensive manufactures of iron.
THE new system of roads may next be consi-
dered with reference to its influence upon the
revival of the Irish mines. -
With this view a line of railway should be
carried from Kilkenny to Waterford, and at a fu-
ture time to the proposed new harbour upon
Dungarvon Bay.
This railroad would not only open out the
cheapest mode of transmission for the agricul-
tural produce of Kilkenny and the neighbouring
counties, to the markets of England and Wales,
but will cause new operations in the coal,
which abounds over all that portion of Ireland.
This coal is of the kind called anthracite ; it is an
almost pure carbonaceous substance, is devoid of
hydrogen, lies near to the surface, and is invari-
OF RAILROADS. 167
ably found upon the primitive rocks. The great
solidity and hardness of the texture of this mineral
renders its excavation a work of three times greater
expense than the mining of the bituminous coal of
England and Wales; to which cause, with its defi-
ciency of hydrogen, and therefore of flame, and con-
sequent injurious effect upon the boilers of steam-
engines, is to be attributed its having not become
so important an article of trade which coal in
the centre of Ireland might be supposed to create.
The superabundance of carbonic acid gas, a fluid
most prejudicial to the human lungs, has also
rendered it not very desirable for purposes of do-
mestic use, and therefore the coal fields of Kil-
kenny and the surrounding counties have been
little worked for other purposes than malting, iron
foundries, and other operations for which flame
is not required.
The introduction of railroads now renders it,
however, an object of importance to examine
whether there be not prospects of employing this
coal in a very extensive branch of trade, as fuel
for the purposes of steam navigation.
Owing to the greater specific gravity of anthra-
cite coal, there would be a saving of more than one
half of the room now required for fuel in the shape
of the English bituminous coal. In the passage
from England to the United States, the fuel for a
steam ship of one hundred and twenty horse power,
for sixteen days, would amount to more than three
168. THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
hundred and twenty tons of bituminous coal ;
whereas less than one hundred and fifty tons of
anthracite would create an equal amount of fire;
and it therefore follows that one hundred and fifty
tons of space would be saved for the carrying of
merchandise; and that if the anthracite of Kil-
kenny could be conveyed to Dungarvon, and there
sold at 1/. 5s. per ton, it would still be immeasur-
ably cheaper for fuel in steam-navigation, even
with the expense occasioned by its greater oxyd-
ation of the iron of the boiler, than any English
coal. This fuel being thus so much more de-
sirable for the purposes of steam navigation than
any other which is known, and no extensive beds
of it existing in England, Scotland, or Wales, it
is probable that steam vessels departing across the
ocean would call for their fuel at Dungarvon,
Cork, Youhall, or other harbours contiguous to
this great field of coal. As the harbour which is
proposed to be formed at Dungarvon Bay would
be the most accessible, and secure, it is probable
that the coal trade of Ireland would centre at that
port.
Allowing, then, that fuel for a voyage to New
York could be provided at Il. 5s. per ton, and that
one-half of the space now required for the coal
were saved for the stowage of merchandise, at 3/.
or even 4!. per ton, which the more rapid passage
and saving of interest of money upon the voyage
would cause to be afforded for the freight; it is
OF RAILROADS. 169
apparent that the bringing into use of the coal
of Kilkenny would become the source of an
extensive trade in that description of fuel, and
would also overcome the only remaining obstacle
to the navigation of the ocean by steam.
For steam navigation to the United States there
is the double advantage in the abundance of an-
thracite in that country for the supply of fuel upon
the voyage home. The great anthracite field of
Pennsylvania is at a place called Carbondale, upon
the Shulkyll river, where more than forty thou-
sand tons of this mineral have in some years been
raised for the supply of Philadelphia, New York,
Boston, and other American cities, and even par-
tially for exportation to France, Germany, and
Holland. This material is of a better quality than
that of the Irish field,” for it contains of hydrogen
from two to five per cent., and is found in much
deeper veins. Estimating its price to be the
same as at an Irish port, we have then the fuel of
steam shipping for the whole of the voyage, out-
ward and homeward, from the ports of America
to Great Britain, contained in one half the pre-
sent space. What effect this may have upon
giving impetus to that most desirable mode of
shortening the voyage between the continents of
* According to the experiments of my friend, Dr. Samuel L.
Medcalf, of New York. -
170 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
Europe and America, is a matter most worthy of
examination, not more for the benefit of Ireland,
through the extensive supplies of coal that
would be required, than for its commercial and
political influence both upon the old and the new
world.
Not only, indeed, would supplies of anthracite
be at hand for sale to steam shipping which
should call at the Irish ports upon the outward
voyage, but a great export trade would also be
created to France, Hamburg, Holland, and others
of the European states. The enormous blocks in
which this coal can be procured, with the ad-
vantage in its greater specific gravity, renders it
capable of being freighted at a considerably
cheaper rate than any bituminous coal. For
English coals are so light a cargo that the expense
of exporting Kilkenny coal would be at least one
third less for a similar distance than that of any
of the English, Welsh, or Scotch bituminous coals.
Again, the cheap conveyance of this coal upon
railways will have a most extensive effect in
causing the re-opening of the mines of iron ore,
copper and lead, with which Ireland is so abun-
dantly stored. Its deficiency of flame is not an
injurious quality in the smelting of ores; and the
cheap carriage of those substances, and of lime
which also abounds and is indispensable in the
manufacture of iron, will now enable the Irish
O E RAILROADS. . 171
mines to be most profitably re-worked. They have
all been gradually abandoned through the de-
struction of the woods and absence of a substitute
in coal; for even the copper mines of Killar-
ney could only be worked by coals imported for
the steam power from Swansea at a cost of 21.
per ton, and thence the decline and abandonment
of those valuable mines. But now the economy of
fuel in manufactures is rapidly becoming better un-
derstood; as the hot-blast, which has been intro-
duced within the last four years into the iron
manufactories of Scotland, has had the extraor-
dinary effect of reducing the quantity of fuel to
one quarter of the former amount required—two
tons and a half of coal, or a corresponding
quantity of coke, being at this time sufficient for
the smelting of one ton of iron, though for the same
process about eight tons of the same quality of
fuel was formerly required.
By introducing this system of smelting into
Ireland, the expense of the anthracite required in .
the manufacture of iron would be reduced to one
quarter of the present cost, and only one quarter
of the weight being required to be carried to the
iron mines, and lime generally abounding in the
vicinity of the ores, this conjunction of new cir-
cumstances, with the cheap transit of the manu-
factured iron upon the railways for exportation,
may lead to a most extensive resumption of the
operations at the Irish mines. The quantity of
172 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
coal required in smelting being now reduced to
one quarter of its former weight, that ingredient
in the manufacture of iron will become less over-
whelming in its importance, and be outweighed
by the cheapness of the ores and the lime. An-
thracite coal, though not equal to the charcoal
from wood in imparting malleability to the metal,
is much superior to it in the manufacture of cast
iron, and being much cheaper in expense than the
coke which is used in England and Wales, there
remains no reason why Ireland, under the new
system of roads, should not take to itself a very
extensive portion of the iron manufactures of the
world
Perhaps, also, the expense of raising this coal
may become extensively diminished ; for it usually
lies so near to the surface, that the whole super-
incumbent strata might be removed at a small
expense by tramways; the soil becoming an article
of sale in the new order of things in agriculture,
through the introduction of iron roads. The stra-
tum of coal could be then worked as a quarry, and
the blocks sawn into the best shapes for stow-
age, for the purposes of steam navigation. Under
this system the expense of the excavation of an-
thracite may become even less than that occa-
sioned by the raising of bituminous coal, in con-
sequence of the extraordinary depth of many
of the best English mines.
Thus will the new system of transport produce
OF RAILROADS. 173
openings upon all hands for Irish labour, enter-
prise, and skill. The soil, the sea, the mines,
all will be brought into subjection to the capital
which will then accumulate with compound rapi-
dity in each succeeding year.
174 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
CHAPTER XVIII.
English railways as connected nith the Irish trade—Line from
Bristol to London–Nen harbour upon the Bristol Channel
proposed—Railway from Birmingham to Bristol proposed—
Great importance of such a line—The port of Liverpool as con-
nected nith the Irish trade—Injustice of the high dock dues—
Proposal for deepening the Menai Strait—The English manu-
Jacturing districts interested in the cheap supplies of Irish grain
—The general interests of the two countries the same.
OTHER views for the facilitating of the inter-
course between Ireland and England present
themselves next, in conjunction with the railroads
and harbours upon the English side.
First, the whole trade of the south of Ireland
has a tendency, from geographical position, to
centre at the port of Bristol, and the merchandise
to be conveyed to London by land upon the rail-
ways to be formed. But upon the scale upon which
the Great Western railway has commenced its
operations, this object of conveying to the metro-
politan market the corn, cattle, and potatoes of
Ireland is not even proposed to be accomplished.
For this railroad professes to depend for its revenue
upon passengers alone; and it is apparent that a
line, which has commenced its operations with
preliminary mill-stones of so enormous a weight
OF RAILROADS. 175
about its neck, never can convey the cheap agri-
cultural productions of Ireland, at that farthing
per ton mile which is required as the true rate of
toll. To convey Irish passengers at a rapid and
agreeable rate from Bristol to London, is certainly
an advantage to those who visit us for purposes of
pleasure; but the amount of gain to the commer-
cial part of the travellers upon such a railroad
would not be very extensive, if the cargoes, which
they are supposed to come to England to sell, are
not carried upon the railway simultaneously with
themselves, but in the act of being beaten round
to the Thames, and therefore detained sometimes
a month upon the sea. Consequently some road
must be found which shall be enabled to act at
the minimum of expense, and the turnpike road
from the metropolis to Bristol will naturally be
made the foundation of the line.
There is, however, no reason why this line
should be carried to the city of Bristol itself,
otherwise than by a branch. That port is dear—
difficult and tedious of access—and a new har-
bour upon the Bristol Channel, due west from the
metropolis, may become most requisite to be
formed.
To this new port upon the Bristol Channel a
number of other great lines would be brought.
From Birmingham to such a new place of ship-
ment would be a distance of about ninety miles.
Here, upon a railway, the whole exports of Bir-
176 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
mingham to the south of Ireland, and indeed
to the United States, West Indies, South Ame-
rica, and all other countries to the west, would be
conveyed in one day, and at a cost of not more
than 7s.6d. per ton, even at the rate of 1d, per
ton, per mile. At the present time we have seen
that the very cost of canal transport, from Bir-
mingham to London alone, is never less than 2/.
15s. per ton, exclusive of all the succeeding ex-
penses of the Thames. Thence the export trade of
that great manufacturing town and district will di-
vide itself into two wide streams, one from Dover
to the European states, and the other to the western
nations at the Bristol Channel. The potteries of
Staffordshire, and the iron manufactures of Wales,
with the woollen manufactures of the west of En-
gland, all at this port will find their outlet to the
western world. Then the imports of grain, cattle,
and potatoes from the south of Ireland, with all the
colonial imports of those great seats of our staple
manufactures, will be conveyed at a similarly low
rate upon the line. Thence this new railroad and
harbour will become of the greatest possible im-
portance both for the Irish and the English trade.
The people of Ireland are also interested in the
most economical entrance to the Liverpool Docks.
