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 lASCHESTlR SHIP GAIAL BILL, 
 
 SESSION 1884. 
 
 EEPLY 
 
 OF 
 
 MR. PEMBER, Q.C., 
 
 ON BEHALF OF 
 
 THE PROMOTERS OF THE BILJ^, 
 BEFOEE THE SELECT COMMITTEE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 HOUSE OF LOEDS, 
 20th, 21st, and 22nd MAY, 1884. 
 
 HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF RICHMOND AND GORDON IN THE CHAIR. 
 
 PRINTED FOR THE PROMOTERS 
 
 BY MACKIE AND CO., LIMITED, LONDON, LIVERPOOL, AND WARRINGTON. 
 
 3
 
 Z uiuc .
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE- 
 1 
 
 Chapter I. 
 Chapter II. 
 Chapter III. 
 Chapter IV. 
 Chapter V. 
 Chapter VI. 
 
 Chapter VII. 
 Chapter VIII. 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 Chapter X. 
 Chapter XC. 
 Chapter XII. 
 Chapter XIII. 
 
 Introduction 
 
 The Commercial Case ... ... ... 1 
 
 The Cotton Trade ... ... ... 3 
 
 Savings to the Cotton and other Trades... 16 
 
 Depression in Trade— Foreign Competition 18 
 
 Equal Sea Freights ... .. ... 20 
 
 The Navigation of the Estuary. — Tides. 
 
 Size and Masts of Vessels ... ... 24 
 
 Resume of First Day's Speech ... ... 33 
 
 Return Cargoes from Manchester ... 33 
 
 General Traffic Prospects of the Port of 
 
 Manchester ... ... ... 38 
 
 Marine Insurance ... ... ... 39 
 
 Estimates of Traffic by Ship Canal ... 41 
 
 Through Rates and Tolls ... ... 47 
 
 Prospects of Revenue ... ... ... 51 
 
 Working Expenses ... ... ... 70
 
 V 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter XIV. 
 
 page; 
 Warehouses ... ... ... ... 75 
 
 Chapteu XV. 
 
 The Capital ... ... ... ... 77 
 
 Chapter XVI. 
 
 Water: Floods, &c, ... ... ... 87 
 
 Chapter XVII. 
 
 Past Legislation — Swing Bridges ... 88 
 
 Chapter XVIII. 
 
 Competition with Railways ... ... 91 
 
 Chapter XIX. 
 
 The Engineering Estimates of Cost of 
 
 
 Works ... ... ... ... 94- 
 
 Chapter XX. 
 
 The Estuary Case. — The Effect of Frets 
 
 
 ON THE Bar... ... ... ... 95 
 
 Chapter XXI. 
 
 Do. The Effect of Frets in Increas- 
 
 
 ing OR Decreasing Tidal Capacity... 107 
 
 Chapter XXII. 
 
 Do. Accretion ... ... ... 119 
 
 Chapter XXIII. 
 
 Do. General Conclusions .. . ... 133:
 
 REPLY OF MR. PEMBER, Q.C., 
 
 ON BEHALF OF THE PKOMOTERS OF THE BILL, 
 TUESDAY, THE 20th MAY, 1884 
 
 (Being the 38th day of the hearing of the case). 
 
 HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF RICHMOND AND GORDON 
 IN THE CHAIR. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : My lords, it is no affectation upon my part if I say that 
 as I approach the close of this case, I shrink somewhat from the task that is 
 before me. I have no right whatever to leave a single topic untouched ; 
 if any member of the Committee had given any direct ij;idication of 
 opinion in the course of the inquiry (and I am bound to say that no 
 tribunal before which I have had the honour to appear has kept their 
 counsel better than the present) in so great a case, I should have hesitated 
 very much to act upon any such presumption ; and, therefore, an inexorable 
 fate will keep me some time speaking, and keep you some time listening 
 to me ; but I am sure that you will sympathize with me in an exposition 
 which has many branches forming a somewhat tangled skein, which it 
 will be very difficult for me to unravel properly. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE COMMERCIAL CASE. 
 
 Now I ask myself what have I to answer ? What was it I undertook 
 to prove ? What did I fail to prove ? What have the opponents alleged 
 or proved either substantially as something fresh upon their own part, or 
 by way of criticism upon my evidence and my speech ? I began 
 this two-sided investigation by stating succinctly the position which I 
 have all along taken up for the promoters. We say that Lancashire, and 
 such parts of Yorkshire and Cheshire as are geographically and commer- 
 cially associated with Lancashire, form together by far the most impor-
 
 2 The Commercial Case. [Chap, i, 
 
 tant trading and producing centres of Great Britain, or, I may say, of the 
 world. They have been supreme in their own Hne, but their supremacy is 
 seriously threatened. The maintenance of the supremacy, if possible, I say, 
 is vital to the interests of England, It is threatened by that wave of 
 industrial growth which has spread over Europe and over the United 
 States and India, and which is temporarily intensified by the fiscal 
 perversity of the nations in which it has arisen ; but this in- 
 dustrial growth abroad affects nearly all our home industries and I 
 venture to say that many writers and others underestimate its effects 
 They see that England has real or apparent means of wealth-making, 
 which are not home industries ; for instance, they see the enormous 
 extent to which banking both home and foreign, and all that is akin to 
 the home and foreign banking, has gone. They see the enormous extent 
 to which foreign businesses of one kind and another have been carried by 
 Englishmen — ?hat is to say, by Englishmen who conduct business abroad,, 
 and remit home, all of which goes to swell the home profits. They see 
 the various investments which are carried on in different parts of the 
 globe with English capital, such as gas works, railways, harbours, water 
 works, and what not ; and lastly, but by no means least, they see, and 
 see truly, that England possesses to a very considerable extent the 
 carrying trade of the world. They are content with all this. I venture 
 to think they are rashly content, and they seem to say, as it were. Let the 
 home industries look after themselves ; the country grows richer and 
 richer every day, somehow or other. I dare say that is true, but surely, 
 your Grace, home industries are worth preservation. After all, produc- 
 tion is the safest thing to cling to — it is the surest and securest form of 
 wealth— the money markets may shift, foreign business may decay, the 
 carrying trade may carry itself somewhere else, but our home industries 
 will never forsake us unless we ourselves, in the first instance, are foolish 
 enough to forsake them. 
 
 Now, my lords, this Bill is the outcome of a long feeling and develop- 
 ment of a long standing idea, applied as a remedy. Engineer after 
 engineer has schemed it ; Parliament, in Act after Act, has safeguarded 
 it ; it is based upon the universal conviction that, in the cost of produc- 
 tion, transit is the last great factor which it is possible for us to reduce. 
 That is the meaning of the Bill, and I will say at this point how irrational 
 has been the dislike with which the project has been met. There has 
 been, quite apart from all question of its feasibility — quite apart from all 
 question of damage to the railway gradients, or anything of that nature, 
 quite apart from the question of injury to the Mersey — there has been, I 
 say, a sort of irritation against Lancashire for not having rested content 
 with things as they are, and especially against Manchester and my clients as 
 the leaders and organ and mouthpiece of that discontent. The very folk 
 who would have been the loudest against any attempt to feed and foster 
 the industries of foreigners by the imposition of the smallest import 
 duty are equally angry with us for a perfectly legitimate attempt upon 
 our part to cheapen home production. Really it would seem as if there 
 were a certain class, and by no means a small class, in the country. 

 
 Chap. I.] The Commercial Case. 3 
 
 who were as hostile to the relief of home industry as they are to 
 protection. 
 
 I attach, your Grace, great importance to the fact that this is a pro- 
 ducers' Bill. Liverpool produces nothing ; that is admitted upon all 
 sides ; Lancashire, I had almost said, produces all things, or at all events 
 is capable of producing almost all things. I draw a distinction between 
 business and industry — between business which is merely transacted and 
 the industry which actually produces. The businesses that Liverpool can 
 do are secondary ; they arise out of the industries of Lancashire. Liver- 
 pool is the tradesman, so to speak ; Lancashire the producer and the 
 consumer. I say that the former, that is the tradesman, exists for the 
 two latter, and not the two latter for the former. The former is sub- 
 servient and secondary, both in character and also in importance to the 
 country. If Liverpool owes £16,000,000 to those who hold its dock 
 bonds, Lancashire has dB100,000,000 invested in its cotton industry alone. 
 It will not harm the country if a portion of the business done at Liver- 
 pool be transferred to Manchester — it will harm the country much, or it 
 would harm the country much, if a proportion, even though a small one, 
 of the production done in Lancashire were to be transferred to Pennsyl- 
 vania or to India, to the banks of the Seine or of the Elbe. 
 
 That is the position we take up — it is to prevent that kind of 
 damage to the country that we are here, and have been here in two suc- 
 cessive Sessions of Parliament. It seems to me, your Grace, to matter 
 little with what branch of the evidence I first deal; but I began in 
 opening this case with the mercantile part of it, and so in reply I will 
 deal;- with the mercantile evidence first. The mercantile evidence is ob- 
 viously divisible into two great heads : first, the saving that is to be 
 achieved in transit ; and, secondly, the traffic which exists, or which may 
 be looked forward to, and therefore is either at the present moment, or 
 in the future, to be accommodated. Now the saving is laid down in 
 Mr. Adamson's original tables, supported by the individual testimony of 
 various witnesses, each man speaking for his own trade or for his own 
 town. 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 THE COTTON TRADE. 
 
 Now let us take the cotton trade first, as being the most im- 
 portant of the existing interests. The tables, as your lordships well 
 know, which refer more particularly to the cotton trade, are the tables 
 Nos. 28 and 29 and 30 ; No. 28 containing the details and method of saving, 
 Nos. 29 the towns embraced in the table, and No. 30 the total summary 
 of savings ; that is to say, I have a table of some 14 or 18 names of towns in 
 Table 28 ; and then, as subsidiary to the difl'erent towns, a variety of places
 
 4 The Cotton Trade, [Chap. il. 
 
 and districts, every one embracing a certain neighbourhood of satelHtes, 
 each one of which is of importance to the subsidiary centre of produc- 
 tion ; and finally, on Table 30, we have a summary of the savings 
 involved to the cotton trade alone, which is put at £508,000 a year. 
 Now those tables, with which we begin, are the saving to the cotton 
 trade. They are the texts upon which we all have preached, and the 
 points made against those tables by the opponents' witnesses are the 
 points, of course, upon which they preach, and they are very well 
 defined by Sir William Forwood ; in fact, I made him do it myself for 
 my own purposes, and if you turn to page 1740 to one question which I 
 asked Sir William Forwood, and his answer, that is Question 22803, 
 you will find distinctly how he formulates the attack. I asked Sir 
 William Forwood what are the points at issue between him and Mr. 
 Adamson. He gives me first the consumption of raw cotton per spindle, 
 then the 6d. a ton, which we admit is the amount of the reduction in 
 dock dues since March, the quay attendance, and the master porterage ; 
 and I say, " Those are the items upon which we difi'er." He says, 
 *' Precisely, and the cartage." Now I ask you to note that the only 
 evidence worth talking about, which is produced in the attack upon the 
 cotton evidence, is that of a Liverpool man, and that is Sir William 
 Forwood. 
 