One-half of the revenue from these docks is
derived from the Irish trade, whether through
the direct dues upon the importations of Irish
corn, cattle, and other productions, or indirectly
OF RAILROADS. 177
through the importations of colonial produce with
which Ireland is again so extensively supplied from
that port, and all of which must be raised in price
to the Irish consumer by the amount of dock dues
which the importer may have paid. Upon the le-
gislative principles of corporations, which bodies
are supposed to be endowed with their privileges
for the protection of trade, the dues at all har-
bours and docks should be maintained at the
minimum required for their construction, ma-
nagement, and repair. The appropriation of the
revenue derived from the Liverpool Docks to the
purposes of the police, churches, and other civic
expenses of the town, is most unjust towards the
Irish traders who thus support, in a very exten-
sive degree, the establishments of an English town.
Either, therefore, the dock dues of Liverpool
should be reduced to the lowest practicable rate,
or the revenues be appropriated to the exclusive
improvement of the harbour, or to the improvement
of the harbours of Ireland itself, or other public
purposes in which both countries have a recipro-
city of advantage in the expenditure of those great
annual sums. The true principle, however, would
seem to point to the abolition of all corporate
rights, and the sale of the docks to private indivi-
duals, or private companies, and the consequent
introduction of the cheapest management, and
greatest reduction of toll, which the competition
of numerous proprietors of individual docks would
N
178 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY.
create. The utmost benefit would by this change
be conferred upon the commerce of both England
and Ireland, and the surplus revenue would re-
main, where the French statesman so justly de-
clared that it ought to remain, in the pockets of
the people. In the new order of things at Liver-
pool, it is indeed supposed that the present pos-
sessors of municipal power will search for the just
principles of commerce, and have no wish to be
filled up to vomiting with undue Irish wealth.
For the beneficial employment of such revenues
for the present, it may be worthy to point to the
improvement of the navigation of the Menai Strait.
Could the navigation of this strait be effectually
opened, then a direct line of passage up the channel
would exist, not only from the south of Ireland,
but from all quarters of the western world. This
would cut off a circuit of about one hundred miles
round the entire island of Anglesea, which is
a very dangerous lee shore. Not only would
the rate of insurance be reduced, but the ex-
pense of a navigation of one hundred miles,
from the harbours of the south of Ireland, and
a corresponding diminution of the cost of con-
veying merchandise and passengers across the
channel would be saved by passing through the
strait. Were one or two millions of money ex-
pended upon the deepening this channel to about
six fathoms of water, a very minute toll would
repay this outlay, so great would be the number of
vessels which then would pass through the strait.
OF RAILROADS. 179
The interests and rights of the people of Ire-
land and of England are one, individual, and the
same. The manufacturers of Manchester are
interested in obtaining the cheap entrance of Irish
grain, cattle, and potatoes, into the harbour of
Liverpool, because thence results cheap markets
for food, cheap wages to workmen, and therefore
a more extended foreign trade. The Irish corn
grower can also purchase an extended quantity
of English goods, when freed from an undue
intermediate mulcting of his prices by the corpo-
rate proprietors of docks, and when the expendi-
ture of revenue shall be directed to the cutting off
the difficulty, danger, and time, of his arriving
with his cargo at an English port. Neither could
that quarter of England obtain its requisite sup-
plies of provisions so cheaply from abroad, an
advantage which must certainly be pointed out
and allowed in casting up the balance of national
statistics with our Irish friends.
N 2
18O THE POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER XIX.
Some of the present political questions of Ireland discussed—
Church reform—Poor rates—Public education—Public norks
—The fisheries—Draining of the bogs—Tawes upon absentees
—All these exaggerated in their importance—Ireland is pos-
sessed of abundant resources nithout assistance from the state.
To establish fully these views and to prove that
the grievances usually complained of by the
people of Ireland, have not so paramount an
influence upon their condition as is usually sup-
posed, and may be all overcome by the means of
acquiring wealth, which the advances of science
are so rapidly opening out, it is purposed to COn-
clude this review of the affairs of that country with
some remarks upon the principal questions of the
day,+reform of the church—poor rates—educa-
tion—public works—draining of the bogs—public
fisheries—taxes upon absentees, and other proposi-
tions of the Irish politicians, engineers, and people
at large.
First, with regard to the property of the church.
All the maxims of the political writers, point to the
expediency of following the religious prejudices of
the people of conquered states; for this sentiment
occasions whole ages of opposition to the invading
power, and never can be removed by military
OF RAILROADS. 181
force. The attempts to maintain a foreign church
in so populous a country as Ireland are attended
with an expense for police, troops, legal proceed-
ings, and the cessation from labour which the
combinations against the system create, probably
greater than though the clergy were triply paid
out from the general revenues of the state.
But still, it is not probable that the transfer of
the property of the church would have any sub-
stantial influence upon the prosperity of Ireland,
beyond the beneficial results which would result
from the assuagement of the national mind. The
productions of the soil now owned by the church
would remain the same, and the same aggregate
amount of employment would exist for the mass
of the people. Alterations in the tenures of church
property are certainly required, for considerable
impediments to the improvement of the agricul-
ture of Ireland are produced by those ancient
modes, but to those changes it is probable that
the factions would not object.
With regard to poor laws for Ireland, that also
is of very questionable utility indeed. We have
seen that the great source of the poverty of the
people is occasioned by the absence of tillage,
through the low prices of agricultural produce by
reason of the expense of its transmission to the
English side. It therefore would be a cruelty to
compel the owners of the property of Ireland to sup-
port the poor whom their own disadvantageous cir-
182 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY.
cumstances will not enable them to employ ; and
compulsory support of the poor would soon make
property valueless in the average of Ireland, and
by impeding improvement would magnify the evil
it was intended to prevent. An Irish landlord
does not obtain more than one half of the rental of
his land, though the contrary is usually supposed,
which is obtained by the landowner in England
for property of a similar quality and value in point
of situation. Estimating the larger quantity of
land contained in the Irish acre, and the smaller
amount of money in which Irish rent usually is
paid, it will certainly be found that, notwithstand-
ing the pressure of the population upon the soil,
the average rental of land is not more than one
half of the rent paid for lands of similar fertility
in England, or even in Scotland or Wales. Whole
counties of land in the west of Ireland do not
average a rental of 10s. per acre, and yet those
are the spots where, by reason of the absence of
tillage, the distressed population is seen princi-
pally to abound, and thus the evil is greatest
where the means for its prevention are unfortu-
nately the least. To give compulsory relief to the
whole of the unemployed population of Ireland, is
to allow more than one half of their numbers to
consume the produce of the labour of the re-
mainder which in the whole of the western counties
would cause the entire abandonment of the soil.
And passing to the farthest argument in favour
OF RAILROADS. 183
of the system of poor laws, that each man has
a right to a subsistence in the locality of his
birtli, and though all properly should be at an
end, yet that human beings are not to be found
dead upon the roads whilst there is anything
remaining to be seized upon by force, yet even the
allowance of this right would be found to add
more to the accumulations of misery that already
are too great. For, if property were abandoned
to the surrounding population, the paupers would
be devoid of all means of cultivating the soil; since
it is perfectly well known that the absence of
accumulation, and the consequent pressure of the
instantaneous hunger of the cotter, forces him
upon the average of the small holdings to dig his
potatoes unripe, and one third portion of the crops
of the western counties is estimated to be thus
annually lost. Therefore, the absence of capital,
and inability to wait for the crop, would gradually
cause even the holding which had been abandoned
to the peasant, to be by him in turn abandoned
to the weeds. All this routine has occurred
in the agricultural parishes of England, and it
would occur with much greater rapidity in Ireland,
where the unemployed multitudes are so much
more great. It is, moreover, to be doubted, that
the claims of the distressed are really just against
the individual possessors of property, in the neigh-
bourhood of whose estates they may have hap-
pened to have been born, for this is throwing the
whole burthen upon individuals, who are not
184, THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
more interested than others in the preservation of
the peace of society, for which poor laws are sup-
posed to be passed. If poor laws be required, a
general rate would equalize the burthen, whilst
parochial systems operate only where the distress
is the greater, by the greater distress of the em-
ployers of labour themselves; and this leads to an
exception of the rich, and a seizure of the pro-
perty of the nearer and the poorer possessor of the
soil. It is certain, moreover, that no poor rates
will be required in Ireland, after governments have
become more enlightened to the truth that they
themselves, by placing shackles upon the labour
of the people, are the grand originators of all our
distress. Thus the abolition of the corn laws of
England, by allowing the manufactures to expand,
would drain away a large portion of the unem-
ployed Irish population, and probably the manu-
factories of England would regularly absorb them
all. It is, therefore, more in accordance with the
principle of benevolence, that Ireland should not
adopt the system of compulsory relief, but wait
rather for the progress of commercial liberty, and
the consequent opening out of the English fields
of employment for the Irish poor. The Irish are
laborious, vigorous, humble, grateful, and enthu-
siastic in fidelity where confidence is reposed ;
and it is employment that such a population is in
search of, and not mere charitable bread.
Education, again, in the famishing of great
OF RAILROADS. 185.
multitudes of the people, is not a correct
mode of applying the surplus of the revenues
of the church. Education, no more than shoes
or potatoes, ought to be conferred upon the peo-
ple by the state. Like poor laws, general sys-
tems of education tend to teach people to depend
for that upon others which employment and good
wages would much better enable them to procure
for themselves. General systems of charity are
entirely the result of erroneous or tyrannical legis-
lation; for were there real liberty in the world,
the fields of production are so boundless, that the
poor would be limited to the aged and the sick,
the means of whose support would be so super-
abundant, that no compulsory rate would be re-
quired. Would governments but stand out of the
way of the industry of the people, remove the fet-
ters upon our commerce, and allow a really free
trade in corn, money, and all other commodities—
then poverty, and with it, workhouses, gaols,
hulks, and scaffolds, all soon would disappear,
and be heard of no more.
The proposed tax upon absentees would also
be impolitic and unjust. To fine individuals for
residing where they will, is contrary to the com-
mon right of locomotion which every subject
should possess; whether for the pursuits of com-
merce, or of that pleasure of travel, which he has
previously toiled to enjoy. Through such a re-
striction as this the possessors of the soil would
186 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
become a poorer and, therefore, less efficacious
race of cultivators, for no purchaser who could
obtain landed property in England, or in Belgium,
or France, would purchase it in Ireland, when
subject to a fine or to be made a prisoner upon it.
Moreover, the evils of absenteeism have been
greatly exaggerated, for the non-resident landlord
would have only consumed in Ireland the provi-
sions for his family, corn for his coach-horses, and
other supplies to which rent is devoted, which he
consumes equally in England, after the transmis-
sion of these supplies from Ireland, by the corn
merchant, who purchased them from the tenant,
and paid for them in the money which that tenant
then transmitted to the landlord at London, Chel-
tenham, or Bath. Unless it be proved that the
landlord upon his Irish estate pays more for his
corn than the corn merchant in the neighbouring
town, it is not material to the payer of rent to
which of these parties the grain shall be sold.