 I must ask you, my lords, to consider to a certain extent the 
 personality of Sir William Forwood ; he is hostile to this measure, and 
 always has been, I am sorry to say it, almost to the very verge of 
 spitefulness ; he is inaccurate, and I will undertake to prove it, even to 
 rashness. " Inaccurate even to rashness," I say ; and let me give you 
 one or two instances to prove it. Remember what he said about this 
 measure, this scheme, about the astute lawyers and the clever engineers 
 who had started it, but who had nothing whatever to do with it. As Mr. 
 Adamson showed you abundantly, rightly or wrongly, the scheme is the 
 outcome of the feeling in the Manchester district. My learned friend, 
 Mr. Pope, may be right or wrong in saying it is the enthusiasm of the 
 ** unthinking masses" — at all events, it is the enthusiastic view of some- 
 body, and it is not the chicanery of clever lawyers or engineers,who have had 
 nothing whatever to do with it until they were called in to consider the 
 best means of carrying out the scheme which the local people devised. 
 So far from its having originated with the engineer, the first engineer whom 
 we called in gave us a scheme which we could not commit ourselves to, 
 and we had to change our engineer. Then another thing showing the 
 extreme rashness of Sir William Forwood ; after all the evidence you had 
 from witness after witness engaged in trade, after all the declarations on the 
 part of many of my learned friends as to the depressed state in which the 
 industries of Lancashire were — so depressed that they laughed at the idea 
 of finding the money for the purpose — Sir William Forwood came for- 
 ward in the face of it to say that the cotton trade is remarkably 
 prosperous. Thirdly, again, after having the evidence of man after 
 man, every one of whom was examined in his own line. Sir William 
 Forwood comes forward and says there is no risk or danger from foreign
 
 CiiAp. II.] The Cotton Trade. 5 
 
 competition. Liverpool, of course, he is to the very backbone ; a pro- 
 minent member of the Cotton Brokers' Association of Liverpool, and has 
 been its president. Now, that is the gentleman who is put forward to 
 lead the commercial evidence against us, and endeavour to rebut ours. 
 But there has not been a man from all Lancashire outside Liverpool 
 produced upon their behalf to show disbelief in this scheme, or to exhibit 
 any criticisms of it, or the grounds upon which it was based. 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : There was Mr. Hunter. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : He is a member of a Liverpool firm. 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : No, he came from Manchester. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : I am distinctly told that Mr. Hunter is a member of 
 a firm which has a house in Liverpool, and who do a large forwarding 
 agency business there ; that must be a fact, which you can investigate for 
 yourselves. 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : I say distinctly he is not, and he was not asked the 
 question. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : I say again, until I am contradicted, that it is so. 
 He is asked this question : "You are resident managing partner in 
 Manchester of the firm of William Graham and Company ? — I am. (Q.) 
 Do they carry on a large business in Glasgow, Manchester, and Liverpool ? 
 — Yes, they do and elsewhere." 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : Then he is asked, " I believe your firm is about 
 the largest firm engaged in the export trade from Manchester ? — Yes, that 
 is so." 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : I dare say Sir W. Forwood exports Manchester goods 
 through Liverpool, but you would not say that Sir W. Forwood was not a 
 Liverpool man. I say again, Mr. Hunter is as much interested in 
 Liverpool as Manchester, but if you like to take Mr. Hunter as an 
 unimportant exception, you must. There has not been a man called 
 from Lancashire who has not an interest in Liverpool, produced either 
 to show that they disapprove or to exhibit criticism of our scheme in 
 any particular. Even Mr. Ellison, who is a Liverpool cotton broker, 
 has not been produced, although he has been vouched for two 
 years by Sir William Forwood. And yet it must have been easy, 
 according to my learned friend Mr. Pope's showing, to do this. 
 Where are the mooied classes of Manchester who stand aloof from 
 our scheme, or disapprove of it ? Could not the energy of the oppo- 
 nents' solicitor find one man to come forward and say, with my learned 
 friend, Mr. Pope, "This is all moonshine?" Could not Sir William. 
 Forwood, with all his ingenuity and hate of the scheme, hunt up one 
 man, to come and back him, out of all Lancashire ? Not even Mr. Hugh 
 Mason ? I say there is not a soul called who is worth talking about, 
 except Sir WiUiam Forwood, and his attack is confined, as the cross- 
 examination of all our witnesses was confined, day after day, to the 
 points I mentioned — brokerage, cartage, quay attendance, master por- 
 terage, and consumption per spindle. I forgot to mention brokerage just 
 now, when I mentioned the points Sir William Forwood raised. 
 
 Now I will, one after another, deal with Sir William Forwood as my
 
 6 The Cotton Trade. [Chap. ii. 
 
 opponent, upon brokerage, cartage, quay attendance, master porterage, 
 and the consumption per spindle. Sir William Forwood and ourselves are 
 at issue upon 2Jlbs. per spindle. He gives 37jlbs. as the average ; we give 
 401bs. It is characteristic of the carelessness of Sir William Forwood 
 that last year he put down the consumption per spindle at 321bs. 
 Obviously he was wrong last year, and, as we say, he is in the last 
 degree Hkely to be wrong in this. He vouched Mr. Ellison last year for 
 his 321bs.,and he vouches him this year for his 37|lbs. Then he further 
 insisted that Mr. Ellison's tables of consumption were the actual con- 
 sumption, and stood me out for a long time that it was so — that it was 
 an actual fact — and he drew a most elaborate distinction between 
 deliveries for consumption and consumption itself ; the latter dis- 
 tinction I admit would be substantial if our tables dealt with 
 deliveries for consumption only of one year ; but our Table 24 
 deals with the consumption for 30 years — for a whole generation. 
 It is clear, therefore, that our deliveries for consumption during 
 the 29 years out of the 30 must have been consumed, because 
 no one supposes — even Sir William Forwood did not go further 
 than to say that the consumer bought for more than a year in 
 advance, at all events. If so, I might ask. Where does he store it ? 
 Can many buyers store a 12 months' supply ? If they can, then all I 
 can say is, that the canal company need not bother itself about ware- 
 houses. But so much for the highly important difference between con- 
 sumption and delivery for consumption, which is entirely destroyed by 
 the fact that our table is not for one year, but for 30 years. 
 
 But there remains the other point with regard to consumption, 
 upon which Sir William Forwood was so positive, namely, first of all, 
 that Mr. Ellison's figures for consumption were actual. " Those figures 
 are absolute," says Sir William Forwood, upon page 1716 ; *' we have the 
 actual figures for consumption given by Mr. ElHson," he says at page 
 1714. Yet he is asked to admit to me that alter all it was an estimate. 
 This is said upon page 1714, and I think is worth looking at: "Now 
 is not Mr. Ellison's estimate of actual consumption an estimate ? — It is an 
 estimate." And I show him later on, Mr. Ellison's declaration quoted 
 from his own tables were under the head " Consumption of raw cotton 
 in Great Britain." This is the heading: " Statement of the actual de- 
 liveries, estimated consumption, and surplus stocks at the mills." But 
 not only did this appear upon Mr. Ellison's table, but* I should like to 
 call attention to a letter Mr. Ellison wrote us himself. On page 1740 
 you will find Mr. ElHson's own declaration of his inability to state the 
 actjLial consumption. We wrote to Mr. Ellison, as I put to Sir William 
 Forwood in cross-examination, to ask him how we could get at the con- 
 sumption per spindle, and we wrote thus : *' Could you favour me with a 
 sight of your statistics of the number of spindles and quantity 
 of cotton sent inland to the different towns in Lancashire for consumption 
 in the course of the year?- I have a number of statistics furnished 
 by a number of authorities but I am anxious to verify them. I shall be 
 happy to pay any charge on learning the amount." Now what was the
 
 CuAP. II.] The Cotton Trade, 7 
 
 answer from Mr. Ellison: "I regret to say that I have no means 
 of ascertaining the particulars you require. I have no doubt that you 
 will be able to obtain very full information from the secretaries of the 
 Masters' and Operatives' Associations in the various towns." That is 
 precisely what, many days ago, you were told we had done. We 
 had correspondence with those persons before Mr. Ellison told us, 
 and we got, not the deliveries for consumption from them, but we 
 got the exact amount of pounds per spindle consumed. What Mr. 
 Ellison suggests to us, therefore, as the right course, we had previously 
 adopted. While Sir William Forwood's own vouchee was, therefore, 
 unable to give me the information as he told us, he told us where 
 to get it, and we got it. Mark this, that with the fullest intention 
 of giving the evidence that he did give, Sir William Forwood never 
 instructs, directly or indirectly, and no one instructed my learned friends 
 to cross-examine any of the skilled witnesses we called, who could have 
 given the information as to the consumption per spindle of cotton in all 
 our mills. Now, when I cross-examined as to whether 40 lbs. was the 
 right amount or not, as the average consumption including waste and tear, 
 40 lbs. per spindle had been in the evidence ever since the first day Mr. 
 Adamson was put into the box. Any Oldham gentleman could have 
 answered the question at once. Why were they not asked ? And, more- 
 over, the inaccuracy must have been known to the opponents ail along. 
 They took several days to prepare the cross-examination of Mr. Adamson. 
 Why did not they cross-examine upon a point of that kind ? Besides, 
 there is this point on this question of deliveries for consumption, and con- 
 sumption, even if the cotton were wasted, or stored, or consumed by fire, 
 if you like, instead of by spindle, the delivery would still be actual ; and 
 all the saving in transit would arise -the saving is on every bale delivered 
 — it does not matter whether it is consumed or not. But I may go a great 
 deal beyond even Sir WiUiam Forwood, in the presumptions against 
 his evidence. Mr. Findlay gives in his evidence the strongest presump- 
 tion that we are right ; he gives the quantities of cotton carried within 
 what he calls the 12 mile radius ; and if you look at page 1854 you will 
 find that he gives that quantity at 474,292 tons ; it is Table C. Sir 
 William Forwood totals the consumption, irrespective of radius in the 
 spinning district; he gave it at 458,000 tons, we gave 508,000 tons. 
 Therefore, Mr. Findlay makes up that odd 16,000 tons out of the 
 50,000 tons difference between us and Sir William Forwood, and yet, 
 mind, Mr. Findlay, in cross-examination, confesses that the district coloured 
 red on his map is not nearly a real 12 mile radius. It leaves out many 
 stations on our Table No. 29, which shows the number of towns that 
 we save upon — I believe over 40 railway stations are left out by Mr. 
 Findlay. And further, Sir William Forwood allowed nothing for waste. 
 That I hold, therefore, most distinctly to be a combination of proof out of 
 the mouths of Sir William Forwood and Mr. Findlay that our consumption 
 of 40 lbs. per spindle is probably right. Mr. Findlay brings it up pretty 
 nearly half way between 37i lbs. and 40 lbs., and the towns Mr. Findlay 
 has not taken into consideration may be, will make up the odd 1^ lbs. I
 
 8 The Cotton Trade, [Chap, ir, 
 
 leave that point in all confidence with this quadruple defence. Mr. Ellison 
 says " I do not know, I cannot tell you." Then Sir William Forwood 
 says, I talk after Mr. Ellison ; Mr. Ellison says, that the way we have 
 gone about to find out is the right one. Thirdly, I say the saving in 
 transit would be upon deliveries and not actual consumption ; and fourthly, 
 I say that Mr. Findlay says what we say. 
 
 Now as to brokerage. This forms a very important item in our- 
 saving. The avoiding of the brokerage of 6s. a ton gives a saving of 
 £152,641, that is only avoidance of one brokerage. Now as to the 
 system of double brokerage at Liverpool. You can surely see how that 
 has arisen. It arose, undoubtedly, from the fact of distance, and it is 
 protected by the most rigid rules ; it is a trade union of very great 
 power and most uncompromising tenacity ; it is composed of wealthy 
 men, who know at once their strength, and their interest, and who use 
 their strength without scruple to protect their interest. The association 
 is so jealous that, as Sir William Forwood admitted, they black-balled a 
 candidate because he represented the principle of co-operation ; and 
 they fined a member d650 for acting alone between buyer and seller. 
 Mr. Fielden explains at the present time how difficult it is to evade the 
 association. Mr. Fielden says : " There are very close regulations in 
 Liverpool about the sale of cotton. The Cotton Brokers' Association, 
 injures the free sale of cotton. It is not a very easy matter. If a man 
 passes by the association he is a black sheep for the future ; that is why 
 so small an amount of cotton is bought direct between the spinners and 
 the merchants." That he says on page 116, in answer to Question 1625 
 — and then he adds what is extremely wise, and of great pertinence :. 
 " Whenever cotton or any other article rests upon the line of communica- 
 tion there is a growth of traders there and a growth of dealers, and they 
 interrupt the free flow direct of the article from the plantation to the 
 mill. Now, wherever it rests, there is a growth of traders — traders and 
 dealers are not likely to honour an article with that intermediate atten- 
 tion without a profit, and their interruption must be, of course, costly to* 
 industry, and become an indirect tax upon raw material. Now Mr. 
 Adamson in his table gives the exact amount at 6s. per ton. It seems to 
 me, I confess, to be ridiculous to suppose that this kind of " dual con- 
 trol " of the cotton trade is in the least degree necessary. So 
 ridiculous is it that Mr. Andrew, who is the secretary to the Oldham 
 Master Spinners' Association, tells you that the same nmn very often acts 
 the two parts — one broker acts the part of the buyers' and the 
 sellers' broker, receiving very often payment from both sides. I 
 wish I could manage to be on both sides occasionally ; it would add 
 a good deal to my slender gains. He says on page 132 that this 
 habit^ is notorious. Now, not even the ready Sir William Forwood, 
 who is a member of the Association, and has been president, contradicted 
 Mr. Andrew ; and he says they fined a man for acting between 
 the two, but it is perfectly obvious what he meant — namely, acting 
 for one fee. The same witness, Mr. Andrew, says that 90 per cent. 
 of the cotton sold in Liverpool is subject to this factitious and unnecessary
 
 CiiAP. II.] The Cotton Trade, 9 
 
 method of restriction. Mr. Bradbury insisted upon the (ibiKty 
 with which he could transact his purchases at Manchester if he got 
 the chance. He says, I could do it at Liverpool even, if it were not 
 for the rules of the Association. My learned friend, Mr. Aspinall, 
 indeed tried to make him admit in cross-examination that doing his 
 own broking would involve a great loss of time, but he declined to 
 admit it. He stuck to his guns, and it is obvious that Mr, Andrew is 
 right — that distance is really the great propagator of middlemen, and 
 that a parasite would have no chance of growing in what I would call 
 the healthy home atmosphere of Manchester. 
 