Then the rent of the landlord would have been
only partially consumed in Ireland, though he
were resident upon his estate, for a considerable
portion of the amount would still be compulsorily
sent over to England, either directly or indirectly,
for the purchase of clothing for his family, liveries
for his servants, and the many other manufactured
commodities in which money must be spent. The
mere supplies of provisions consumed by the
whole of the non-resident landlords, would pro-
OF RAILROADS. - 187
bably not much increase the prices of grain, for it
is the absence of the millions and not of the few,
the absence of the steam engine and not of the
landlords, which causes the low prices of Irish
corn. Even if this landlord should reside in Italy,
Belgium, or France, yet there he would consume
the agricultural productions which have been
raised by labourers who wear English clothing and
use English tools, and the English makers of those
clothing and tools have consumed the Irish grain,
in which the rent of this landlord was originally
paid. With regard to the effect of absenteeism
upon the improvement of the country, it may also
be doubted whether landlords, whose patriotism
is not now sufficient to draw from the pleasures of
London or Rome, would be more disposed to cul-
tivate estates, or to be of any other utility to their
country at home. Nor is it sufficiently borne in
mind that great numbers of English and foreign
visiters annually travel into Ireland ; these in-
creasing in numbers and the consequent expendi-
ture of money, through the increasing facilities of
steam navigation—or that the Irish labourers also
take back a great aggregate amount of the money
of England saved from their wages in harvest
time. Altogether, the evils of absenteeism have
been much exaggerated, for the poverty of Ire-
land arising from other causes, has fixed the
attention of the people upon a subject which
in England, a country which parts annually with
188 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
twenty times more capital through an aristocracy
absent abroad, never is a subject of the slightest
consideration amongst those who are accustomed
to investigate the sources of the national wealth.
Public works are called for by the Irish engi-
neers; although the history of the previous public
works in canals, harbours, and fishing stations, is
one uninterrupted history of corruption, unpa-
ralleled in the history of any civilized land. From
the time when Mr. Arthur Young could not con-
ceal his indignation at the state of the public
works, to the period when 70,000l. has been lent
to a railroad which never has carried one ton of
potatoes upon its line, all has been one vast inroad
upon plain commercial law. And yet more mil-
lions are now loudly demanded for the draining
of bogs, making of roads, and erection of fishing
stations upon the western coast. But all this
new expenditure would follow into the tomb of
the millions that have gone before ; since it is
useless to drain bogs at a cost three times greater
than the value of land ready drained in Bel-
gium, or France, and from which the agricul-
tural supplies could therefore be obtained at a
cheaper rate. But when the prices of produce,
shall be raised in Ireland to a rate at which land
may be obtained from the bogs will repay the ex.
penses of its reclamation, then the self interest
of individual proprietors will cause that expendi-
ture to be made without the assistance of the
THE POLITICAL ECONOMY 189
state. Nor is it required to grant money for the
formation of roads until there is the semblance of a
trade, for trade will usually make roads, but roads
will not always make a trade. And when the fish
taken upon the western coast can be sold at an
increased price through the speed and economy of
railway transport to the markets of Ireland and
England, or when the surplus of fish can be cured
with salt brought from Cheshire, at 12s. per ton,
instead of 21. 2s. per ton at the present time, or
with salt manufactured from sea-water with Kil-
kenny coal, to be carried at a small toll upon the
railways, then the declining fisheries will be invi-
gorated without the aid of the useless crutches
which are now sought to be borrowed from the
state. Open really the fields of wealth, and in-
dividual capitalists will build fishing piers, and
effect the draining of bogs more effectually than
those operations can be accomplished by public
boards, of which the component members feast
sumptuously every day. There is no want of indi-
vidual capitalists in Ireland where there is a really
profitable investment to be found, and when such
openings shall be seen, then the English capital
which travels for investment to the farthest corner
of the world, would prefer the nearest field of oc-
cupation, and be carried into Ireland upon the
wings of the wind.
The people of Ireland should, therefore, call no
longer upon the heavens and the earth for pity
190 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
upon the sorrows which they declare have been
occasioned only by our English misrule. For
there is no error in legislation which does not fall
upon England in an equal share of injurious con-
sequences, and yet English science has overcome
all the follies of a government, which certainly
does exist for little else than to mar the indus-
trious efforts of the great mass of the people. But,
better prospects are now arising upon both nations;
principles are now becoming better understood,
and this will lead to the removal of many mono-
polies, and of much erroneous undoubtedly, but
not intentionally tyrannical, law. Labour will not
now remain much longer in its chains, and the
people of Ireland would be more benefited by the
cessation of their feelings of political alienation
from England, whose better days they may now
have an opportunity to share by following her for-
tunes to the end.
OF RAILROADS. 19]
CHAPTER XX.
The railway system in the men world—Railnays from Halifax
to Boston, and round the nhole circuit of the sea board of the
United States—Line from Quebec to the Bay of Fundy—The
St. Lanrence superseded—Railway across the peninsula of
Florida—Importance of this nork—Line from Baltimore to
the Ohio river.
FROM Ireland the transition is not unnatural to the
busy cities and roads of the New World.
Here, the influence of railroads will probably
be greater than in any of the European States.
Already we have seen that England is the great
mart for all the agricultural nations; that the corn,
cotton, rice and provisions of America, like the
corn and the cattle of Ireland, will be raised in
price by the facility of reaching these islands by
the nearest and the cheapest route ; and that this
transit may be quickened by the introduction of
steam navigation through the use of Irish anthra-
cite coal, and of American anthracite upon the
voyage home. And as the building of steam
engines and steam ships is very obviously in its
infancy, and steam ships will be driven at double
their present rate of speed, before many years
have elapsed, we may reasonably now foresee
that the Atlantic will be regularly crossed in a
192 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
week. The effect of such a change upon the com-
merce, politics, and pleasures of the people of both
hemispheres, it is needless to attempt to describe.
Here, I will boldly point to the circumstance,
that the depth of the Atlantic Ocean, between
the western coast of Ireland and the coast of
Newfoundland, does not carry an average depth
of more than about thirty-five fathoms, the dis-
tance being twelve hundred miles. In this age,
nothing can be presumed to be founded upon
such a circumstance in the natural history of the
sea, but in anticipation of the wonders of futurity,
the shallowness of the ocean between these islands
and the continent of America may be worthy of
being pointed out.
Arriving, then, at Halifax in Nova Scotia, we
see the site of a railway to St. John’s in the pro-
vince of New Brunswick, and thence southward
to Boston, New York, and around the whole circuit
of the United States. So rapid has been the
introduction of railroads in those states, that thir-
teen seventeenths of the whole circuit of their
coasts, from New Orleans to Boston, are now
covered, or in the act of being covered with
iron roads. And as Europe is the great market
for the productions of those states, and Halifax
stands one thousand miles nearer to England than
does even the central city of New York, it is ap-
parent that a continuation of the railroad line from
New York, through Boston and Halifax, would
. OF RAILROADS. • *, 193
command the whole stream of passengers, mer-
chandise, and mails, to and from the whole of the
American and the European states. 4
But the principal railroad for the Canadian
provinces is the line projected from Quebec, to
the harbour of St. Andrews, upon the Bay of
Fundy. This line will cut off a navigation of
twelve hundred miles down the river St. Lawrence,
and convey the whole commerce of the upper
regions of that river to the Atlantic in a distance
of one hundred and ninety-five miles, to a harbour
which is open at all seasons of the year. For the
St. Lawrence river affords not only a very cir-
cuitous and dangerous navigation, but, for many
months in the year, is closed by the ice: the whole
foreign commerce of the Canadas being at a stand
for those long periods of time. The proposed new
road would pass through now almost untrodden
forests, and through the heart of the government
lands, the increased value of which would repay
companies who should undertake to construct this
work for a grant of lands of some given extent
upon the line. By commencing with a single
track, and laying down the framework of timber,
which may be obtained upon the line for the mere
expense of cutting it down, this railroad may be
constructed at an expense of less than 1000l. per
mile, and the whole cost of the undertaking would
undoubtedly be repaid in a single year, when the
O
194, THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
whole trade of the St. Lawrence should be carried
upon it to the sea.
The construction of these works will effect the
most extraordinary change in the Canadian pro-
vinces, which then will be peopled, cleared,
warmed, and enriched, with a rapidity which will
bring them to a level of advantages in climate
and agricultural productions with the countries in
their parallel latitudes in the southern depart-
ments of France.
The population and clearing of the Canadas
are objects of the greatest importance, not certainly
to England, as colonial possessions, for it is im-
material under what government those provinces
may ultimately be ranged ; but through the im-
provements in the climate, which may be effected
in the Canadas, and thence in the United States,
and indirectly in England, Ireland, and all the
European states. For it is the clearing of the
forests of Canada which has produced those extra-
ordinary changes in the seasons, which cause us in
Great Britain to fancy that our island has been trans-
ported to some southern sea. The levelling of the
forests of the continent of America has mitigated
the severity of the north-west wind, which blows
over the continent of America with the intensity
of temperature and deficiency of moisture, which
in Europe we experience from the winds which
come to us from the Russian regions of the north-
east. It is this mitigation of the severity of the
OF RAII, ROADS. 195
prevailing wind which has diminished the quan-
tity of snow which formerly barricated the inha.
bitants of Canada in their dwellings for months
of the year; which has caused snow in the once
wintry state of Virginia to become almost un-
known; is causing the St. Lawrence river to close
annually later in the autumn, and to open earlier
in the spring ; and communicates its influence to
all these islands, and the whole of the countries
which lie open to the warm Atlantic winds. The
continued extension of the clearing and draining
of the Canadian wastes, will increase these in-
fluences in a compound degree, through the in-
crease of emigration, occasioned by steam naviga-
tion and of railway transit through the colonics;
and thus, in another quarter of a century, the
changes in the climate of Canada will be still
more extraordinary than those which have been
witnessed during recent years.
It is for these reasons that the whole force of
our surplus capital and labour should be poured
into the Canadas, as the foreign land most con-
tiguous to our shores, and presenting the richest
field for the acquisition of future wealth. The
labour of convicts should be directed to these
provinces in preference to New South Wales; for
never, in the history of statistics, was folly so
monstrous to be seen, as our sending away con-
victs, at a cost of 100l. per head, over a distance of
twelve thousand miles, and to a country in which
O 2
196 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
their labours can render no benefit to the present
state—whereas one twentieth part of that expense
would cover the cost of their conveyance to the
Canadas, where the operations of clearing, drain-
ing, and the construction of roads, would produce
an immediate and profitable return. If punishment
and isolation be the object of transportation, that
purpose could be more easily attained upon the
wintry islands of New Brunswick and Newfound-
land, than in the temperate and delightful glimate
of New South Wales, to which so many thousands
of our people are seen to emigrate from their own
free will. Were the labour of convicts employed
only in filling up the countless shallow bays, lakes,
and rivers, of the Canadas and Newfoundland, and
thus diminishing the surface of the inland waters
of those provinces; this employment of their labour
would repay its expense in the amelioration of
the climate, and the consequent improvement of
the agricultural productions of the country, and
the general influence of happiness which a genial
climate always will create. For it is not suffici-
ently observed, that the improvement of the
climate of a country adds greatly to its wealth
through the improved quality and increased quan-
tity of the productions of the soil. -
The mitigation of the severity of the north-west
wind, is a most desirable object, not only to the
people of the Canadian provinces, but equally
to the inhabitants of the whole United States.
OF RAILROADS. 197
The violent changes of temperature now expe-
rienced in all those states to the north of the
Chesapeake, have their origin in the uncleared
millions of acres of forest land and in the existence
of the cold surfaces of the inland lakes, and the
consequent low temperature of the north-west
wind. The New England states are subject to
the ravages of consumption, arising in the climate
of the country from this great defect alone; for
the bills of mortality of the city of Philadelphia
bear witness that almost one half of its popula-
tion are carried off by that terrible disease. The
thermometer in the city of Albany has been ob-
served to stand at seventy degrees at mid-day in the
month of January, and yet with a change in the
wind to the north-west, within a period of less than
nine hours, has fallen to the freezing point. Such a
country, therefore, is not fit to be inhabited by man;
and it becomes immaterial to what power the Ca-
nadas shall ultimately belong, whilst the winters
of the United States are being brought, by the
labours of the people, to a temperature of the
warm European latitudes, in the parallels of
which these provinces are placed. The reciprocal
interests of nations are here very plainly seen,
for one nation partakes of the victory gained over
winter by another; and therefore disputes about
boundary lines are reduced into insignificance,
when the axe of the emigrant, in clearing the Ca-
nadian woods, is warming the wings of the
98 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
wind, and levelling the common foe of the new
world.