 My learned friend, Mr. Pope, had along discussion with Mr. Walmsley 
 about brokerage, which is on pages 90 and 91. My learned friend, Mr^ 
 Pope, insisted that you must have either a selling broker as well as a 
 buying broker, or an arbitrator, to settle disputes ; either you must have 
 the buying and selling brokers as he there mentioned, or you must have 
 an arbitrator to settle disputes in the event of your buying straight from 
 the merchant. But my learned friend, Mr. Pope, forgets that the buyer's 
 or the seller's broker on the one hand are not more likely to fall out with 
 the merchant than they are to fall out with the merchant's broker. 
 Why should they ? Why, if I employ a man to do my business, if I 
 cannot do it myself, am I a bit more likely to fall out with the principal 
 than with the intermediary ? I should have thought I was more likely 
 to fall out with the intermediary, and, as a matter of fact, they do 
 fall out with the intermediary ; which is proved by tjie fact that in 
 Liverpool you have three functionaries, two of whom you must employ^ 
 and one whom you may call in. You must call in the buyer's and seller's 
 broker, and you may have to call in a functionary called an arbitrator 
 of the Association to settle disputes. Mr. Walmsley goes the length of 
 saying, I should get rid of both brokers, I should find plenty of merchants 
 in Manchester who would show me samples, instead of merchants* 
 brokers, showing me them. He says, "I come into Manchester to 
 sell my yarns ; I should walk on to the merchant's warehouse, when in 
 Manchester, and buy my own cotton, and if they did not turn out to 
 be according to sample, then I should call in the arbitrator." Without 
 going so far as Mr. Walmsley was prepared to go, certainly one broker 
 would be abolished — ^^just see how the thing would work. One broker may 
 have 100 samples culled from a dozen merchants, from which the buyer 
 might choose safely- — it might be dangerous for a buyer to buy from 
 the ship, but a long-experienced spinner must be a judge of samples 
 and could buy from samples before him. The conclusion is obvious,, 
 that the system of double brokerage has grown up in Liverpool simply 
 because it is 40 miles from the Manchester mills— the ring, and those 
 who profit by it, is far too strong to be broken through so long as they 
 sell stufi" at Liverpool, but it will be broken through as soon as trade 
 moves to Manchester, and when that does occur there will be an 
 enormous saving on the raw material, of at least one brokerage,, 
 equal to 6s. a ton, which represents £152,000 a year. 
 
 That is the story about the brokerage. If your lordships do not
 
 10 The Cotton Trade. [Chap. il. 
 
 think it not merely a plausible story, not merely a likely story, but a 
 natural story, and a solution, in part, of great and difficult problems, I 
 must say I shall be astonished. That serves me, therefore, upon 
 those two points — unless my review of the evidence is altogether 
 erroneous — the consumption of cotton per spindle, and certainly proves 
 as clearly as inference can prove it that there will be a saving of 6s. 
 a ton upon the amount of the article consumed by the abolition of only 
 one of these middlemen. If Mr. Walmsley is right we shall have double 
 the saving ; but for that we have not taken credit. We have been in that 
 particular, as I venture to assert, in spite of Mr. Littler, we have been all 
 through moderate and modest in our estimate of the saving. 
 
 And now for the cartage. To begin with, the amount put down 
 by Mr. Adamson as an element in saving for cartage was not an esti- 
 mate ; it was an actual offer by a carter, and inasmuch as this cartage 
 is really an important item, I will venture to risk losing a minute or two 
 to show you that it was so. My learned friend, Mr. Balfour Browne, at 
 page 20, asked Mr. Adamson this question. He states what the cartage 
 is to be, and then your Grace asked him yourself at No. 188 : *' Do you 
 ever use this land carriage to Manchester now ? — No. The Cheshire 
 Lines Committee have one of their lines passing from Liverpool via 
 Stockport, and we have a direct railway communication with the mill. 
 Mr. Balfour Browne : The carter is employed in carrying your yarns 
 into Manchester? — Yes, every day. (Q.) You know the cost of carriage 
 and you have put down a fair and sufficient sum ? — It is his offer to do 
 it as a maximum." That, you see, is better than all the inference which 
 Sir William Forwood may draw as to what he thinks at the present 
 time ought to be the price of cartage. But Mr. Leigh, the cotton spinner 
 of Stockport, which is about seven miles from Manchester, went much 
 beyond Mr. Adamson. At page 214 he tells you that he has inquired 
 of many carters, and 3s. a ton to Stockport is the average price quoted 
 to him. That is in answer to Question 2921 : " What ground have you 
 for supposing that you could carry that distance cotton for 3s.?" and he 
 says : "I have asked several carriers what their charge would be, and 
 8s. is the average of the prices that were given to me, and I know that 
 the back carriage of 3s. would leave a profit to the carrier." Now 
 there you see Mr. Adamson has asked one, and Mr. Leigh, of Stockport, 
 had asked a great many. Here, again, I claim moderation. We allow 
 3s. 6d. to Stockport, and the several carters told Mr. Leigh that they 
 would do it for 3s., so that we were 6d. over the mark. My learned 
 friend, Mr. Aspinall, cross-examined Mr. Leigh to show that the stock of 
 carts would fail. If so, all I can say is that the cartwrights' and wheel- 
 wrights' trade is one that would obviously be revivified to a considerable 
 extent round Manchester, but that is all nonsense. Mr. Adamson tells you, 
 at page 155, that the contract price in Manchester is 5d. per ton per mile 
 for short distances, which is rather under our rate for long distances ; he is 
 asked at Question 2200, "What do you cart at 5d. per ton per mile ? — Manu- 
 factured goods." At 2197 he is asked what it should be, " How much per ton 
 per mile you are accustomed to that ? — Mr. Bradbury says his goods
 
 CuAP. II.] The Cotton Trade, 11 
 
 cost him (Q.) I would rather you told me ?— 5d. per ton per mile.'' 
 
 Mr. Barlow, cotton spinner, of Bolton, another experienced witness, put it 
 rather lower. He gives evidence which works out at 4s. a ton for ten miles. 
 At page 168, Question 2399 : " What does it at present cost you to cart 
 from Bolton to Manchester? -Somewhere about 6s. a ton, but we anti- 
 cipate that if we could give the cart and horses back carriage we could 
 reduce that considerably and easily get it done for 4s. (Q.) That is 
 without back cargo ?— We have no back cargo. (Q.) That is 4s. a ton 
 for 10 miles?— Yes." You see, if you work it out, it is 4'80d. per ton 
 per mile. Mr. Bradbury says the Ashton cartage will be 3s., and he bases 
 that upon the actual charge from Manchester to his mill, of 2s. 6d., and 
 he says. Your docks at Throstle Nest will be a mile or a mile and a half 
 further from me than the Railway Station at Manchester is, so I put 
 another 6d. on, bringing it to 3s, 
 
 Again, your Grace, our table, which Mr. Bradbury says need not be higher 
 than 3s. to Ashton, is 8s. 6d., so again we are there over the mark. Mr. 
 Walmsley, once more referring to his Stockport charges, says, I pay 6s. 8d. 
 now to Stockport ; it will be 3s. 6d. because I can ensure my back fare. 
 
 But passing by these gentlemen, who after all, though they have 
 talked to carters and know what they pay now, are somewhat in the 
 position of witnesses giving secondary evidence, let me go to what Mr. 
 Priest, the carter, the high priest of his trade, says on page 846, and if he 
 is not enough for Sir William Forwood, I will try another remedy with 
 him before I have done. Mr. Priest says, I will cart, if, a return load 
 is given me, at 5d. a ton a mile. I will cart within a radius of two 
 miles for Is. 6d., showing, therefore, that the short distance pays 
 somewhat more than the longer, and, says he, I will go to Oldham now 
 for a guinea, taking and fetching four tons each way, that is eight tons. 
 Now, if you take Mr. Priest's evidence, in which he says distinctly^ that 
 he will go to Oldham and back again for a guinea, and then divide it by 
 the mileage, it works out at 2s. Tjd. a ton altogether, and at the mileage 
 it is something very small mdeed, but it works out at 2s. 7jd. per ton 
 between Manchester and Oldham. Now, if you look at Table 28 
 again, the table with which we are taunted as being absurd and 
 immoderate, we allow 4s. for Oldham, that is to say Is. 4jd. more than 
 Mr. Priest, the carter, says he will do it for. As this cartage is an impor- 
 tant matter, because ,it is part of our route, I do trust that I 
 may not seem to be pertinacious in asking your lordships to refer to Mr. 
 Priest's evidence, beginning upon page 845 and ending on page 850 — it 
 is in cross-examination by Mr. Sutton — he gives 21s., which Mr. Sutton 
 puts at 3d. a mile, though his arithmetic is wrong ; and therefore for 
 Oldham, which is one of the most important of all our stations and towns, 
 we make our saving too little upon the cartage ; we ought to have made the 
 total saving 8s. 3Jd. per ton, if we put the cartage at Mr. Priest's figures, at 
 2s. 7^d. instead of 4s., adding Is. 4jd. to the total savings— to Oldham, 
 one of the largest of all the consuming towns in Lancashire for raw- 
 cotton— taking the 4s , it would make 32s. for 8 tons against Mr. Priest's 
 guinea, or an addition of 50 per cent.
 
 12 The Cotton Trade. [Chap, ii, 
 
 I should like to wind up the evidence upon the cartage, not with 
 the evidence of our own experienced traders, not w^th the evidence of 
 the carter who is an expert in the trade, but with the evidence of Sir 
 William Forwood himself, given in 1881, only two years ago. 
 You will find it, in case you have not got the evidence of 1881, which is 
 quite possible, if you turn to page 174 (i, Question 22849 of this year, 
 where it is repeated. I may as well read it from there, though 
 I have the evidence of 1881 before me. "I should like you to 
 go to what you say about cartage in your evidence of 1881 upon 
 page 97, Question 1956. With regard to the rate to Manchester 
 you said you had an ofi'er of 8s. a ton to be carried by carts ? — 
 Yes, for a distance of 31 miles. (Q.) Have you tested it yourself as a 
 practical person to ascertain whether it is really a valid ofi'er ? — Looking 
 to the position of the man who made the offer, I think I may accept it as 
 a valid offer. (Q.) Do you know the nature of the road between Liver- 
 pool and Manchester ? — It is a very level road directly after you get out 
 of Liverpool. (Q.) I suppose two horses would draw three tons ? — 
 They would draw four tons I think upon that road. (Q.) That is to say 
 in a well-constructed wagon ? — Yes. (Q.) I suppose they would require 
 something like three days to go there and come back ? — I should imagine 
 that they would work by stages, leaving the horses at fixed stages. (Q. ) 
 I presume that team w^ould cost something like 10s. a day, would it not ; 
 that is to say, two horses and a man ? — I should think so, from 10s. to 
 12s. a day. (Q.) So that the owner of the horses would have 48s. 
 if the expenses were 12s. a day for the distance ? — Yes, that 
 would be about it, and 32s. each way for the carriage. (Q.) That 
 is 48s. that he would actually have to pay for expenses and the 
 carriage would be 32s. each way, so that he could do it and have a 
 profit ? — He could do it upon that showing and have a profit upon that. 
 (Q.) That brings you to the conclusion you expressed at the beginning 
 of your evidence that you were no better off at Liverpool now with rail- 
 ways than you were before you had them ? — I stated that with regard to 
 the rates by the canals before the railway times upon the Duke of Bridge- 
 water's canal." There is Sir William Forwood, who adds enormously to 
 our cartage, actually declaring that he has had a substantial offer from a 
 man he could trust, two or three years ago, to do his cartage for 31 
 miles for 8s. for 4 ton loads, just over 3d. a ton a mile, and not a word was 
 suggested about back carriage. Well, that seems to me to be pretty 
 opalescent sort of evidence which gives a different colour in almost every 
 light in which you exhibit it. The back carriage can be easily arranged 
 by these traders, by choosing the day to have the raw cotton in when 
 their yarn is being sent to Manchester. 
 
 Now, have I or not made good my cartage point out of the mouths 
 of competent witnesses called by me, and also out of the mouth of a 
 witness whom the other side must admit to be competent, even though I 
 do not agree with them ? 
 
 Then I go to the master porterage question and the quay atten- 
 dance ; there can surely be no question that it is a gross abuse which exists
 
 Chap. II.] The Cottou Trade. 13 
 
 in Liverpool to Lancashire's cost, and at no other port in the United King- 
 dom. It is an aggregate charge for master porterage alone of Is. 2Jd. a ton, 
 covering 18 alleged services. Very few of these are ordinarily necessary as 
 stated by Mr. Marshall Stevens, who has his long experience at Garston 
 to guide him as to what need be done with a bale of cotton when coming 
 into port, yet the payment upon one and all, whether one out of 18 or 
 the whole 18 are performed, or none, is absolutely compulsory. My 
 learned friend, Mr. Pope, tries once or twice to say that quay attendance, 
 for which another Is. per ton is charged at Liverpool, is an " inventive 
 term," but Mr. Marshall Stevens says it is invariable. Mr. Marshall 
 Stevens says, " I copied it from the London and North -Western 
 rate books :" how can it be invented or contestable? He says, I copied 
 from the London and North-Western rate books. Mr. Crossley and Mr. 
 Adamson produced invoices, and they say the charges which appear 
 there are invariably made, and these are payments which are inevitable 
 and payable. Mr. Crossley says so on page 279, in answer to Question 
 4080, and Mr. Adamson says so on page 165, in answer to Question 
 2339. Now that being so, it is no answer if it is an abuse, and if it is 
 useless and unique, to say it is statutory. There very likely was at the 
 time Parliament passed the Mersey Dock Act about master porterage a still 
 greater abuse existing, of which the present system of master porterage, for 
 all I know, may have been a slight or a great amelioration. But remember 
 that statute is a dock board statute ; it does not bear the same imprima- 
 tur, to use Mr. Littler's funny phrase, of Parliament, • that a public 
 statute bears when passed in consequence of being brought forward by 
 a great department. It was settled between the dock board and the 
 shipowners — they asked Parliament to sanction it, and it was sanctioned — 
 I do not suppose Parliament went deeply into the matter, but it was 
 done. But Parliament has never said — holding the scale between the 
 traders who pay this master porterage and the dock authorities — you 
 traders shall pay this impost whether you have the services performed 
 which it represents or not. Of course it is a very profitable thing to 
 shipowners, no doubt, and to other master porters. One or two ship- 
 owners affect to say it is not, but they will not show their accounts, and 
 one or two say they do not keep any. Mr. Squarey, the Dock Board 
 solicitor, admitted in evidence in 1880 that it was a profitable business. 
 No professional master porter other than a steamship owner, no dele- 
 gated master porter is brought to prove that it is what farmers call a 
 very near thing ; and why these high charges are necessary only at 
 Liverpool is what we want to know. There is no attempt to prove its 
 existence at Hull, Glasgow, Bristol, Southampton, or any other port. We 
 know what a ton of cotton can be passed through Fleetwood and Garston 
 for ; and on Fleetwood and Garston let me say this — it is absurd to twit 
 us with their being railway ports. Mr. Pope and Mr. Aspinall suggest that 
 the work is done at a loss to attract trafiic at Garston and Fleetwood, be- 
 cause they were railway ports, and that the railway rate recoups them ; but 
 the competition between Fleetwood and Garston is an ordinary competition 
 between the Lancashire and Yorkshire Kailway Company and the London
 
 14 The Cotton Trade, [Chap. ii. 
 
 and North- Western Railway Company ; their docks are part of their system, 
 and there is no greater competition between their docks than there is between 
 their railways, and there is no reason why companies should carry on a 
 more ruinous competition at their docks than upon their own lines of 
 railway. That the railway rate recoups them the loss of the dock due is 
 simply absurd. How can it be ? Fleetwood is 50 miles from Manches- 
 ter, Liverpool is only 31 miles, therefore the Fleetwood rate is leaner, to 
 use their own phrase, than the Manchester rate. Moreover, if their 
 suggestion was a true one, how grossly unfair it makes the rate from 
 Liverpool to Manchester. If the Fleetwood rate is so large and ample 
 that it covers a profit upon 50 miles of railway transit to Manchester, 
 and also the loss on the docks, what must the same rate be between 
 Liverpool and Manchester, only 31 miles instead of 50, when it has no 
 dock dues to cover ? But Hull, Bristol, and Glasgow are not railway 
 ports. It is no good pointing out the smallness of the business done at 
 Garston ; the larger the business the more cheaply it should be done per ton» 
 Sir William Forwood says in 1881 that " There is no cheaper traffic than 
 that between Manchester and Liverpool — it is a continuous flow each 
 way." It is, in fact, the case of wholesale price against retail. But 
 besides that they forget this also, that we should be in a position analogous to 
 the railway company. We are not a mere dock company; we have a longish 
 navigation upon which we are to take tolls outside our docks, to which 
 we want to attract traffic. But it is all nonsense and mere fabrication, 
 as you will find by referring to Mr. Marshall Stevens, upon page 400. 
 There he tells you this, that the London and North- Western Company 
 used to employ stevedores to do the work ; they paid them all round a 
 sum which was less than what they charged the public ; therefore, the 
 stevedore lived out of that sum, and the railway company made a 
 certain profit ; but in 1882, he says, the London and North Western 
 Company came to the conclusion that they might do it themselves for 
 less than they paid the stevedores, and so they took it from the steve 
 dores, securing a larger profit than in charging the public Is., and giving 
 the stevedore, say 9d. ; that is a larger profit than the 3d. by doing it 
 themselves. 
 
 Now that, if it went no further, is proof positive that the cost at 
 which a ton of cotton is passed through Garston or Fleetwood involves 
 a profit to those passing it through. But Mr. Findlay, who alone could 
 have proved that there was a loss at Garston — becauscnobody was called 
 about Fleetwood — does not do it ; and not only that, but by the merest 
 accident he proves that there is a profit ; and it was very funny — if you 
 look at page 1911 it is very curious indeed. He tells you there the 
 receipts and expenses of Garston Dock for the year 1883. Will your 
 lordships first kindly look at the first item of the receipts, that is for 
 porterage, £38,320 ? All the subsequent receipts are irrelevant to the 
 issue — " Stores, dock dues, ballast, water, slates, tipping coal at 3d. per 
 ton," all that is irrelevant ; the one relevant item is £38,320, which is 
 receipt for porterage. Now take expenses — " Maintenance of dock 
 masts," irrelevant; "Dredging dock," irrelevant; "Depreciation of
 
 Chap. II.] The Cotton Trade. 15 
 
 dredgers," irrelevant; " Repairs to cranes," irrelevant: "Superinten- 
 dence," irrelevant; "Wages," irrelevant; "Materials," irrelevant; 
 " Fuel," irrelevant ; " Gas, water, stores, plant, &c.," all irrelevant, but the 
 one relevant item is " Wages of dock labourers loading vessels, &c., 
 £34,280." Now take the £34,280 from the £38,320, and you get a 
 profit of £4,010, which is just a trifle under 12 per cent, profit, an unim- 
 portant fraction under 12 per cent, profit ; and mark that the work there 
 includes all the services rendered or necessary, all the services in the 
 nature of railway terminals ; so that a ton of cotton to Garston for the 
 charge of 6d. a ton is taken from the ship's side and put on the railway 
 truck and sent ofi", at the charge of 6d. a ton, to the owner or consignee, 
 and at a profit of 1 2 per cent, to the railway company. It is simple demon- 
 stration. 
 
 Now what do we do ? We estimate as our charges not the Garston 
 rates. Again we are over the mark ; we estimate 9d. for master por- 
 terage, the same as at Fleetwood, and 6d. for quay attendance — in 
 other words, Is. 3d. We are 3d. over Garston, in respect of master 
 porterage, which would add 25 per cent, to the profits of Garston — 
 it would mean, therefore, a profit to us of 15 per cent, on the 
 transaction. We should make that obviously ; but we have not left our- 
 selves the chance of making it legally, because by Section 82 of our 
 Bill we limit ourselves, in charging for these services, to the actual cost 
 of those services plus 10 per cent, to cover profits. So that we should 
 be a little under Garston, and the saving to the cotton trade would be 
 greater than Table 28 shows. I mean that if Garston gives a profit of 
 12 per cent., and we are only entiiled to 10 per cent., our charges must be 
 somewhat under the charges per ton of the London and North- Western 
 Company at Garston, and therefore the saving to the cotton trade in respect 
 of master porterage is considerably more than represented by the 
 saving which gives 9d. for that service, as Garston, with a 6d. rate, 
 yields 12 per cent, profit, and our clause only enables us to charge 10 per 
 cent. Quay attendance, for which Is. per ton is charged at Liverpool, 
 will be practically done away with, as the spinner or his clerks will be 
 able to see to it himself. However, we have debited ourselves with 6d. 
 per ton for that service to be quite safe, although the charge is needless. 
 That is the vvay I deal with Sir William Forwnod's attack upon our 
 Table 28, which is practically dealing with his Table No. 3, because his 
 Table No. 3 was a counter table that he put in to our Table No. 28. 
 
 I have gone, as I promised, through the method by which he reduces 
 our total savings on raw cotton imported in the matter of mere transit 
 £158,000 to £74,157. Now it is for you and your colleagues to say 
 whether I have or not given a conclusive and careful answer to one 
 point after another. If Sir William Forwood is right, how many distinct 
 traders, one and all as important as himself, are wrong upon this matter 
 • — experts who know their own business. They have no interest in 
 deceiving themselves in this matter. What on earth would be the use of 
 a perfectly useless scheme to them ? This canal would be not the slightest 
 use to them unless it would save them the money they think it will save ;
 
 16 The Cotton Trade. [Chap. ii. 
 
 and they would not trouble themselves to give evidence upon it unless they 
 assured themselves that it would do so. They have no cause for mental blind- 
 ness, but Sir WiUiam Forwood has all the usual cases of mental blindness 
 —he has prejudice, as he showed most distinctly ; he has self-interest, 
 because he is bound up with Liverpool, and I am bound to add he is not 
 free from that spleen which is evinced in more quarters than one about 
 this scheme. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 SAVINGS TO THE COTTON AND OTHER TRADES. 
 
 I pass, therefore, from that Table 28 fearless and confident that it 
 iias been clearly established by witnesses in support of it, and not 
 shaken by one witness called against it. As to the aggregate savings at 
 the different places, you must judge of that by the consumption of the 
 different places ; but you had enormously large figures given you. 
 Mr. Bradbury, speaking for Ashton, in answer to questions ranging from 
 1339 to 1352, said that it will save Ashton £30,000 a year. Mr. Andrew 
 said that it would save Oldham £60,000 a year in raw cotton alone. Mr. 
 Barlow, speaking for Bolton, said that it would save Bolton £12,000 a 
 year. Now Mr. Andrew gave that answer to Question 1843, and Mr. 
 Barlow to Question 2411. Now upon those three towns alone, and I 
 took them as specimens — and Bolton is not one of the towns we serve 
 most — there is a saving of £102,000 upon the raw cotton imported. 
 
 Now this, remember, is on the cotton trade alone, and for three 
 towns out of 18 which are in Mr. Adamson's Table No. 28. Sir William 
 Norwood does not condescend to take into account any of the savings to 
 the other trades, but of what they are you have one or two fair illustrations. 
 Now, on Manchester goods, Mr. Mendel says, speaking of what his former 
 business was : " If I were transacting business as I used to transact it 
 when in business, the saving in my business in consequence of this canal 
 would be £5,000 a year to our firm," that is upon page 265. In answer 
 to Question 38^^.6, Mr. Lieben says it would save him £1,000 a year. Mr. 
 Spencer says it would save Rylands and Company £2,500 to £3,000 a 
 year, that is on Manchester goods. On iron ore, to go to another trade, 
 the saving would be, according to Mr. McNeil, on page 235, on railway- 
 borne iron ore, for some comes by railway and some by sea, and the 
 Bridgewater Canal, the saving would be 4s. 2d per ton. On the sea- 
 borne and the Bridgewater Canal borne iron ore, it would be less — 
 3s. lOd.; and he adds that Manchester is admirably adapted for the 
 iron trade, and only wants to be upon the seaboard to rival rapidly the 
 Tyne. That is Mr. McNeil, a gentleman of great experience in the iron 
 and metal trades — that is his evidence in answer to Questions 3297 to 
 S317.
 
 Chap. III.] Savings to the Cotton and other Trades. 17 
 
 Now, as to the manufactured iron trade, there is Mr. Bowes, who 
 appeared as the representative of Barningham and Company. He says 
 it will save his firm £2,000 a year. Mr. Ashbury, speaking for the 
 Ashbury Carriage Company, says it will save him £4,900 a year. Messrs. 
 Piatt Brothers, the largest manufacturers of machinery in their own way 
 in the kingdom, says that it will save them £7,500 a year. In the timber 
 trade Mr. Bradford says that there will be a saving of from 4s. to 5s. a 
 ton. In the grain trade Mr. Render says that to himself alone there 
 would be a saving of 4s. lid. a ton, and conceive what the grain trade of this 
 •district must be. Mr. Render says that to himself personally the saving 
 would be £6,000 a year. Mr. Scarborough, speaking for the wool trade 
 of Yorkshire, says : I am certain of a large saving ; and he says this is an 
 enormous trade ; and Mr. Crossley, who comes from Halifax, says that 
 he pays no less than £8,000 or £9,000 a year in carriage. 
 