The facilities of railroad transport, and of steam-
navigation will, therefore, effect the most extra-
ordinary changes in the Canadas, which, from
their position, one thousand miles nearer to
Europe than the United States, will become the
most valuable portion of the new world, should the
climate become so changed as to cause the cultiva-
tion of cotton, tobacco, Indian corn, and the other
more valuable crops of the countries to the south.
We proceed, then, from Halifax, round the
coast of Nova Scotia, in one uninterrupted line of
railroads, across the St. Lawrence river, to Bos-
ton, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Wash-
ington, Richmond, Charleston, Savannah, and
across the Peninsula of Florida to the Mississippi
river at New Orleans; a line which encircles the
whole coast of the United States, connects all its
divisions, from the Mexican Gulf to the frontiers
of Canada, and is carried over a distance of two
thousand miles. Visionary as such a chain of
railroads might have appeared within a period of
a very few years, it is yet certain that the greater
portion of this wide circuit is already under the
progress of rapid execution, and that the whole
will be completed within the next ten years.
Then the traveller shall pass at the rate of five
hundred miles per day, from the snows of Maine
to the warm wintry sun of the southern states.
OF RAILROADS. 199
But greater advantages will arise from the
formation of the railways which now are reaching
their giant arms over hundreds of miles towards
the rivers and regions of the west. The railroad
from Baltimore to the Ohio river at Wheeling,
when completed, will turn the whole trade of that
great river from its present southern course towards
the Gulf of Mexico, to the Atlantic states, a change,
the advantages of which will at once be seen. For
the course of the western rivers is towards the
market of New Orleans, a voyage which occupies
a period of a month, through the dangerous na-
vigation of the Mississippi river, for a distance of
two thousand miles, and thence by the circuit
of the whole Gulf of Mexico to Europe and the
Northern States. Therefore, a line of railroad
from the Ohio river to the Atlantic Ocean, will
cut off a navigation of five thousand miles towards
Europe, the Canadas, and the N orthern States;
and though this line were carried even for a dis-
tance of five hundred miles through the states of
Kentucky and Tennessee, yet the cotton, tobacco,
and Indian corn of those fertile states could be car-
ried at one half of the price, and in one twentieth
part of the time, and without any of the hazard,
of the navigation of the Mississippi and the Gulf
of Mexico, that most dangerous of seas.
In this diversion of the trade of the Western
States from the Mississippi to the Atlantic Ocean,
great political advantages will also arise. At pre-
200 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
sent the people of the West are separated from
the Eastern and Northern States by the difference
of the channels through which they communicate
with the sea. -
The rivers of the west flow towards the Mexican
Gulf, and thence the population of the rich states
beyond the Alleghany mountains frequent markets
unconnected with the other divisions of the union,
and therefore, little commercial intercourse or com-
munity of interest is found to exist. But when the
imports and exports of the western states shall be
conveyed through the eastern states at a quarter
of the cost, and in one twentieth portion of the
time now required for the passage round the
Mexican Gulf, a connexion between these divi-
sions of the union will be established and con-
firmed, and the rapidity of intercourse with the
more civilized portions of the nation will carry
the influence of intelligence across the now Tartar-
ous regions of the west.
OF RAILROADS. 2O1
CHAPTER XXI.
Other political consequences of railways in the United States
—Their effect in concentrating the population—Commerce
directed from the nestern rivers by railways to the Atlantic
Ocean—Thence the prevention of emigration to the men, States,
and spread of agriculture in the Nen, England States—The
climate of the Nen, England States considered—Its eatreme va-
riableness and lon, temperature in winter—Proposal for the
embankment of the Lakes. -
THIs conjunction of the states, and concentra-
tion of the people, is amongst the greatest advan-
tages which the United States will derive from the
introduction of the system of iron roads. The more
fertile of the lands and the most salubrious climate
are found beyond the Alleghany mountains,
the population is, therefore, hurrying in masses to
the west; the principle of concentration is aban-
doned, and in the interminable choice of lands all
stray like Arabs to the fertile spots—are dispersed
—divided—lost. This dispersion of the people
is the greatest disadvantage of those wide states,
for no improvements take place when men com-
bine not into masses, and when the subdivision of
labour cannot be obtained. Were England not an
island where the land is all in occupation, and
could all become independent proprietors at their
202 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
will, then the steam-engine and all the vast power
of machinery could never, probably, have been
brought into action amongst a people who then
could not have been gathered into the mines, the
foundries, and the mills. It is the principle of
concentration that gives solid power to states.
When the railroads shall gather the population
into masses, and divert the trade from the distant
channels into which it now flows, then this ex-
change will redouble the value of the simultaneous
exertions of the people, and by the concentration
of their capital and labour, these states will exhibit
to the world the spectacle of a prosperous popu-
lation, and of a well cemented government and
solid power.
Amongst the most remarkable of the railroads
already completed in the United States is the line
from Charleston to Hamburgh, upon the Sa-
vannah river, a distance of one hundred and
ninety-five miles. This work has been executed
with great ingenuity, and comparatively at a very
inconsiderable cost. It consists of a single track,
with a turnout at a distance of each quarter of a
mile, and is carried over the swampy country by
means of charred piles, which give it the ap-
pearance of a bridge. The land through which
this railroad is carried was given gratuitously by
the proprietors for a distance of about ninety miles,
and the whole cost of the work has not exceeded
the sum of 5,260 dollars, or about 1,300l. per mile.
OF RAILROADS. 2O3
A very low rate of toll is, accordingly, sufficient
upon the cotton and other productions which are
its staple articles of conveyance, and foreign im-
ports now reach the upland districts at an ex-
tensive diminution in expense. Locomotive
steam engines are used, although it is evidently an
error to place a machine weighing upon an ave-
rage ten tons, upon a framework resting only
upon piles, and therefore not calculated for the
bearing of any extraordinary weight. The horse,
weighing not a tenth part of a locomotive engine,
the use of animal power would be an advanta-
geous change, upon that portion of the line which
passes through the swamps. The work is alto-
gether a most valuable one, and well calculated
to enrich the southern states.
A line of railroad, from New Orleans to the
Atlantic Ocean across the Isthmus of Florida,
would produce most extensive results. This dis-
tance is one hundred and ninety-five miles, and
the railroad would cut off the navigation of the
Gulf of Mexico for a distance of more than two
thousand miles. This route has been surveyed
for a canal, by the engineers of the government of
the United States, and it is certainly one of those
necks of land over which a canal, if practicable,
would be superior to a railroad, by reason of
the directness of the passage, without the ex-
pense of unloading, land carriage, and reloading,
with the consequent loss of time and interest of
204, THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
money upon these changes. But being found to
afford only an average depth of about four feet
of water at all seasons of the year, and this being
insufficient for the passage of sea vessels of even
the smallest burthen, it may be well that the
people of the United States should turn their at-
tention to the construction of a railroad across
this most important pass. For not only the trade
of the Mississippi and Alabama rivers, and of the
states of East and West Florida, now rising into
great importance through the fertility of the land
and advantages of climate, but also the whole
commerce of Mexico would be brought across
this peninsula, for the saving of two thousand
miles of the most dangerous navigation in the
world. For the gulf stream, though favourable
to vessels bound from the westward, is so dan-
gerous a track of navigation, through the extraor-
dinary prevalence of lightning upon its course,
with the darkness of the weather; and the diffi-
culty of measuring the speed with which vessels
of different degrees of burthen, and with different
winds, are carried imperceptibly towards the reefs
which abound along the Gulfs of Mexico and
Florida ; that, to avoid above two thousand miles
of so dangerous a navigation, is an object most
desirable to be gained by all the rich countries
and islands beyond the peninsula of Florida.
The commerce of the Floridas, Louisiana,
Mexico, and the northern islands of the West
OF RAILROADS. - 205
Indies, all would be brought across this penin-
sula, and therefore an expenditure of many mil-
lions of dollars would be very amply repaid by the
construction of a railroad across so important
a pass.
The railroad to be formed from Lake Erie to
New York and Boston, will also produce exten-
sive results. For experience having shewn that
railways, with ſoundations of wood, may be con-
structed for one thousand dollars per mile, it
will no longer be required to preserve the canal
navigation to the city of New York; and the canal
may therefore be closed, and its level be converted
into the site of a railroad to Boston—towards
which harbour the course is direct. The advan-
tage of the bringing the country of the lakes
into the cheapest and nearest connexion with
the Atlantic seaboard, will lead to a great exten-
sion of the agriculture of those cold regions, and
the consequent improvement of the climate of
the whole New England States. For we have
seen already that the north-west wind is poured
down upon those states with a severity which
forms almost an arctic winter in countries lying
in the parallels of the finest latitudes of the Medi-
terranean Sea. This wind, upon its passage to
the New England States, travels over those im-
mense inland seas — the Lakes Erie, Huron,
Michigan, and Superior—the shallows of which
present annually to the atmosphere, surfaces of
206 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
many hundreds of miles of ice. Hence the elimate
of the Canadas is increasing in temperature in a
much more rapid comparative degree than that
of the New England States, to which the north-
west wind passes afterwards across those inland
seas; and whilst the climate of Canada, from its
steadiness, is salubrious in the greatest degree,
that of the New England States is very prejudicial
to life as was formerly described. Therefore the
attention of the people of the United States might
be most profitably directed to the embankment of
the lakes within much narrower bounds. The
deepening these waters, by covering over the
shallower portions contiguous to the shore, would
have all the effect which is required; for deep
lakes, like the ocean, by giving out their caloric,
render the temperature of the air more warm;
whereas shallow waters are more rapidly ex-
hausted of their temperature, and being converted
into ice, continue to lower the temperature of the
air which passes over their surfaces during the
whole of the winter months. It is not the greater
fertility of the land of the western states which so
much invites the population which is poured out
of the New England States, for that advantage is
counterbalanced by the lower price of the agri-
cultural productions of countries so remote, but
the greater salubrity of the steady climates of the
states beyond the Alleghany Mountains, which
are not subject to be lowered by the changes of
OF RAILROADS. . . 207
the wind from the ocean to the land The improve-
ment of the climate of the eastern states is there-
fore a most important object in the estimation of
those who are aware how much a regular tempe-
rature of the air is concerned in the improvement
of agriculture, and in the health, comfort and
longevity of man. The Lakes, Erie, Superior,
Huron and Champlain, all lie far above the level
of the Atlantic Ocean; all have shallows of im-
mense extent, and generally abound with islands,
ſrom which might simultaneously be carried on
the operation of covering those portions of the
surface with solid land. This narrowing of the
waters of the lakes would also communicate
rapidity to the waters of the River St. Lawrence,
and this would further diminish the intensity of
the cold of the winters of the New England
States.