 With regard to these savings I have only given you a few of those 
 that have been proved. These savings to individual firms or to towns 
 are enormous, and they point to enormous traffic and the traffic of many 
 towns. Do you suppose that these men who come to give these figures, and 
 who have gone into the thing, not suddenly but for a long time, and who 
 give their evidence before Parliament for the second time in two consecutive 
 years, are all unconsciously or consciously blind ? And do you suppose, 
 on the other hand, that if they are right and clear-sighted, and know 
 their own business and interests, that the canal will not be made, and 
 that they will not take care that it will be made, and, if made, that it will 
 not be used to an enormous extent ? Mr. Warburton says that the con- 
 sumption of flour alone within seven miles of Manchester is 150,000 tons, 
 and he says the saving on flour would be 6s. a ton. The total saving 
 on this one article of food of the population, within seven miles of one 
 <;ity, would be £45,000 a year. At page 355 he gives the sum total of 
 saving upon other grain, and gives the grand total of saving on the grain 
 and flour trade for this population within seven miles of Manchester only, 
 at £90,000 a year. And Mr. Warburton was not cross-examined. 
 
 Lord SHUTE : What is the aggregate saving on cotton ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : That is at the foot of Table 30, on the last line. The 
 total saving on the total quantity of raw cotton only, and manufactured 
 cotton goods, or upon the export trade in and out ; but the saving on raw 
 cotton is in Table 28, and that is £158,926. But if your lordship will 
 turn now to Table 30, you will see a summary of the estimate — " Entire 
 savings to the cotton trade by the Ship Canal :" it is on page 30 of the 
 tables, this is the way it is taken. On 508,000 tons used by mills within 
 cartage distance of Manchester, a saving of 6s. 3d. a ton, which is an 
 average of the savings in Table 28, because some of the savings go beyond 
 6s. 3d. a ton ; for instance, Ashton is 7s. 3d.; Manchester, 7s. 8d.; Middle- 
 ton, 7s. 5d.; Mossley, 7s., and so on — Oldham, 6s. lid.; the average of 
 the savings we take all through, town by town, at 6s. 3d., though we 
 there go against ourselves — where the savings are greatest it means the 
 greatest consumption, so it is very much against ourselves, if we put 
 (down the average savings at £158,926 upon the raw material. 
 
 B
 
 18 Savings to the Cotton and other Trades. [Chap, hi. 
 
 Then that again is on the supposition that we charge the maximum 
 rates upon the canal, but in taking credit to ourselves for income I have 
 always been careful to calculate only 5s. a ton as what we should receive 
 — if you remember, I did that in my opening speech, so that on the sup- 
 position that we only charge 5s. on canal toll and wharfage, it would be 
 a saving of Is. a ton, and it would give us an extra £25,440. Then 
 there is the avoidance of one brokerage, 6s. a ton, £152,000 — lower 
 charges for dock quay services ; then those charges at Liverpool, say 6d. ; 
 average saving per ton, 14s. 9d., making a total of £387,887. Then 
 we add a very small sum, that is unimportant, for the spindles, in 
 Yorkshire of £9,000, making a total saving of £397,246. Those are the 
 total savings on the imports of cotton. On the exports you see that we 
 save £110,000, nothing nearly so large — that brings up the grand total 
 of saving in the cotton trade to £508,035. It is worth remembering that 
 Sir William Forwood never touched the question of outward cargo. He 
 showed that we should only save £74,000 on a limited quantity of raw 
 cotton imported reducing the savings in the unwarrantable way 
 suggested by him, but he takes no heed of the facts that there is outward 
 trade to be considered also. But when you asked me a question about 
 Table 30 I had just said that the saving in the grain trade and the flour 
 trade was no less than £90,000 to the population within seven miles of 
 Manchester. Upon that question of cheapening food Mr. Fielden said there 
 were 3,000,000 persons at the present time m^aking Manchester their food 
 market. He is not cross-examined on that point at all. Every man, he 
 says, over the United Kingdom consumes £5 sterling worth of imported 
 food. Each man, he says, of one sort or another consumes "6 cwt. of im- 
 ported food in the year — it seems a great deal, but it is not much when you 
 come to divide it by 365 ; it comes to lib. 9oz. per day. The import into 
 Liverpoolof flour or grain 1,822,000 tons, provisions 527,000 tons, fruit 
 68,000 tons; in all a tonnage of 2,417,000 tons. Now, roughly, 
 2,400,000 tons represents 48,000,000 cwt,, in other words food accord- 
 ing to that calculation for 6J millions of men. Now Mr. Fielden also 
 says that he knows statistically that the working man feeds himself 15 
 per cent, cheaper in Liverpool than he does at Manchester, that is at 
 page 119. Now if Manchester as a port did no more than serve the 
 3,000,000 people as a port which she now serves as an inland market, see 
 what a benefit she would confer ; but conceive how the i)enefit w^ould be 
 quadrupled if, as a port, she helped in that way to save 15 per cent, to 
 a vastly larger area of population. 
 
 CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 DEPRESSION IN TRADE— FOREIGN COMPETITION. 
 
 Now I might ask after all that, have you any doubt as to the volume 
 of the trade, or any doubt as to the saving to be eff'ected, and were yow 
 misled by the trumpery evidence on the other side as to the impor-
 
 CiiAP. lY.] Depression in Trade — Foreign Competition. 19 
 
 tance of either table by Sir William Forwood or Mr. FincUay ? By Sir 
 William Forwood, who has the courage to insist that the cotton trade is 
 prosperous, in the face of the traders who come and tell you not only 
 that it is the reverse to the manufacturers but that its very existence is at 
 stake ! Not only does the trade tell you that ; you might have thought 
 perhaps that they were unduly discontented with the profit they make ; but 
 Mr. Hall, Lord Stamford's agent, is perfectly independent of the traders. 
 We called him, and he says, at page 229, how very great the depression is. 
 He is a justice of the peace, and there are 70 cotton mills upon the Stamford 
 property. Then he says, in answer to Question 3172, "I understand 
 there is great depression in the trade. The cotton spinners complain 
 much of the bad trade, that is, that they have had no profit. They have 
 been carrying on their concerns without any profit or with very little 
 profit. (Q.) Have you felt the efi'ecb of it at all upon letting land ? — 
 Yes, I think there is no doubt about that. We have not sold anything near 
 so much land for mills and other objects connected with trade during 
 the last six or seven or eight years as we did previously," and then he 
 talked about the high rates upon which I do not want his evidence ; 
 but he says distinctly that depression is widespread, that his employer, 
 the owner of property, sufi'ers from it, and further he says that he fully 
 believes in the canal. Mr. Spencer, of Rylands and Sons, says that 
 foreign competition grows more and more, and becomes more burthen- 
 some every day. Mr. Thomas Wilson says, speaking of Indian competi- 
 tion, what the growth is, and says how this canal would involve a shifting 
 of the lines upon which we can compete for the supply not only of India 
 but of the market which India underselKng us, is beginning to supply ; 
 yet Sir William Forwood comes forward and tells you, in the face of 
 these gentlemen, that the trade is not pressed by foreign competition ; and 
 he tells you this in the face of gentlemen who came and spoke to the 
 very nations who undersell them, and tell you the markets in which they 
 are undersold. Mr. Lieben tells you that Switzerland undersells him 
 in the Italian markets, that Austria undersells him in the Servian 
 markets, and he says that a saving of 5s. a ton will just enable him io 
 compete. Mr. Walmsley says France, Germany, Spain, India and the 
 United States are increasmg their spinning power by vast strides at the 
 expense of England ; he tells you that the Enghsh exports to Japan in 
 1880 were 27,000,000 pounds of yarn ; in 1882 only 19,000,000 pounds 
 of yarn — a decrease of 30 per cent. He tells you that the Indian exports 
 — in the decade we have just passed through — had risen from 
 £121,469 to £1,330,051 odd; in other words, a rise of 1,000 
 per cent., and all that in those very markets, China and Japan 
 and the Straits Settlements, which India supplies and we used to 
 supply. Mr. Ogden says large concerns work at a profit of Id. 
 upon 8s. ; is not that making the trade a very near thing ? Mr. Ogden 
 shows that the Indian yarn exportation was greater in 1888 than in 
 1882. Mr. Walmsley had only carried it down to J 882 ; Mr. Cdgen 
 takes it to 1883, and he says it was 1,870,000 against Mr. Walmsley's 
 1,300,000, and he says the Indian cloth between 1872 and 1883 had gone
 
 20 Depression in Trade — Foreign Competition. [Chap. if. 
 
 up from £1,000,000 to £2,000,000. What is the use of Sir William 
 Forwood attempting to gainsay such figures as those ? This same gentle- 
 man, Mr. Ogden, who I may parenthetically observe, says that 32 con- 
 cerns out of 40 have lately gone down — shows in cross-examination by 
 my learned friend, Mr. Bidder, who wanted to tell him that 5s. a ton was 
 a very small thing, that it was sufficient to turn the market against us ; 5s. 
 a ton which Sir William Forwood thought enough to turn the trade in 1881, 
 and make them choose one route instead of another, Mr. Fielden says 
 that the loss upon capital in the Cotton Trade in the years 1877, 1878, 
 and 1879 was no less than £20,000,000 sterling. Mr. Ogden also shows 
 that the saving of 5s. a ton, which Sir W^illiam Forwood in 1881 
 thought would be enough to turn the trade, is to be calculated, not 
 upon the value of £150 per ton of the product produced, but upon the 
 profit made, and that on the profit of 2 per cent, an addition of 5s. is an 
 addition of 12| per cent., and if, as Mr. Ogden says, he would readily 
 sell at 1 per cent, commission and be thankful — then 5s. a ton is an 
 increase of 25 per cent, upon his profit. 
 
 That is the way to test our 5s. a ton. What does Sir William 
 Forwood mean by teUing you 5s. is unimportant, if, as he said in 1881, it is 
 enough to turn the whole trade from one road to another ? — Merchants 
 do not dislocate a large trade for unimportant trifles. Mr. Woods, of 
 Warrington, shows the competition in the w4re trade for Australia, 
 which is a very large trade, a competition between Germany and England 
 for the supply of our own colony ; he says the wire starts from London in 
 Australian ships— it comes from Cologne to London for lis. to lis. 6d., 
 and it costs him from Warrington to London 17s. 6d., in other words 
 6s. or 7s. more. Germany, he says, cannot produce it cheaper, but it is 
 the transit that beats him. That is all upon the question of the saving 
 by transit, and the enormous value which the saving represents that it 
 is in the last degree necessary to say to you. 
 
 CHAPTEK V. 
 
 EQUAL SEA FREIGHTS. 
 