It must not be omitted to remark upon the
error of that great line of railroad which is pro-
jected and about to be hurried forward from
Nashville, in Tennessee, to New Orleans. The
object of this line is to cut off the navigation of the
Mississippi river, and to form a direct communi-
cation with the Gulf of Mexico at all seasons of the
year. But, upon the view alluded to before,
that the western states should direct their rail-
ways to the Atlantic Ocean, as the nearest route
to the European and the northern states, it is
clear, that to form a railroad six hundred miles
208 - THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
long, from Tennessee to a port at which the ex-
ports of that state would be two thousand miles
further from the market, is the utmost of folly,
when a line, of three hundred miles, may be car-
ried to the eastward, in connexion with the rail-
roads from the western waters to Baltimore,
Charleston, or New York. The Mississippi and
the Gulf of Mexico must be utterly abandoned,
and the western states direct their roads to the
eastern quarter of the Union.
OF RAILROADS. 209
CHAPTER XXII.
Pass across the Isthmus of Suez considered—A canal the best
mode of effecting the communication between the Red and Me-
diterranean seas—An iron canal proposed—A marine railway
—Calculations of revenue from the nork—Steam navigation to
the East Indies favoured by circumstances—Railroad from
Bombay to Calcutta— From Calcutta to Canton—Great results
to be eaſpected from this nork.
WE now turn from the Western to the Eastern
world, and first to the great pass across the Isth-
mus of Suez, from the Red to the Mediterranean
Seas.
This project has long occupied the attention of
the European states; and as the present govern-
ment of Egypt is favourable to its execution, and
the navigation of the Red Sea has been found to
be practicable by steam, it now only remains that
capital and science should be found for the for-
mation of the work.
A canal would be here the most advanta-
geous manner of passing from sea to sea, for
the purpose of avoiding the expenses of unload-
ing, re-shipment, and delay ; but as the heat
of the climate, and the shifting nature of the
sands, have been considered adverse to that
mode, some engineers have supposed that the
P
210 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
best method of constructing the communication
would be by an iron road. But with regard
to a canal, if the absorbent nature of the sand
render the usual methods of puddling unavailing,
it may be thrown out that an iron canal should
be constructed for the purpose in this country,
in a series of arched iron vessels, in an uninter-
rupted line. If the expense be not too great,
of casting such a work, and sending out the parts
to be joined in that country, then the absorbent
nature of the sand would be finally overcome; and
a very extensive degree of incorrodibility may be
communicated to iron, for all aquatic purposes,
by the impregnation of it with carbon, by methods
which are now perfectly well known. Iron-work,
for containing the requisite body of water, could
very readily and cheaply be constructed in these
kingdoms; and supposing the work to consist
of an inverted elliptic arch,--which form would
combine the greatest amount of surface and depth
with the greatest strength of the work,-and es-
timating the iron at an average of four inches in
thickness, and the span of the arch at ninety-five
feet, with a depth of about twenty-two feet,
thereby providing room for the passing of vessels
of five hundred tons burthen, it would be found
that the required weight of cast-iron could be
furnished from the various iron-works of the king-
dom at about a cost of about twelve millions of
money for the whole distance from sea to sea.
OF RAF LROADS. . 211
If, therefore, an iron canal could be constructed
of metal so durable as to be impervious to water
even for ages, and the mere joining of this iron-
work together in the sands of which the country
is composed,—added to the cheapness of excava-
tion, and future facility of being cleansed and
repaired,—it may become worthy of considera-
tion whether such a canal could not be benefi-
cially constructed across this pass. Should the
work cost altogether an expenditure of more
than double the amount which has been named—
yet, the saving of a navigation of ten thousand
miles round the Cape of Good Hope, would enable
vessels to pay a toll of 5/. per ton, and estimating
the number of vessels which here would cross to
and from the East Indies, and China, to England,
France, Germany, Holland, America, and, in-
deed, all quarters of the world, to be five thousand
a-year, or ten thousand paying toll upon passing
and returning, and being of an average burthen of
five hundred tons each, and the toll at only Il. per
ton, yet here is a revenue of ten millions a-year
which thus would result from the work. This
does not include that doubling of the commerce
to China and the East Indies which the work
itself would create; and, therefore, if even
50,000,000l. were required for the completion of the
canal, yet that great expenditure would be abun-
dantly repaid by the toll. The expenses of sailing
round the Cape of Good Hope may be reckoned
P 2
212 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
at a greater amount by 4!. per ton for all the
vessels which now sail to the East Indies: and
estimating the saving of two months of time, and
the consequent interest upon the value of the rich
cargoes of tea, silk, and manufactured goods,
which pass to and from the East Indies and China
to all quarters of the world, it is clear that
the annual saving of capital to the various Eu-
ropean nations through this direct communi-
cation with the East, would amount to many
hundreds of millions in the year. If the discovery
of the passage round the Cape of Good Hope was
one of the greatest discoveries of modern times,
the completion of a direct pass from the Red to
the Mediterranean Sea, would be a ten-fold greater
event in the history of modern trade.
Should the project of a canal be abandoned,
and a railway be the ultimate mode of achieving
this pass, then the marine railway, becomes first
worthy of consideration; for could vessels be
here raised upon a railway and transported by
locomotive steam engines across the isthmus, that
assuredly would be the best mode of accomplish-
ing the work. The railway should then be
formed upon a series of elliptic arches; and the
sand being an uncertain foundation, the whole
work may be made to rest upon a solid floor of
iron-work, when the sinking of the work would be
uniform in every part, and no derangement of the
level be caused by the insolidity of the sand.
OF RAILROADS. 213
Failing the marine railway, a common railroad
for waggons would still effect a most extensive
saving of time, hazard, and expense, as compared
to the doubling of the Cape of Good Hope. A
waggon might be then shipped at Bombay, and
unloaded at Suez, passing thence to Alexandria,
and again shipped for the port of Marseilles,
and upon the railroad to England direct.
Thus would this waggon and its contents be
conveyed from Bombay to London without be-
ing unloaded, in about fifteen days, and at a
charge of not more than about 7/. per ton; for
the distance by this new route from London to
Bombay, would be not more than five thousand
miles. A waggon, therefore, could be shipped
at Bombay, and be brought to Suez, a distance of
fifteen hundred miles, in about five days; and one
day being occupied in passing across the isthmus,
and re-shipment at Alexandria, and five days
more being occupied in navigating the Mediter-
ranean to Marseilles, a further distance of fifteen
hundred miles, and two days being sufficient for
passing upon a railway of five hundred and forty
miles from Marseilles to London, - the whole time
consumed in passing from the East Indies to
these islands would become reduced to a period
of about fifteen days. -
Indeed, through France to the Mediterranean
at Marseilles, the passage by railways will be
scarcely less important than the pass across the
214, THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
Isthmus of Suez, -for it will cut off a navigation of
two thousand miles round the coast of Spain, and
through the Straits of Gibraltar, thus passing in
a direct line from England to the port of Alexan-
dria; by which so great an amount of time,
freight, and insurance would be saved, that a ton-
nage of la per ton, per mile, or 2/. 2s. per ton
from Marseilles to England, could be afforded
upon the valuable cargoes of silk, tea, spices, gold,
and other productions of the East. *
Steam-navigation from Bombay to London will
also be cheapened extensively by the opportune
discovery of coals in Greece, and upon the Ner-
budda, in the presidency of Bengal. For, by the
existence of coals at the extremities and the in-
termediate position of the voyage, the necessity
would be removed of carrying more than the
consumption of a few days, or a quantity which
might be contained in so small a space that the
great difficulty of foreign steam-navigation would
thus be overcome ; for coals will be almost as
cheap at Alexandria, when brought over from
Greece, as at present in England, and at an equal
price at Bombay, when brought from the Ner-
budda, or perhaps from a nearer position, where
beds of that fuel will undoubtedly be found to
exist. Added to these advantages, is the calm-
ness of the whole of the seas from Bombay to the
Red Sea, and along the whole course of the Me-
diterranean, the entire track of navigation being
OF RAILROADS. - 215
thus in the greatest degree favourable for steam-
navigation from Europe to the whole Eastern
world.
In continuation and connexion with this route
to the East Indies, a railway may be formed
across the Peninsula of India from Bombay to Cal-
cutta, which is a distance of nine hundred miles.
There is already a road across the peninsula, and
the construction of one iron track would therefore
be attended with a comparatively small expense.
A direct communication with Bombay would cut
off a navigation of three thousand miles between
Calcutta and Great Britain, and a railway car-
riage of nine hundred miles could be supported by
the rich products of the East. The whole exports
and imports of the many millions of population
upon the fertile plains of the Ganges would then
be brought to Bombay, and the line from Calcutta
to England becoming almost direct, this will
redouble the facilities for emigration, and the con-
sequent carrying out our laws, language, sciences,
and arts, to the millions now subject to our power
in the wide regions of the East.
Due west from Calcutta, at a distance of twelve
hundred miles, and two thousand west from Bom-
bay, is the city of Canton, the great trading port
of the Chinese empire. In anticipation of the
revolutionary changes which are evidently at
hand in the celestial empire, and the probability
that a much more extended intercourse with
216 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
foreign nations will become, at an early time, the
policy of that people, it may not be visionary to
foresee that a land communication shall exist from
Canton, through Calcutta, to Bombay, and across
the Isthmus of Suez to the Mediterranean,—thus
cutting off a navigation of more than twelve thou-
sand miles from China to Great Britain, and to all
the European states. If the caravans of Russia now
proceed by land from St. Petersburg and Moscow
to the Chinese empire, over a distance of seven
thousand miles, it is certainly not unreasonable
to anticipate the time when so industrious, inge-
nious, and wealthy a nation as the Chinese shall
avail themselves of the invention of iron roads for
the facility of reaching the European states.
From Canton to Bombay, the conveyance for
teas, silks, and other light and yet valuable arti-
cles of export and import, would be accomplished
in a week; and the route would pass also through
many rich provinces and cities of the celestial
empire on the way.
OF RAILROADS. 217
CHAPTER XXIII.
Railroads as connected mith the general question of free trade—
Will be useless if monopolies be not previously abolished—Over-
legislation the principal cause of national poverty and distress—
Governments must be limited in their ponyers—The Post Office
an instance of the bad consequences of monopolies—The corn
laws discussed mith reference to railroads—Shenn to be a great
eviſ–Produce great derangements of trade, both at home and
abroad—The importance of the landed interest over-rated—
Manufactures the great source of national nealth—Probability
that railways mill transfer the ascendancy to France—The
landed interest shortsighted in opposing the progress of manu-
Jactures. -
BUT all these wonders can only be produced
under a really free system of trade. If monopo-
lies be not previously abolished, and the field
opened to the full operation of the new system of
locomotion, then better were it that the construc-
tion of railroads should be interdicted at once,
than that the millions of people, whom they will
bring into existence, should be the victims of that
everlasting derangement of trade, and precarious-
ness of the comforts of existence, which our pre-
sent systems of monopoly and prohibition so exten-
sively create. Millions already are starved, im-
218 • THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
prisoned, and destroyed through the operation of
erroneous over-legislation; and let us not advo-
cate the birth of other millions and tens of mil-
lions, if they come not unshackled into the world,
and have not the right to pursue their labour, and
obtain their happiness, how they will.
For there is scarcely an evil in the world,
which governments do not indirectly cause to
exist. Not that these miseries are intentionally
produced by the governing powers, for there is
not probably a wilfully evil-minded legislator in
existence in the present age; and from despotism
to democracy, all think themselves acting well for
the people subjected to their rule. It is not
tyranny, but folly, that desolates the world.
All that is required from our governors, is the
discovery that their wisdom is foolishness; that
the intermeddling legislator is the only enemy
whom the science, enterprise, and labour of na-
tions cannot overcome ; and that governments are
not instituted for managing the affairs of individual
subjects of the state, but only to protect us from
violence and fraud in the management of our own.