 But, your Grace, there are other points in the case which touch 
 upon the question as to whether we shall save which are very important, 
 and those I will deal with one by one. There is a question whether we 
 shall have equal freights to Manchester as to Liverpool ; that, of course, is 
 a crucial test. If Sir William Forwood were right, and we should have 
 to pay more upon freights from America, for a few hours extra journey to 
 Manchester than to Liverpool, which seems absurd upon the face of it, 
 some of the gilt would be taken off" our gingerbread ; but see how 
 the evidence stands upon that point. No less than 14 witnesses of
 
 Chap. V.] Equal Sea Freights. 21 
 
 great experience have given the most positive evidence upon this point 
 in our favour, namely, that the freight will be equal — seven of these 
 are shipowners, and these are not mere opinions that they volunteer. 
 They give you a string of most conclusive facts and illustrations. The 
 sort of gentlemen who give evidence are these — I do not think I have 
 taken them all down : Mr. Spencer, of Rylands and Company, 
 obviously import and export merchants of great experience, whose trade 
 is on a scale of very great magnitude ; Mr. Bradbury, of Gartside and 
 Company, of Ashton; and a very considerable person is Mr. Leigh, 
 of Stockport, a large spinner and direct importer of cotton ; Mr. Wilson, 
 of Nasmyth and Company ; Mr. Behrens, of Sir Jacob Behrens and 
 Company, Manchester and Bradford ; Mr. Lieben, of H. P. Nathan and 
 Sons, Manchester : Mr. Woods, a wire manufacturer, whose evidence 
 I have quoted. Then I come to the shipowners. I come to Mr. Browne, 
 a shipowner of Glasgow, a thoroughly well-known shipowner in a large 
 way ; Mr. Marshall Stevens, a steamship agent of Liverpool and 
 Garston ; Mr. Edwards, a shipowner of Cardiff; Mr. Raeburn, the 
 chairman of the Clyde Steamship Owners' Association ; Mr. Scrutton, 
 of London ; Mr. Hutchison, an equally well-known steamship owner of 
 Glasgow ; Mr. Macdougall, of Lindsay and Company, shipowners, 
 Greenock. Now here is an array of most positive evidence of the very 
 strongest and the most substantial order, which no mere negative evidence 
 can possibly gainsay. It is no use Sir William Forwood coming forward 
 to say they will not bring their ships — they come and say they will — 
 what is the use of his saying they will not ? Mr. Browne says a couple 
 of days will make no difference ; he says he charters vessels loading at 
 San Francisco or Calcutta, as the case may be, to call at Falmouth for 
 orders. Mr. Marshall Stevens having previously explained to you the 
 system of ports of call — then Mr. Browne says, I send them to Leith, to 
 Limerick, or to Liverpool at equal rates. Now, I pause to say this : 
 what would there be comparable in a voyage up to Liverpool from Man- 
 chester to the difference of a journey coming from Falmouth to Limerick, 
 and Falmouth to Leith, or Falmouth to Liverpool ? Mr. Marshall Stevens 
 says the freights to Liverpool, Runcorn, and Garston are all equal now. 
 That is a small case, but precisely in point — the freights to Liverpool, 
 Runcorn, and Garston are all equal now — Runcorn and Garston with 
 their navigation in such a condition that if the ship loses the spring tide 
 at Runcorn she has to wait 10 days, and yet the freights are the same. 
 Mr. Marshall Stevens tells you that a day up and a day down only means 
 t)d. a ton upon a 2,000 ton steamer, and he says further that ships 
 amounting in tne aggregate to 230, 000 tons register and 750,000 tons 
 burthen now use Runcorn at equal freights with Liverpool. Further, 
 Mr. Marshall Stevens points out what I trust your Grace has not 
 forgotten, that is that we have a large reserve fund of revenue in the 
 dues which the ships pay. We have only calculated our revenue for 
 the purpose of this investigation upon the amount paid for the goods. 
 The reason we have done that is this : that the present actual dues 
 upon ships at Liverpool are the same as the maximum dues upon ships
 
 99 
 
 Eqiial Sea Freights. [Chap. V. 
 
 upon our canal which we take powers to charge ; therefore, as ours was 
 to be a comparative Hst of charges between Liverpool and Manchester, we 
 did not think it worth while to go into the question of the charges upon 
 ships, but not the less is it a source of income, and if ever I say I 
 shall derive from such and such a trade £500,000 a year, always 
 understand that there are rates upon the ships to be added which 
 come to £180,000 more calculated upon the same basis. Now in that 
 receipt of rates upon ships we have a reserve fund of revenue upon 
 which we can draw — if the shipowners did come to us and say, we 
 ought to have a little more for the navigation of this channel, we have a 
 lund amounting, in some cases, to Is. 8d. a ton to draw upon. We shall 
 say, you shall not pay Is. 8d., but Is., 9d., or whatever it may be ; and 
 if so see where we are — we do not draw our revenue down beyond the 
 minimum point it is necessary to prove to you, but we utterly destroy 
 any chance of damage to ourselves by an increase of freight between 
 Liverpool and Manchester. Do not understand this as a confession 
 of weakness upon my part. I do not believe in it, but I point out that 
 it is possible. 
 
 Then Mr. Edwards, a shipowner of Cardiff, gives a table of equal 
 sea freights upon page 777. Now kindly turn to that ; all these are 
 equal freights. The first pair, Cronstadt and Antwerp, four days longer 
 to one than to the other. The next is Malta, Constantinople, and Odessa, 
 six days longer to Constantinople, and eight days longer to Odessa than 
 to Malta. The next two are Gibralter and Malta, four days longer to 
 Malta ; Newport (South Wales) to Liverpool and Cardiff to Liverpool, 15 
 miles longer from Newport ; Galveston and New Orleans to Liverpool, 
 one day longer from Galveston. Bombay to Marseilles, Hull, and 
 London — London 10 days further than Marseilles, and yet the same 
 freights. Is a ship going to spend 10 days upon our canal getting 
 up and down ? London to Calcutta and London to Bombay, 10 to 
 12 days further to Calcutta than to Bombay, and yet the freights are 
 equal ! " London to Hong Kong, Yokohama, and Hiogo steamers are 
 10 days longer reaching Japan after they arrive at Hong Kong ; Liverpool, 
 and London to Genoa or Trieste 10 or 11 days further sail to Trieste, 
 Norway, Antwerp, or Hamburg to Grimsby." There is the navigation of 
 tlie Humber to Hull, 30 miles further up the River Humber, and to Goole 
 50 miles further up the River Humber, often having io wait a day for 
 tide to Goole up and down ; and yet the same freight. I should Hke to 
 know whether the 50 miles to Goole is a bit better than the 80 odd miles 
 between Liverpool and Manchester, and so I may go through all that 
 table ; but I have gone through enough. 
 
 Now one statement of Mr. Edwards is particularly instructive — he 
 says, competition forces us to deliver cargoes near to the point of con- 
 sumption — a few years ago almost all the American trade went to Liver- 
 pool — now it goes to various ports all round the country which serves 
 an area of 30 or 40 miles round — that is upon page 779. Mr. Raeburn 
 explains certain special causes, such as the heavier dock dues at Glasgow, 
 which may sometimes involve differential rates as between Ardrossan and
 
 €hap. v.] Equal Sea Freights. 23 
 
 Glasgow, which my learned friend Mr. Pope rather tried to get from 
 Mr. Browne — that is not important, and I pass it over. But Mr. 
 Kaeburn did admit this, that the rule is for the freights to be equal to 
 those two places. Mr. Scrutton says I should send my steamers to 
 Manchester first, because I should get better despatch ; secondly, because 
 I should have a better chance of return cargoes ; thirdly, because I could 
 not be worse ofi" in the particular of return cargoes at Manchester than I 
 am now at Liverpool ; and he goes on to say, I should treat Manchester 
 as a safe port. Ports differ now considerably in expense, but it 
 does not alter the freight. That is at page 791. Again he says, 
 later on at page 796 : "Do you seek return cargoes from Liverpool ? 
 — For our sailing vessels most. (Q.) Do you for your hne of steamers 
 seek for return cargoes from Liverpool ? — No I have not done it ; " 
 and he says this upon the matter of cost on page 795, Question 
 11867, that the cost of a 1,700 ton steamer is £18 a day; 6d. a ton 
 demurrage is what I get from the Government, and it is splendid pay, 
 and he says I should make no difference between Liverpool and Man- 
 chester, and Mr. Aspinall, putting it that the freights are lower now and 
 he would go anywhere to earn a sixpence, he says I would not make any 
 difference in good times. You must either believe that man or disbelieve 
 him. Upon that point I should like to hear my learned friend, Mr. Pope, 
 explain logically to me the difference between the distance and delays in 
 this matter of equal freights — he said to your lordship, with a show of 
 profound conviction which sometimes overcomes him, Mv lords, it is not 
 distance — it is delay, as if there was any difference. What does delay 
 mean ? Time. What does distance mean ? Time. I cannot see the 
 difference between the two. They are convertible terms for this pro- 
 position. 
 
 Then Mr. Hutchison says, 50 or 100 miles further by sea, canal, or 
 river would make no difference in freight, and he explains to 
 my learned friend, Mr. Aspinall, that the difference between 
 Ardrossan and Glasgow when trade was good was about 3d. 
 per ton, but that the difference in the dues saved was equal to 9d. 
 or lOd. ; and that, therefore, it was a matter simply of a 
 cheaper port. " (Q.) That was a question of about 3d. a ton ? 
 — Yes, it was a difference in our calculation of the expense. (Q.) Are 
 you speaking again of one particular case or generally ? — I am speaking 
 of several charters offered to me " — iron ore charters. " Have you acted 
 upon any of them ? — Yes, ore charters ; it is only ore goes to Ardrossan. 
 (Q.) Which did you go to — Ardrossan or Glasgow ? — -We choose Glasgow 
 at the 3d. a ton extra ? — Yes. (Q ) What sort of goods are imported 
 into Havre chiefly ? — Chemicals from Glasgow, iron and oil, and there 
 are bale goods of all sorts." Then he is asked about cotton, "Does the 
 cotton which goes to France now go direct to large manufactories at 
 Rouen?— Yes, I think so." This gentleman has a house at Rouen, and 
 therefore knows what he is about. There may be certain persons whose 
 method of doing business is peculiar, and we may have certain charter 
 parties printed which except Rouen, but it is not the usual practice of
 
 24 Equal Sea Freights. [Chap. Y. 
 
 the trade; he says it makes very little, if any, difference in the freight, 
 ** As at present we carry goods from Havre and Kouen from Glasgow 
 and other ports and for Cadiz and Seville, in all cases they are much 
 less ; the one is at the mouth of the river and the other up the river. 
 (Q.) In each case you have given a port at the mouth and a port up 
 the river and the freights are the same ? — Yes. (Q.) You have had 
 constantly freights offered, have you not, for Ardrossan and Glasgow ? — 
 Yes ; we have had occasion to offer our boats for charters for an ore 
 freight from Seville." Why Seville crops up is on account 
 of the Spanish iron ore, which is mixed with the Scotch ore. Then he 
 says that in good times there was 9d. or lOd. difference in the saving Id 
 the dues ; he absolutely denies as distinctly as a man can deny — and 
 as they make such a fuss about it, I will point your lordships to it — he 
 absolutely denies that there is a fixed difference between Rouen and 
 Havre for grain — that is in answer to Question 120ii5, and one or two 
 questions following on up to 12037: " Do you know anything about 
 corn in reference to that matter" (that is with reference to the difference 
 of freight between Havre and Rouen)? " Do not you know absolutely 
 that there is a fixed difference of freight as between Havre and Rouen 
 for corn ? — No, I know the very opposite." Mr. Hutchison has an office 
 of his own at Rouen. Well, all I can say is that these charter parties 
 which they produce are honest charter parties, no doubt, and there may 
 be a certain set of men who do their business in that way ; but Mr 
 Hutchison, who has a business of his-own at Rouen, knows there is no such 
 thing as a fixed difference — he says : "I know the very opposite, 
 (Q.) That it is the same ?— Yes. (Q.) From where ?— These 
 are all ordered to the United Kingdom or the continent, and a little 
 more is given for the continent, and it includes the towns of Havre and 
 Hamburgh ; they are all bound to go to any port there. (Q.) You know 
 that ? — I know that because we have had vessels consigned to us in 
 Rouen, and the freight is the same. (Q) For corn ? — For corn. (Q.) 
 Where from ? — Once from San Francisco that I speak of particularly^ 
 (Q.) Was she to call for orders ? — She was to call for orders at Fal- 
 mouth, and was ordered to Rouen and was consigned to us. (Q.) In 
 that case the freight was the same ? — The same at any continental port 
 along that space from Hamburg to Havre." You cannot get out of that, 
 you know. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE NAVIGATION OF THE ESTUARY TIDES; SIZE; AND 
 
 MASTS OF VESSELS. 
 