No legislator can do good to an individualso exten-
sively as his own self-interest will prompt him to
benefit himself. Let governments repress violence,
and discountenance fraud, says Mr. Burke, and
then the less that they interfere with the affairs of
the citizens, the better it will be. This is an invalu-
able maxim, conveyed in the simplest terms; and
OF RAILROADS. . . 219
yet no lesson has been derived from it by our le-
gislators; for all is one wide scene of inter-
ference together in our private transactions; inter-
ference with our dealings in corn, in money, and
every department of our trade. But all this must
be removed, before any permanent prosperity, any
well-secured accumulation of wealth, or freedom
from the hazard of revolutionary changes, can be
found in the land. The corn laws must be abo-
lished; the currency left free; all prohibitions
upon our foreign trade removed, before railroads,
or any other scientific inventions, can be rendered
a blessing instead of their consequences being
turned into a curse through the errors of those who
have undertaken to manage our affairs. Let us
but toil without restraint, and we require no
more; let our legislators tax us to their content,
for their individual feastings and fine linen would
form a small diminution of our national wealth,
would our hereditary governors but content them-
selves to eat, drink, and be merry at a distance
from the labours of the people; and discover that
whole volumes of statesmanship are contained in
the “ ſaissez mous faire’ of the merchants of Bor-
deaux. - - . . . . . . .
Governments must be simplified and reduced in
size. The repression of violence and discounte-
nance of fraud, which Mr. Burke describes to
form the only business of just legislation, can be
effected almost entirely by the courts of law; and
220 THE POLITICAL ECONOMIY
mankind have no real occasion for the weeds,
the lumber, and briars of the statute-book, and
can exist in peace with scarcely any government
at all. The Indian tribes who possess no regular
government, were thought by Mr. Jefferson to ob-
tain a larger share of the pleasures of existence
than the civilised nations where the masses are
perpetually subject to the violent changes in
their condition arising from the derangements
produced by excessive legislation. The cup of
refinement is delicious, undoubtedly, but better
were it that we never should have tasted it at all,
if governments be engaged in perpetually dashing
it from our lips. *
To proceed to particulars; let us observe, and it
is immediately connected with our present subject,
the operation of the monopoly of the transmission
of intelligence, which, through the Post Office,
the government has violently taken to itself.
Here laws are to be passed, to prevent the sub-
jects of the state from carrying letters from one
quarter of the country to another; and these
laws are only required, because the rates of
postage are a thousand per cent. higher than the
sum for which the same transport could be
effected by individual carriers, coach-masters, or
others; and this additional charge of nine hundred
per cent. upon the carriage of the intelligence of
this great commercial nation, is required for the
support of whole hundreds of supernumerary
OF RAILROADS. 221
functionaries, whose salaries of thousands a-year
would be reduced to one twentieth portion of
such sums if sent into the market to sell their
labour and ability where they may. The intel-
ligence of the country could be conveyed with
equal regularity by individuals, who now, indeed,
carry passengers and parcels in the same vehicle
in which letters cannot be conveyed without
paying nine hundred per cent. to the supernu-
meraries of the state. Thence the sum of intelli-
gence is diminished, when letters are conveyed
at a cost of a shilling, which could be profitably
carried for one penny; and the profit, intelligence,
and pleasures arising from the free inter-commu-
nication of the people are diminished through the
influence of a monopoly which ought not to exist.
It is clear that the government has no more right
to the monopoly of the transport of letters, than
of corn, coals, timber, or any other commodity
whatsoever ; and that direct taxation to the
amount now gained by the Post Office, would be
a saving of millions to the nation at large through
the cheaper transport by individuals of the letters
now forced through that painted public sepulchre,
which is the only term by which the Post Office
can justly be described. . . -
The corn laws have immediate reference to
the subject of this work. For we have seen that
the prices of corn, and the consequent rental of
land, is full fifty per cent. higher in England than
222 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
in Ireland; and that the manufactured commodi-
ties in which money usually is spent, are cheaper
in a similar ratio in England, by avoiding the
expenses of the exportation of grain, and im-
porting of manufactures, to which the landed in-
terest of Ireland is subjected by the intervention
of the sea. Here, then, in England, is a body of
men who have a double reward for the cultivation
of the earth, and yet are clamouring for more
protection against the importation of foreign corn,
which in the nature of things must always be
loaded with the cost of importing it to an island,
and the double cost of carrying back the tools,
clothing, and other manufactured commodities,
without which corn cannot be cultivated any-
where in the world. -
Then, too, it has been shewn that this state of
things is occasioned by the presence of manufac-
tures in England, and their absence from Ireland
and the continental states. The masses assem-
bled in the manufactories of Manchester, Bir-
mingham, and Leeds, are the purchasers of the
surplus corn which produces the rental of the
land; and were those hives of manufactures sud-
denly swallowed up into the earth, then the corn-
grower of England would obtain no higher price
for his commodity, than the corn-grower of Ire-
land, Belgium, or France; and rents therefore
would fall to the level of the neighbouring states,
or less than one-half of their amount at the present
OF RAILROADS.’ 223
period of alleged overwhelming agricultural dis-
tress. Here is seen the fallacy of the argument
that a landed interest is the staff and foundation
of the power of the state. Had England no manu-
factures of woollen, cotton, hardware, and silk to
export to the surrounding nations, but only the
gross produce of the earth in the form of cattle,
corn, potatoes, or wool, then the aspect of Eng-
land would have been equally cheerless as that of
Ireland itself; no accumulation of capital would
have arisen, no favourable balance of trade with
all foreign nations, no consequent double rental of
land, no aristocracy supported in a splendour
surpassing those of all agricultural countries, no
ships, colonies, and commerce,——no wine and
no gold could be brought from abroad in exchange
for the cattle, potatoes, and grain of those landed
proprietors, and no comfort, wealth, refinement,
or abundance could exist amongst the great mass
of the population of the land. -
Thus we see the short-sightedness of the
prohibitions which the landed proprietors would
increase against the manufactures which are the
true foundations of all their wealth. For to the
invention of the steam engine is it owing that all
nations are tributaries at our feet, and the super-
cession of that power which should enable other
nations to manufacture at home the commodities.
which now must be brought from this country,
would level all our superiority amongst the na-
224 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
tions, reduce the prices of corn and of land to the
level of the continental states, and perhaps even
carry us down to a second rank amongst the nations
through the cessation of our export trade, and the
dearness of corn, which then would be consumed
by a manufacturing population in the nations
abroad. Therefore, to pursue a policy which
shall impede the prosperity of English manufac-
tures, is not ungrateful only, upon the part of the
English proprietor of land, but tending to the very
destruction of his own right arm.
For with the rise of manufactures abroad the
scale would be turned, the English manufacturer
would no longer be enabled to surpass or even to
compete with, the manufacturers of the continen-
tal states, then the balance of trade would be
turned against this island, present accumulations
would rapidly disappear, population would decay,
the rental of land would be lowered by the cor-
responding poverty of the people, three quarters
of the estates of the aristocracy would be aban-
doned to incumbrancers and their double prices
of corn, double rents, double splendour, pleasure,
influence, and power, as compared to the aristo-
cracy of Poland, Germany, or France, would dis-
appear, and be for ever at an end. . . . .
And yet these corn laws confer in reality no
advantage in prices to the landed proprietor,
which would not always be obtained under a per-
fect system of free trade. For the proprietors of
OF RAILROADS. . 225
land would be benefited by the removal of the ex-
penditure occasioned by the resistance to the
spread of manufactures, which thus deprives great
masses of the people of a field for the employment
of their industry; drives back the labourers of Ire.
land from the English manufactories, and then
occasions millions to be annually expended for
troops, police, hulks, gaols, and the ten thousand
evils which are clearly to be traced to the fountain
head of English monopoly alone. -
The corn laws produce also the general enmity
of foreign nations, limitation of intercourse, and
obstruction to the spread of English science,
enterprise, and wealth, which commerce alone
can convey throughout the world.
To shew the dangerous consequences of this
latter consequence of the corn laws, in the aliena-
tion of foreign nations, and that desire for our
downfall which certainly exists amongst the agri-
cultural states, let us here suppose—and the
danger is indeed immediately at hand—that rail-
roads shall be carried through France to the Medi-
terranean at Marseilles. At the present time,
through the senseless and barbarous policy of an-
cient prohibitions, the French have certainly no
chance whatever to compete with the manufactu-
rers of England in the markets of foreign states; for
the fuel of the country being of wood, and wood
being three times dearer at Havre de Grace than
coals at Manchester or Leeds, the steam power of
Q
226 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
France can only be supported by an immense
annual waste of the national wealth. But as the
present order of things in France is evidently des-
tined to endure only for a very short period of
time, let us further suppose that no duty existed
upon the importation of coals, and that the ma-
nufactures of the north of France were then sup-
plied by railroads from the Belgic mines. The
carriage of coals for an average distance of about
thirty miles, would be an unimportant addition to
their expense, and therefore the steam engines of
France would be supplied with fuel at one-third
of their present expenditure, and indeed upon
equal terms with the steam engines of England,
Scotland, or Wales. Then we have seen that
railway transport will be infinitely less than that
of navigation, and allowing that a railway be car-
ried from the north of France to the Mediterranean.
at Marseilles, the manufactures of France would
be conveyed direct to that port, whilst the manu-
factures of England must be carried to the same
point by a voyage of two thousand miles, through
the Straits of Gibraltar, to the various countries
upon the shores of the Mediterranean sea. Thus
the French, under the new system of transport,
would manufacture their exports upon equal
terms with the English manufacturers, and would
have access by a railway in two days to the Me-
diterranean, and to all its shores, without the
costs of navigation, insurance, and interest of
OF RAILROADS. , 227
money upon the cargoes which would be fre-
quently a month in arriving at the same destina-
tion from England by the sea. And not only to
the countries upon the Mediterranean, but to the
East Indies and China, France would have the
same advantages over England, should the passage
be obtained across the Isthmus of Suez at some
early time. Here, then, the people of France
would have the most decided advantages in the
trade to the whole eastern world ; and if no land
communication be formed across the English Chan-
nel, or, being formed, the French should refuse to
us the right of road, then the expenses of a cir-
cuitous voyage of two thousand miles even to our
own dominions in the East Indies, would throw
the ascendancy in future foreign commerce de-
cidedly into the hands of France. Our insular
situation would become a disadvantage, the scep-
tre would depart, and England would become,
like Ireland, solitary amongst the nations of the
earth. Seeing these changes approaching, through
the rapid march of scientific improvements, it is
the policy of England to remove all prohibitions
upon the agricultural productions of France, and
all foreign nations, that when the period of reta-
liation shall arrive, national animosities may have
disappeared, and nations no longer have the dis-
position to injure the interests of one another.
England is now in the ascendant, and, for her own
present and future self-interest, should very evi-
Q 2
228 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
dently disseminate the principle, that nations, like
individuals, should love their neighbours as them-
selves.
Reason, self-interest, justice, and the common
principle of benevolence towards the poor, re-
quire then that such broad violations of the rights
of the people should no longer be preserved.
There are other modes by which an aristocracy
can be supported in their present abundance
without so mean a taxation upon the loaves of
the poor. The improvements in agriculture, the
reduction of tithes, the substitute of the cheap
spade for the doubly expensive horse, the intro-
duction of railroads and the consequent cheap
transit of corn, cattle, lime, fuel, and other re-
quisites in agriculture, with the reduction of the
prices of manufactured goods by the cheap food
which the operative will then be enabled to ob-
tain ; these are the modes of enabling the farmer
to pay a much greater rent even after the removal
of the duties upon foreign corn.
OF RAILROADS. 229.
CHAPTER XXIV.
The currency considered—Great importance of the question—The
Bank of England a dangerous institution—Legislative errors
committed mith regard to it—The panic occasioned by the
errors of the government and the Bank—Suppression of the
one and two pound notes a great injury to the commerce of the
country—The trade in money should be free—Free trade mill
always produce an abundance of the precious metals—No legis-
lation required nith regard to gold.
THE trade in money must also, like the trade
in corn, and all other commodities which money
represents, be freed from the chains in which
it has been placed ; as if only to create poverty,
misery, crime and revolutionary violence in the
world.
For the history of the trade in money, or the
question of the currency, as it is usually called,
is one wide scene of legislative errors of the most
fatal operation upon the affairs of this, and through
this, of all modern states. -
First, upon the principles which were pointed
out in the commencement of this work, and
proving the dangerous consequences of all com-
mercial legislation, it was shewn that there is no
enterprise which private bankers, or private
traders of any other description, cannot accom-
plish from the capital of individuals in the present
230 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
day. Joint-stock banks, like joint-stock washing,
milking and baking institutions, are not required,
whilst there are the Drummonds, Hoares, Glynns,
and Couttes’, in the mercantile world ; therefore,
no such institution as the Bank of England ever
has been required, or ought to have been allowed
to exist. Its management has presented all the
folly, irregularity, and waste of the other joint-
stock institutions, with the exception that its
operation having been upon a more extended
scale, has been productive of injury to the com-
munity more than a million fold. Passing by the
smaller considerations that such an institution,
like all others of a similar class, can only be
managed by the expensive machinery of direc-
tors, with hundreds of clerks placed in it by
interest, and therefore at double rates of payment,
and perquisites of many hundreds per annum
arising from pens only once dipped in ink;
these things, though paid for by an annual
waste of the public money for the management
of the national debt, which could be managed for
one quarter of the expense if divided amongst the
private banking institutions of the metropolis, are
not more than one grain of sand, when compared
to our folly in allowing this joint-stock institution
to deal out to us what amount of money they in
their wisdom shall see fit, and thus to hurry or
to impede the wheels of the whole commerce of
the world.
OF RAILROADS. 23]
For this institution, through its monopoly of the
circulation, has the power to make money plen-
tiful or scarce; and this power, entrusted to men
almost unknown, has been the principal cause of
the panics, commercial vicissitudes, bankrupt-
cies, broken hearts, gaols, incendiary fires, risings
of the pauper population, precipitation of the aris-
tocracy from power, and the general shaking upon
their foundations, of all the institutions of the land.
First, this joint-stock company of bankers,
in the year 1799, procured from the government,
in the shape of a law for the suspension of cash
payment, a violent absolution from their debts;
and this inroad upon all justice was followed by
those spendthrift issues of paper, which men
would naturally put forth, who, by a connexion
with the ruling power, were no longer in the
wholesome fear of being taken by the throat
When this connexion was again dissolved, in
the year 1819, the Bank of England, with all the
incalculable profits upon baseless spendthrift
issues of paper, and upon millions of the public
money received for their services in the manage-
ment of the national debt, could not now pay
the gold which they had originally promised upon
the surface of their notes, without withdrawing
those notes in millions from circulation and buying
up the gold to be found in all quarters of the
world. This buying up of the gold and contrac
tion of the circulation, by contracting the opera-
232 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
tions of the general commerce of the world,
occasioned the distresses, and threatened revo-
lutions of the years 1820, 1821 and 1822.
Thus, the passing of a law for the encourage-
ment of spendthrift dealers in money occasioned
a deluge of paper circulation, and afforded the
means of slaughtering the people of the neigh-
bouring nations; and next the return to an honest
course, in the year 1819, occasioned that corres-
ponding period of depression, misery and gloom,
which the spendthrift is always doomed to un-
dergo. - -
This return to an honest course, in the year
1819, was aggravated in its severity of endurance
by the accompanying penance of an abstinence
from the use of one and two pound notes. Per-
haps, indeed, the change from extravagance to
honesty, order and sobriety would have been
effected without pain, if the Bank of England had
not been compelled to provide gold for the com-
pulsory withdrawal of their one and two pound
notes; whether the public was willing to accept
of them or not.
And after three years of suffering, danger, and
alarm, arising from radicals, blanketeers, and
Cato-street conspirators, all brought into existence
through the derangements of trade, occasioned by
the accumulations of gold in the Bank of England
in preparation for the payment of the one and two
pound notes to be forcibly withdrawn at a given
OF RAILROADS. 233
period of time, Lord Castlereagh, finding himself
surrounded on all sides by the coming waves of
revolutionary violence, repealed this compulsory
enactment for the suppression of the one and two
pound notes. Then trade instantaneously revived,
the people returned forthwith to their work in the
foundries and mills; Lord John Russell was
laughed at when he brought on his annual mo-
tion for parliamentary reform; prosperity encom-
passed us with its wings, and the songs of re-
joicing resounded through the land.
But this must not endure whilst there are the
mischievous animals called statesmen, by the
author of the “Wealth of Nations.” Though now
in the full tide of prosperity, the Bank of England
redeeming its notes honestly in gold, and accum-
mulation rising upon accummulation, till the
powers of the fairy lamp of Aladdin were eclipsed
in the bursting up around us of immeasurable
wealth; our own population happy, Ireland even
feeling the genial influence of the dissemination
of our wealth, and foreign nations receiving, in
floods, that English capital which opens out their
resources and returns in redoubled streams to the
country of the steam engine, yet must our states-
men proceed to turn this wealth into the pock-
ets of the multitudes of those swindlers whose
schemes were incorporated by law for milking,
washing, mining, and baking of bread for the
subjects of the state. Then the capital for these
234. THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
robberies and follies was advanced by the im-
becile directors of the Bank of England, and
the nature of the schemes beginning rapidly to
disclose itself, the directors who had lent too
freely now took their debtors too suddenly by
the throat, and then came the bursting of the
bubbles, the panic, and all the long catalogue of
miseries that immediately ensued.
Thus, the government, by sanctioning the joint-
stock schemes, laid the snares in which thou-
sends of the subjects of the state were ruined
and destroyed; then the Bank of England being
not directed with that providence and skill which
private bankers must exercise, whose mansions,
furniture, carriages, and plate will pass away from
them if they give away their property to the pro-
jectors of baking and milking institutions, heed-
lessly seconded the folly of the government by fur-
nishing the sinews for the joint-stock schemes,
and then suddenly withdrawing, affrighted at their
folly, overturned all within the reach of their
operations, and this led to the fall of the schemes.
For if one great banking institution had not mo-
nopolized, by the force of law, the power over
the circulation of the kingdom, its directors would
not have possessed the power to lend imprudently,
and to withdraw, with an equally imprudent rapi-
dity, the loans so made ; nor would these loans
have been of one twentieth part of the amount,
had not the whole of the circulation of the
OF RAILROADS. 235
kingdom been at the disposal of this one joint-
stock bank. The nature of the joint-stock
schemes would have been discovered by the pri-
vate bankers, whose fortunes were more imme-
diately at hazard if supporters of the milking
and the baking operations; and though a few of
the private bankers might have been ignorant of
the principles of commercial legislation, and thus
have been ruined by the joint-stock schemes, yet
this is not the character of the multitude of bank-
ers, and the failure of one or more private banking
institutions would have subdivided the influence
of the folly, which, in allowing one joint-stock
bank to monopolize all power, renders their er-
rors a thousand times more extensive in the sphere
of the ruin in which they involve the subjects of
the state; and which is again rendered more
likely to ensue, because whether the manage-
ment be for evil or for good, the directors of this
great joint-stock bank are secured in their salaries,
and are not, themselves, endangered in the wreck.
Thus we have traced the too celebrated panic
to the doors of the bank. Had there been no
Bank of England, there would have been no
panic.
Then the government re-appears upon the scene
This panic was only intended to be of a very
temporary operation; for the accummulation of
capital had been so prodigious in the three pre-
ceding years of a really free trade in money, that
236 THE POLITICAL FCONOMY
the sweeping away of the projectors and their
victims in the joint-stock schemes, was the effect
with which it would have concluded in a very
short period of time, had the government remained
at a distance, and allowed the channel which just.
had overflowed its banks to regain its ancient
course. But the step next taken by our governors.
was precisely distant from the right track of legis-
lation as the pole is from the pole; the suppres-
sion of the one and two pound notes which imme-
diately followed, having been the concluding blow
to commerce and to themselves; for administration
has been entombed after administration, and more
administrations will follow after those administra-
tions if they do not become wise in time, let the
monetary concerns of the nation “alone,” and
untie the hands of the bankers again.
Thus far we have seen that over-legislation
established this one great banking Juggernaut,
which never could exist but to crush commerce
under its unmanageable wheels—next that over-
legislation passed the restriction act of 1799;
then that the just legislation of 1819 was ac-
companied by over-legislation upon the subject
of one and two pound notes; then that over-
legislation brought the bubble companies into life,
and when the panic arrived, and assistance was
required, then over-legislation withdrew the one
and two pound notes, and thus finally stabbed us
to the heart. -
OF RAILROADS. 237
For these one and two pound notes are the very
soul of modern trade. They are wheels, small,
certainly, in appearance, but which, in their rapid
revolution, give impetus to the whole machine.
A banker is a dealer in money, and a govern-
ment which forcibly debars the banker from fol-
lowing his occupation of lending money in the
shape of one and two pound notes, is guilty of
a tyranny, which affects not the banker alone, but
all other traders of the state, who suffer in their
commerce from the scarcity of money, which
the banker is violently prohibited to lend. For
the manufacturer, farmer, miner, merchant, all
must be supplied with money in a condition of
society in which barter is impracticable through
the complex and wide spread machinery of mo-
dern trade; and if this supply of money be forcibly
withdrawn, the establishments of these various
traders contract in their operation, or fall to the
ground. The manufacturer can only employ one
half of the number of operatives—the farmer sees
his fields covered over with weeds, while the
labourer is wandering upon the road, because there
is no employment for these labourers through the
absence of money for the payment of their wages,
through the absence of banking accommodation,
through the absence of that money from the
banker himself, through the compulsory prohi-
bition of the one and two pound notes. -
Bankers ought then to be no more subjected to
238 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
legislative restraints in their occupations, than
merchants, manufacturers, butchers, bakers,
washerwomen, or any other of the subjects of the
state. If the public will receive their notes with
a promise to pay them in gold, or without a pro-
mise to pay them in gold, and if those notes be one
pound or five pound notes, or notes for five shil-
lings, or one single shilling, or one penny, it is not
the province of the government to prevent these
voluntary transactions of the people, but only
to open the doors of the courts against the
property of the banker if he cannot, or will not,
accomplish the payment of his debts. The banker
should no more be the object of the surveillance
of the legislature than the manufacturer, shoe-
maker, or the baker of bread; and it is not less un-
just to prevent a farmer from selling less than two
sacks of wheat, the nobleman from purchasing a
less number of coach-horses than five, the butcher
from selling a less quantity of meat than five
pounds, or the baker less than five loaves of bread,
than that the banker should be restrained from
issuing notes of the value of less than five pounds
to those who will believe him worthy of being
credited on his promise to make payment in gold.