 Indeed, the evidence against us upon the subject of ships navigating 
 the channel, either conditional or otherwise, goes a great deal too far, 
 and Admiral Grant, though I am anticipating in going into this upon
 
 CiiAP. VI.] JJie Navigation of the Estuary, &c. 25 
 
 the question of danger and time, and the question of the height of the 
 masts, but here it is worth while to say that Admiral Grant is a type' 
 of the point to which they carry the evidence against this channel. 
 His evidence is to the effect that vessels mast navigate the Mersey up- 
 wards and go through the channel upon a falling tide This would 
 doubtless have for a result that they would be in the channel for some 
 period after high tide, some period approaching more or less nearly 
 towards low water, when our depth would be seriously reduced, and 
 the object of the evidence is clearly to show that the canal would only be 
 used by vessels coming up under those conditions ; that is by vessels of a 
 moderate draught, but vessels of considerable size go up on the flood to 
 Garston and even to Runcorn, as I showed you from Mr. Marshall 
 Stevens' evidence, who showed that a tonnage of 230,000 tons goes 
 to Runcorn. If they did not they could not get there at all, because 
 Runcorn is inaccessible at anything like low water, so it is proof positive 
 that the only way of going up is upon a flood tide, and if they do not 
 go up upon the flood tide they could not get there ; so that the impos- 
 sibility of going up with the flood and on the one tide is incompatible 
 with the facts, and, in fact, one might ask generally, if a vessel cannot 
 go up the estuary on a falling tide to an inland port, then other inland 
 ports to which the low water channel went would be unworkable, because 
 it would not to many of them ever be reached. How could vessels ever 
 get to Rouen, or to Glasgow, or up the Tyne, or up the Tees? 
 Surely the Tees is as exposed as the Mersey ; it is exposed 
 enough for anything, and it is the first time I have' ever heard it 
 suggested that there is any particular amount of snugness in the Forth 
 of Clyde. But the impossibility of getting up upon one tide was never 
 suggested to the various owners of the steamships who came to say they 
 would send their steamers up to Manchester — it is all reserved for the 
 substantive evidence of the shipowners, or one or two sea captains who 
 say it is dangerous. After all, I wonder whether the run up the inner 
 reaches of the Mersey is worse than to run over the bar and into the 
 Liverpool Docks, and yet vessels do that in the dark. This scheme has 
 been before the shipping community now for more than two years, and 
 if there was this danger or impossibility of getting up on one tide, and it 
 were real, do you suppose that it would not have occurred to them, or 
 that they would not have recognised it ? Of course they would. And 
 yet they come one after another, seven or eight of them, until you are 
 tired of listening — Messrs. Browne, Raeburn, Scrutton, Hutchison, and the 
 rest, come to say they would send their ships up to Manchester at the same 
 freight as they would send them to Liverpool. What interest have they all 
 got in this scheme ? Nothing whatever — not one is a promoter. Why 
 should they come from various ports and give evidence for the scheme ? 
 Why blind themselves to such an essential blot as that ? They have no 
 interest in it — they put no money into it — they have not subscribed a 
 shilling to the Parliamentary expenses — they have all got reputations as 
 shipowners and tradesmen to keep up ; they have no interest to serve — 
 what are they here for ? Their very presence carries conviction, unless
 
 26 The Navigation of the Estuary^ &c. [Chap. VI. 
 
 you suppose they are ignorant men. And, moreover, most of them have 
 no connection with Manchester. They are perfectly unbiassed and per- 
 fectly independent. I say in being unbiassed and independent, and 
 having no connection with Manchester, they are very unlike Sir William 
 Forwood, and very unHke Captain Kennedy, of the Inman Line, connected 
 with Liverpool, and very unlike Mr. Captain Inglis, of the Cunard Line, 
 all excellent men, no doubt, in their way, but Liverpool to their very 
 backbone. The truth is, that they know that we have never asked upon 
 this canal for the presence of large passenger liners which Captain Inglis 
 and Captain Kennedy represent, namely, the Inman and the Cunard 
 liners ; they are not necessary for our success. They are not cargo ships 
 in the true sense of the word, though they carry cargo — their essence 
 is to carry large passenger traffic ; their accident is to carry goods. 
 Every merchant ship proper in existence, and every cargo ship proper, 
 that is essentially a trading ship, says Mr. Marshall Stevens, can use 
 the canal. And he is not cross-examined on this point. As a matter 
 of fact, he says the general trade of the world, which is what we hope to 
 get our share of, is carried on in ships of from 1,000 to 2,000 tons 
 nett — 95 per cent, he tells you — (that, again, is unchallenged) of the 
 actual shipping in the United Kingdom is under 2,000 tons nett. Mr. 
 Marshall Stevens again — for I can understand the dislike of the other 
 side to him, and, as he is not in the room, I may say he is one of the 
 ablest and best-informed gentlemen in his own department of trade that I 
 ever came across — put in a list of the ships in dock in Liverpool on a 
 certain day in 1883. Now, I had his list copied out. He says that 
 there were 252 ships in the 32 docks, eight were over 8,000 tons, 19 
 over 2,000 tons and under 3,000 tons, and 22 out of 252 were from 
 1,500 tons to 2,000 tons. Now, you see, in fact, there were 49 
 ships only out of 252 which were over 1,500 tons, and only eight 
 over 3,000, and only 27 over 2,000 tons. Every ship, he further says, 
 that arrived at Liverpool with cotton from the 1st January to the 1st 
 March, 1884, could go up the canal with a slight alteration of masts. 
 Then that will do for us — that is all we want. We do not want the 
 Cunard and the Inman Liners, and if Sir William Forwood does not like 
 to send his 10 or 12 steamers, let him keep them away. These facts were 
 spoken to a month ago, and there is no attempt to contradict them. It 
 is no answer to such evidence as this for a gentleman to bring a diagram 
 which contained two or three large ships, whose rig, if altered to a certain 
 point, would just allow, as a matter of fact, the ships to go laden under 
 the bridge. Very well, if that be so, if it is such a near thing they will 
 not come, or if it be possible to alter them materially they will come with 
 that alteration, otherwise they will stay away. If I want the general 
 trade of the world, or a share of it, and that is carried on in ships of 1,000 
 to 2,000 tons nett, 95 per cent, is under 2,000, and if I get my share of it, 
 I do not care two straws about any shipowners who cannot or will not 
 alter their ships to pass Runcorn Bridge. We do not expect large 
 passenger steamers to come — if they have certain ports for certain lines 
 of steamers, certain lines of trade will keep there. Says the Cunard
 
 Chap. VI.] The Navigation of the Estuary, &c, 27 
 
 owner again, or the Cunard captain, My steamer shall not come. Mine 
 shall, says Mr. McDougall ; we set Mr. McDougall against the Cunard 
 captain. Mr. McDougall says, All my steamers would come up the canal 
 by striking their topmasts, and they range from 1,592 to -3,021 tons ; 
 iu order to make them come down we shall have to alter the masts of 
 two of them 6 inches, but we should not content ourselves with the 6 
 inches alteration ; we should give five or six feet margin at once. That 
 is the sort of evidence upon which we rely, the general evidence of the 
 traders, of the possibilities, the probabilities, and the value of the trade, 
 and you may depend upon it, if we upon our side show them that we 
 have a trade, plenty of other shipowners will follow the general example 
 of Mr. McDougall. Every one knows that the competition is keen 
 enough in the carrying trades as one or two of us holding shares in 
 carrying companies know to our cost, and that being so, a few enter- 
 prising men will not be allowed to keep Manchester to themselves. 
 
 So I may pass at once to the question I have led myself to, namely, 
 the height of the masts, and really I ought not to labour at it much, 
 because my learned friend, Mr. Pope, who is certainly always perfectly 
 candid, and a very good judge of the strong or weak points of his case, 
 and never afraid of admitting weak points, said this : — " That is all I 
 will say about masts — there is not much in it," and there is not. Mr. 
 Marshall Stevens says that all vessels using cotton ports could use the 
 canal with slight alterations. Mr. Alexander Adamson, late chief constructor 
 to Messrs. John Elder & Co., of the Clyde, and now manager to 
 Palmer's Shipbuilding Co., at Jarrow-on-the-Tyne, says Ihat 3,000-ton 
 vessels, with topmasts lowered, can pass under Runcorn Bridge— that is in 
 answer to Question 11338— he says it takes 1^ hours to lower the 
 topmast, 2i hours to do the lot ; 95 per cent., he says, of the 
 steamers upon the Liverpool registry could pass under the bridge 
 without alteration, and 5 per cent, would have to be altered, but I do 
 not care whether they alter or not. He says a clear headway of one foot 
 is enough under the canal bridge, but he says they will want three feet at 
 Runcorn Bridge on account of lift. He put in a table of 326 cargo 
 vessels which have been recently built by Elders and Palmers, from 
 585 tons to 2,776 tons, which is the largest, and he says these are 
 the most likely vessels to be used in the canal, being all purely cargo 
 vessels, and they could all do it ; for he says 34 of these could pass under 
 the bridge loaded, and 21 pass light, or loaded without alteration. I 
 would ask you to remember this, that when light they would require less 
 water, and therefore find more headway, and go down at a time of tide 
 when there was not much water. It is only in the highest spring tide 
 that we get so low a headway as 75 feet. But it is an essential fact 
 in this case, if you show me that I have not water enough to come up 
 or go down loaded or light either before or after high water, then I 
 get a better headway at once ; and the point that was put to one or 
 two witnesses, that a ship going down light would strike the bridge 
 that would not strike going up loaded, is fallacious, for that reason. It 
 is fallacious for another reason. The system of water ballast enables a
 
 28 The Navigation of the Estuary^ &c. [Chap. VI. 
 
 ship to make the load line constant. Mr. Leader Williams says there are 
 40 feet at high water under his bridge. Captain Hills says that in the first 
 two hours the tide only falls seven feet. This water ballast is used to keep 
 the load Hne constant. Mr. Adamson, in answer to Questions 11395-(), 
 says this water ballast can keep the load line constant, if it was necessary 
 to get a certain headway — I can if my ship is going down light let in water 
 ballast and bring her down to the original load line, and he says that is 
 constantly done. Then Mr. Adamson gives you that important evidence 
 that a 3,000-ton vessel could have its masts altered for £130, and 
 a l.'iOO-ton vessel could have its masts altered for £80. Now my learned 
 friend, Mr. Pope, suggests that a man who is at Garston thinking whether he 
 should come to Liverpool or Manchester would not incur that expense, but 
 would go to Liverpool rather than Manchester, possibly for one voyage. 
 Bnt we do not consider the alteration of a mast for a single voyage, but for 
 a man who is goiug to do a trade regularly ; and Mr. Adamson also tells 
 you that the working of these masts, when once altered, can be done so easily 
 that it might be done while the ship is loading. He also tells you that the 
 water ballast would let the ship come down light with the same headway that 
 she came up loaded. Captain Pearson, of Liverpool, says there is no diffi- 
 culty striking yards or masts, and my learned friend, Mr. Pope, agrees with 
 him when examining him as to the cost of altering masts, and Mr. Macmillan 
 says that 80 per cent, of the vessels built by IngHs and ^Company, Glas- 
 gow, during the last 20 years can go under Runcorn Bridge without 
 alteration. Captain Pearson says the tendency is to decrease, and not to 
 heighten the mast, and that 68 feet 6 ins. is ample. 
 
 I will give you that reference ; it is given on page 772, in answer to 
 Question 11557. Then Mr. Macmillan, constructor to A. and J. 
 Inglis, says that 45 per cent, of all the steam vessels built in the Clyde^ 
 Tyne, Tees, Wear, and the Hartlepools in 1882 were under 2,000 
 tons. He says that all these would pass under the bridges with lowered 
 topmasts, and 90 per cent, of the total tonnage of the kingdom could use 
 the canal. He is of opinion, he adds, that vessels of 4,000 tons can be 
 so masted as to pass under the bridges. Your lordships maj'- think that 
 that may be going a little too far ; but this gentleman is the chief 
 constructor of Messrs. A. and J. Inglis, the great shipbuilders, and his 
 opinion on that point is surely entitled to weight. But man after man 
 of the greatest possible eminence comes and tells you such facts as these, 
 that practically 90 per cent, of the total tonnage of the United Kingdom 
 could use the canal. What more do your lordships want in the way of 
 evidence upon that point ? 
 
 So much, therefore, for the masts. As to time, in my cross-examination 
 of Captain Graham Hills, I proved that there would be lots of 
 time to get up the canal, and that if a ship got there an hour 
 or two before high water it could do it easily. I find I made a 
 note of what Captain Graham Hills told me a little later on ; but 
 before we go to Captain Graham Hills I will take Captain Pearson. He 
 says, in answer to to Question 11511 : "I have gone over the ground, 
 and I find there will be no difficulty in a vessel drawing 22 feet of
 
 Chap. VI.] The Navigation of the Estuary^ &c, 29 
 
 water crossing the bar and reaching the entrance to the canal proper one 
 hour before high water." That is Captain Pearson's distinct evidence. 
 Therefore, when a vessel got there an hour before high water, she would 
 have more headway. He says he would take a vessel in two hours, at 
 the rate of 5 knots an hour, from the Liverpool Docks to Runcorn with a 
 current of 2^ knots. The channel, he says, is safer than the Clyde 
 between Greenock and Glasgow ; and he says the rate of speed allowed 
 in the Suez Canal is 4 to 5 knots. These answers are between Nos. 11536 
 and 11566. Then Captain Croft says he has had experience of the 
 Amsterdam Canal, the Ghent Canal, and the Rotterdam Canal, and there 
 would be no difficulty, he says, in navigating this Ship Canal. He says, I 
 would take a vessel up to Runcorn upon the flood tide, and it would be 
 quite safe, and that a speed of seven knots, including the tide, would be 
 quite safe. Then Mr. Leonard, the shipowner of Middlesboro', said, if 
 ever a ship went on the training walls it would be by reckless navigation ; 
 those are our witnesses upon the point. 
 