Let the self-interest of the banker and his cus-
tomers be the only guide in their transactions,
and if either of the parties will not fulfil his en-
gagement to his fellow-subjects, it is for the
government to grant redress through a just ad-
OF RAILROADS. 239
ministration of the law, but in all other respects
to interfere not with their transactions, and “ let
them alone.”
But we are told that these one and two pound
notes must be suppressed for the prevention of
future over-trading, panics, and other derange-
ments of trade. Our legislators must save us
from ourselves; we know not what we do; bankers
may fail and then our money would be lost.
To this it is replied, that the panic was created
by our legislators themselves, they alone are the
enemies from which we are solicitous to be saved,
and bankers seldom would fail if not subjected to
the crushing influence of one great joint-stock
bank, and if the trade in money really were free.
By this violent suppression of the one and two
pound notes, we have continued the consequences
of the panic in full force to the present hour; we
have preserved prices and profits at a rate at
which general accumulation is at an end, we
have narrowed the fields of trade, thrown thou-
sands out of employment, and sent them to the
gaol, the hulks, the workhouse, and the grave;
we have wasted whole hundreds of millions of
capital which would have been added to the na-
tional stock, and all these horrors have been gone
through, for the prevention of the failures of
banks, which, but for the interference of the
government in their concerns, would not occur
within a period of one hundred years.
240 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
To save the people from the possibility of one
evil we have inflicted upon them evils a thousand
times greater than any which could possibly have
occurred ; to prevent the operative from losing
about twenty shillings by the failure of a bank, we
have diminished his entire earnings to half the
true annual amount; and lest he at some period
should have not the wisdom to avoid a loss by
the one pound notes, his whole existence is de-
barred of its enjoyment, his wages are diminished
by the over-crowded condition of the market for
his labour through the contraction of the com-
mercial operations of the country, and thus his
solid comforts are destroyed for the prevention of
an evil which never might occur. -
All then that is required at the present time, is
to repeal this fatal act, and to allow the circu-
lation of the country to consist of whatever
money the individual subjects shall find conve-
nient for their wants. The self-interest and
judgment of the banker will prevent him from
lending too much of his capital, since if he sub-
ject himself to loss, his mansion, park, carriages,
and plate will pass away in punishment for his
folly, and though some bankers may commit
errors in their loans, yet the aggregate amount of
benefit derived from banking operations is a
thousand-fold greater than any temporary loss.
Who would pull down his house, because of one
unsound stone? - ... • .
OF RAILROADS. 24, 1
Nor is legislation, with reference to silver and
gold, more justifiable than that which interferes
with the bankers in the issue of their one and two
pound notes. Let the banker provide gold for the
fulfilment of his engagements wherever it may be
found, for there is no reason to fear that there will
not be abundance of gold in the world, whilst there
is a corresponding supply of the commodities which
gold represents. Gold is obtained by labour,
and is abundant in the bowels of the earth, and
therefore the supplies of food, clothing, and tools
which England and other nations will always be
enabled to send to the miners of Mexico and
other gold-producing states, will enable them to
exist whilst they are searching the earth in quest
of the requisite supplies of gold thus demanded
from abroad. There will be no deficiency of gold
whilst there is abundance of blankets, pickaxes,
and provisions, for the miners of Mexico and
Peru.
Free trade is the philosopher's stone, and will
turn all things into gold.
Thus the opening of the trade to China will
increase the supplies of English gold. The
exports of gold to that empire within the last
quarter of a century, have exceeded more than
50,000,000l. from England alone, but now that
the steam-engine has really found an entering
point into that country, through the abolition of
the monopoly of the East India Company, the
R
242 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
Chinese will become buyers of the fabrics, which,
under the monopoly, could not be sold cheaper
than their own, and thus the balance of trade will
be turned, and these masses of gold will flow back
into England again. - -
The sum of these views is, that if we cannot
build our railroads upon a sure foundation, by
the removal of the rubbish of legislation which
has hitherto fallen in such everlasting masses
upon all the preceding efforts of the capital,
enterprise, and labour of the nation, then better
were it that they never had been commenced,
than afterwards be subject to the inroads of a
government which has no principle of self.
guidance whatsoever, and resembles a mere
drunken man reeling to and fro.
It is clear that over-legislation is our greatest,
and indeed, our only curse; for we have brought
more miserics upon ourselves than though the
armies of France had invaded these islands, and
ravaged the length and breadth of the land.
Nor do our follies in legislation fall in their con-
sequences upon this nation alone. From the
position of England at the present period, the in-
fluence of our monetary regulations is universal in
its operation, and the derangements of our com-
merce pass regularly through the whole chain of
nations and are felt at the ends of the earth.
Thus the late threatenings of civil war in the
United States, were, in reality, Occasioned by as
OF RAILROADS. 243
simple a cause as the suppression of the English
one and two pound notes. This measure lowered
the prices in England of the cotton and other
staple exports of the southern states, the low
prices in England occasioned equally low prices
in France, Germany, and the rest of the European
importing states, this lowering of prices occa-
sioned distress, foreclosing of mortgages and other
ruinous consequences to extensive bodies of the
people of the southern states, these attributed the
low prices and their consequences erroneously to
the tariff of their own government which had only
a slight operation in a country where the smug-
glers could so readily find their way across a
frontier a thousand miles long, and though the
removal of this tariff has been one good conse-
quence of the threatened civil war, yet the prices
of cotton have not been raised, and never can be
materially raised until the English bankers be
really set free.
But at home the greatest convulsions must
ensue through the increase of population, which,
from our insular situation, will become accumu-
lated in closer masses, and having no field over
which to be diffused as upon continents where the
land is not in universal occupation.
For the cessation of war has caused popula-
tion to increase with overwhelming force; the
numbers to be contended with are daily swelling
in amount; and if trade, employment, clothing
244 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
and food be not provided for these multitudes,
their weight will inevitably burst through an
iron wall.
That this is the order of events is clear from
the history of all populous states. The over-
flowing population of China is occasioned by
tyrannical prohibitions upon trade, for no im-
provements in agriculture or manufactures are
allowed to proceed, and navigation and foreign
trade, in which millions of the people might be
advantageously employed, are limited by the bar-
barous policy of exclusive commercial legislation.
Thence all are forced upon the land for their sub-
sistence, and twenty-two dynasties have reigned,
and all been overthrown.
“China,” says Montesquieu, “is subject to
frequent famines. When the people are ready to
starve with hunger, they disperse in order to seek
for nourishment; in consequence of this, small
gangs of robbers are formed on all sides. Most of
these are suppressed in their infancy; others swell
and are likewise suppressed; and yet in so great
a number of distant provinces, some gang or
other may happen to meet with success. In that
case they maintain their ground, strengthen their
party, form themselves into a military body,
march straight up to the capital, and their leader
ascends the throne.” Here, with some modifica-
tions, is the circle of events now going forward in
Ireland, Italy, France, and, indeed, three quarters
of the modern states. {
. OF RAILROADS. 245
Thus see the state of things, at this hour, in
beautiful France. Prohibitions upon the impor-
tation of the first articles of civilized existence,
iron and coal, established for the benefit of the
few powerful proprietors of iron mines and forest
lands; wood, the only fuel to be obtained, and
that fuel three times dearer than the English coal
which is forcibly barred out; the manufactures of
cotton, woollens, and silk, worked by steam-en-
gines, of which the expense is three times greater
than those of England, Scotland, or Wales; thence
the clothing, tools, furniture, and all other manu-
factured conveniencies of the people, are three
times dearer in price, and one third only can,
therefore, be consumed. Then, in addition to the
loss of two thirds of their clothing and utensils,
for the benefit of the monopolists of the forests, is
the succeeding loss of two thirds of their domestic
firing, thus raised to three times the price in a
country of which the winters are infinitely more
piercing than our own ; then follows the absence
of employment, low wages, and accumulating po-
verty of a people increasing in numbers through
the cessation of war, and impoverished through
the absence of ship-building, navigation, and fo-
reign trade, through the dearness of iron, which
cannot be afforded for the composition of the mer-
cantile marine; and by the general operation of
a system, which spreads from the roots of the
first monopoly through all the departments of the
246 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY
industry of man. Then a meagre population,
mud-built towns, solitary roads, and long lines of
forests which are forbidden to be covered with
wheat fields and vineyards, in order that the pro-
prietors may sell fuel at three times its just price,
are the disfiguring features of the whole scenery
of France. - -
Then this suffering from hunger and cold
renders disaffected, scowling, and ferocious, a
population, whose natural character is polite,
amiable, and gay; smuggling extends amongst the
population of the frontiers; plots are perpetually
moving about under ground in the capital and
in the provinces and principal cities of a country
where all are disaffected in one great suffering
mass. Four hundred thousand men must be
maintained under arms for the suppression of
everlasting attempts at revolt; batteries are built
over Lyons to overawe a spectral population; the
national debt increases yearly in amount; and
financial operations for its reduction are opposed
because a portion of the owners of it are amongst
the soldiers by whose swords this condition of
things is alone upheld for an hour.
Then million after million of the remaining re-
sources of the country is wasted in gallopping,
about with drawn swords amongst the Algerines,
and in payments to the growers of beet-roots
and other senseless substitutes for the first articles
of a foreign trade: and thus an ignorant and an-
OF RAILROADS. 247
tiquated government is daily approaching nearer
to the hour of its destruction; for the extending
numbers of the population will suddenly burst
asunder the chains in which they are now bound,
and then the military system will be found to
have no power against infuriated millions; and
so the monopolists will be stoned out of France.
It is, therefore, for legislators to be wise in
time. For the masses may be fed, clothed, and
pacified, if allowed to labour without restraint;
and there is no reason to fear that our numbers
can be too great upon the surface of a globe, of
which the diameter is eight thousand miles.
It is not taxation, if levied merely for its
amount, and even if very exorbitantly levied,
which does the great injury to states, for, if
prohibitions be avoided, almost any weight of
taxation may be borne by nations such as this.
The country of the steam-engine, where the
labour of four hundred millions of men is vir-
tually obtained without food, and where those
four hundred millions would soon be extended to
thousands and tens of thousands of millions, if
trade really were free, can support any govern-
ment to the utmost satiety of the governing few.
The monarchy, the law, the church, the army,
navy, colonies, and a national debt of eight hun-
dred millions of money, all can be borne, and the
weight be not heavier than a few grains of sand
upon the steam-engine, if there be only an unob-
248 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY, &c.
structed revolution of the wheel. None would,
then, attempt the overthrow of systems because of
their expense. Close not up the fountain, but
take freely from the stream. . . .
The business of modern legislation is to di-
minish, to remove and symmetricize the shapeless
masses of legislation that have come down to us
from barbarous times. We must cease to suppose
that there is any difficulty in just legislation. It
is our besetting sin to fancy the difficulties of go-
verning the world to be great, and we look into
the clouds for that which is immediately around
us and beneath our feet.
Seeing, then, that in the natural order of events
the triumph of free principles is now inevitable,
magnificent, indeed, are the prospects that are
opening on mankind. Nations will become united
in the golden bands of peace; science, liberty
and abundance, will reign amongst the inhabitants
of the earth ; nations will no longer be seen to
ascend and decline ; human life will become re-
fined and prolonged, years will become centuries
in the development of the blessings of existence;
and even now the eye can reach to the age when
one language, one religion, and one nation, will
alone be existing in the world.
THE E N D.
JOHN LEIGHT ON, JoBN son’s-courtT, IT LEET-ST R.E. E.T.,
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