 Now, I come to the opponents' witnesses. Captain French says that 
 it is true that the vessels must have their masts specially arranged, but 
 he does not say it cannot be done ; all the ten vessels which he com- 
 manded could pass under the bridge by lowering their masts. Mr. 
 Alexander goes no further than the necessity for the alteration of the 
 masts ; and there is no question as to the costs of the alteration until 
 you come to a gentleman named Roydon, who says it will cost £200 a 
 mast, but nobody supports him, not even his own counsel. • But he says, 
 in answer to Question 21492, that fidded masts are quite safe and handy, 
 which I was very glad to hear from an opponent, and he gave in a list of 
 vessels 115 in number, and he says in answer to Question 21504, that all 
 the vessels in this list of 115, except the very largest, could pass if they 
 had fidded masts, which he had previously said were safe and handy. 
 
 Then comes another gentleman named Hoult, and he says he would 
 not hesitate to alter his masts if he saw his way to making them pay. So 
 much for the opponents' evidence upon masts. I admit they are the 
 choice bits culled from their evidence, but the men they called to curse us 
 stayed to bless us in those particulars, and after the evidence we gave 
 from many competent persons, I ask you, have you any longer any doubt, 
 as far as the height of masts goes, that this canal with the bridges can 
 be perfectly easily used ? 
 
 Now, let us see what our opponents say on the question of danger. 
 Captain Graham Hills was called as to the danger of going up in the 
 dark — he says there is such a thing as the winter season in Great Britain, 
 and it gets dark in the afternoon early, and it does not get light till a late 
 hour in the morning ; but he forgot that that is a natural phenomena 
 extending to the Tees, the Tyne, the Clyde, and the Liverpool bar, and 
 he admitted that all these rivers and the Liverpool bar were navigated 
 in the dark. Captain Graham Hills said the danger was considerable, 
 and that there was a chance of running on the training wall — which had 
 been most distinctly denied by our witnesses, who said if it did happen 
 it would be owing to reckless navigation — there had been one accident
 
 30 The Navigation of the Estuary, &c. Chap. yi. 
 
 on the Tees, and one on the Amsterdam canal, but Mr. Thomas Stevenson, 
 the engineer, who knows something of it, had previously said there was no 
 danger to ships in low training walls — he says, " I am not aware of a 
 single instance of a ship fouling a low training wall." How could it ? 
 Our training walls for 9-lOths of the distance will be below the level of the 
 sand, and the sand will be " toppling over" into the channel as they say upon 
 the other side, at all events they admit that it will be above the training wall. 
 They may knock up against them, but they cannot rest upon them. But 
 it is a curious thing that Swansea, Cardiff, Newport and Bristol, though 
 some of these places are up trained channels, and some are not, have all 
 equal rates of insurance. Now if there were any danger in navigating these 
 rivers, there would have been a different rate of insurance. Captain 
 Kennedy says : "I can give no instance of a ship going across a training 
 wall." He says that at times ships go ashore outside the Mersey. It 
 looks as if outside the Mersey was a far more dangerous place for ships to 
 get through than the channel bordered by training walls. Admiral Grant 
 gave his evidence under the impression that the water would always be 
 between the training walls, confined between the walls at a lower level 
 than the tops of the walls, and he said a great deal about bumping and 
 being bilged, but he admitted that if there was a large body of water over 
 the estuary the danger will be then much lessened, and Admiral Grant 
 then admitted that there are no bad bends in our channel as in the Saez 
 Canal. Mr. Ashworth, another witness, said he knew nothing of the 
 upper estuary of the Mersey, and had not piloted a ship to 
 Garston for the last 17 years, and he also admitted that ships of 
 1,500 and 1,800 tons do go to Garston now. Therefore, you see, 
 big ships do go through the estuary of the Mersey at present, except 
 the bit represented by our wall channel. The whole thing is resolvable 
 into this : Our channel is a funnel 10 miles long ; it is 1,000 feet at the 
 widest end, gradually narrowing to 300 feet at the very narrowest, so 
 that there is an average width of between 500 and 600 feet right 
 through. Are you going to suppose that ships cannot steam up a wide 
 deep place of this character without getting aground, when it is going 
 to be well beaconed and buoyed, well lighted, and with no bad turns ? 
 
 Now, as to time, Captain Graham Hills' cross-examination, to which 
 I will refer, is perfectly conclusive. He admitted on page 1086 that 
 if the ship arrived at the bar at the proper timp she could do it. 
 That is in answer to Question 15943. " Now as to the possibility of a 
 vessel coming in and passing over the bar and getting up to the canal 
 in one tide, what do you say as to that ? — It is possible undoubtedly that 
 a vessel might do so under certain circumstances, but before she can 
 meet such circumstances she must arrange her voyage to be at the bar 
 at a certain time, and it is not possible that a vessel — say a cotton ship 
 from New Orleans — can at starting time her arrival at the Liverpool bar 
 so as to go straight over it. The chances are certainly against it, so that 
 in nine cases out of ten in all probability she will reach the bar at a 
 time when she cannot go over it." I dare say she cannot time herself 
 so to arrive if she is going to Liverpool, and if she does not time herself
 
 I 
 
 CiiAP. VI.] The Navigation of the Estuary, &c. 31 
 
 what happens ? The docks at Liverpool are only open one or two 
 hours after high water, and if she does not arrive at the bar before high 
 water there is not time to get to the Liverpool Docks to go in, and 
 she will lose her tide ; therefore, she is as badly off in getting into Liver- 
 pool as she would be in going up this channel. If she arrives at the 
 bar at the right time, she can go up my channel ; if she does not arrive 
 at the right time, she cannot go into the docks at Liverpool either. 
 But Captain Graham Hills gives the time taken from the bar to the 
 Rock Lighthouse upon the next page as one hour, and that is to do 
 eleven miles ; from the Rock Lighthouse to Garston he gives two hours, 
 but he says she has got to get through the shipping opposite Liverpool ;, 
 he says it will take an hour and a-half to two hours — Garston to 
 Runcorn he puts at an hour and a-half ; that is 4f hours. Now he says 
 a ship drawing 20 feet of water can pass the bar at 8^ hours after flood 
 — that he told me himself — that is on page 1090 — that is to say, two 
 hours before high water. I asked him what it meant, and he said when 
 I put to him, *' She has to arrive at the bar, as I understand you, 3^ 
 hours after flood ? — Yes, to cross the bar. (Q.) How much longer will 
 the tide still have to run at the bar then ? — About two hours or a little 
 less than two hours." That being so, I say how long will it be before 
 high water at Runcorn, and he says : *' It is high water at Runcorn one 
 hour and five minutes after high water at the bar for the high spring 
 tide," though last year he gave one hour and fifty minutes, but 
 I take it at the lowest. Add that to the two hour^ before high 
 water. If she can draw 20 feet, and pass the bar according 
 to his original showing, she has three hours and five minutes out 
 of 4J hours required to get to the channel ; in other words, she will 
 reach our channel at one hour and 25 minutes of the ebb. At that time 
 I should have plenty of water in my channel ; at spring tides I started 
 with 40 feet, and Captain Graham Hills told me, with regard to another 
 matter, that in two hours' time the tide only fell six or seven feet at 
 Runcorn, therefore I should have water enough, and also greater head- 
 way. I should have six or seven feet added on to my 75 feet, but from 
 his own showing I may be much sooner at the bar, and yet have plenty 
 of water, because at 8J hours he tells me I shall have 31 feet of water ; 
 at 4J hours before high water he says I shall get 24 feet. In 
 answer to Question 15985, on page 1090, I ask him, " How much before 
 high water should I get 24 feet ? — A little before 4^ hours. (Q.) At 4|- 
 hours before high water at the bar I should have 24 feet ? — Yes. (Q.) 
 To that 4^ hours I have to add one hour and five minutes, the difference 
 between the bar and Runcorn ? — Yes." 
 
 Mr. SQUAREY: That was corrected the next day by Captain 
 Graham Hills to 16 feet from 24 feet. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : If he did correct it I cannot rely upon it, but I 
 content myself with the original calculation. If he corrected it, the 
 argument I founded upon it would fai] , but I will stand upon the other ; 
 he says T should get 81 feet of water at two hours before high tide — it 
 is obvious there must be some time at which I should get something like
 
 32 The Navigation of the Estuary^ &c. [Chap. VI. 
 
 ■what I wanted ; if I had three hours before high water, I should get 24 
 feet — then that will do for me. Supposing I have 24 feet upon the bar 
 for three hours before high water, it would enable a ship drawing 20 
 feet of water to have three hours before high water at the bar plus the 
 one hour and five minutes, the difference between high water at the bar 
 ^nd Runcorn, that is four hours and five minutes, instead of three hours 
 and five minutes, which would bring me 25 minutes after high water at 
 Buncorn Bridge, when I should have abundance of water either way; 
 it adds one hour to two hours, and it gives me one more hour to get up 
 to Runcorn before the tide begins to fall, instead of the tide having 
 fallen one hour and 25 minutes it will only have fallen 25 minutes, and 
 that gives me abundance of water. 
 
 Now, there is a point which I want you to remember, that ships 
 arriving from America draw less than when they started ; and that is 
 where the question of water ballast comes in. Ships arriving at the bar 
 •coming from America draw much less water than they drew when they 
 started from Galveston, because their bunker coal has been used. There is 
 a twofold position ; but one of the witnesses in answer to question 19788, 
 says they draw 18 inches less, so that I want 18 inches less water over 
 bar, and I can therefore go over the bar at a period when it has 18 
 inches less — that is, further off high water, and then when we get to 
 Runcorn, there being lots of water in the channel, I can take my water- 
 ballast in and bring my load-line down again, and so get my headway 
 back. Now, after all this, some of the opposing evidence really sounds 
 •charming. Mr. Hoult at first said the difference of time between Man- 
 chester and Liverpool would positively be three days to get from Liver- 
 pool to Manchester ; he afterwards said that was not enough, and 
 corrected himself to four days — four days to go up and down, two days 
 up and two days down. Just think — four days, or 96 hours ; and what 
 is the distance to be done under all the circumstances, which you know 
 thoroughly well — the headway and the depth of water the same — 96 
 hours to do less than 35 miles, or in other words, less than three quarters 
 of a mile an hour. That is reducing evidence to an absurdity. Surely, 
 with the Tyne and the Tees, and the Clyde and the Avon, and the 
 Amsterdam and Suez Canals before you, you will not credit any assertion of 
 ^reat danger, or believe such nonsense as that which I hope I have 
 exposed. 
 
 (Adjourned to to-morrow, at 11 o'clock.)
 
 CiiAP. Yl.] Resume of First Day's Speech, 33 
 
 CONTINUATION OF REPLY OF MR. PEMBER, Q a 
 
 SECOND DAY.— WEDNESDAY, 21st MAY, 1884. 
 (BEING THE 39rii DAY OF THE HEAEING OF THE CASE.) 
 
 RESUME OF FIRST DAY'S SPEECH. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Now, my lords, what I did yesterday was practically 
 to discuss the question of the enormous value of the saving, to Lancashire, 
 and in doing so I contrasted the evidence of the opponents with the 
 evidence for ourselves, and I trust that our evidence upon the matter 
 has not been shaken by the evidence given upon the other side — 
 I ran through all the different points in which that evidence was 
 attempted to be shaken, namely, master porterage, cartage, the 
 quantity of cotton consumed, and one or two other matters which I do 
 not call to recollection. I further showed that not only on the cotton 
 trade was there the enormous saving of £508,000, which I spoke of in 
 opening this case, and which Mr. Adamson spoke to and maintained, but 
 that very large savings indeed were shown in other trades, which would be 
 of the highest possible importance, if it were not that they do, to a con- 
 siderable extent, fall into the shade when compared with the great cotton 
 trade of Lancashire, notably in the grain and provision trades, which for 
 these millions of people must be on a very vast scale. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 RETURN CARGOES FROM MANCHESTER. 
 
 Now I must go on dealing with the case of the opponents in this 
 matter rather than with our own. Our own case was constructive upon 
 such points as that, and similarly, the opponents' case attempted to be 
 destructive ; but there are certain common points, such as return cargoes, 
 upon which we, in the first instance, may not be supposed to have so 
 much to say, because people may take it for granted that there will be 
 return cargoes from such a place as Manchester ; but they have 
 attacked that, and that leads me to turn to the question of return 
 cargoes, and show what our evidence upon the subject was, and what 
 their evidence was upon the other hand. Now, in the first place, oddly 
 enough, it is not essential to prove these return cargoes absolutely, for, 
 to begin with, Liverpool receives and sends away 20*96 of her ships in 
 ballast The evidence is that 6"71 per cent, enters in ballast, and 14-25 
 per cent, clears out in ballast ; in other words, 20*96 per cent, of the 
 ships in Liverpool come in and leave Liverpool without bringing 
 or taking cargo. That, of course, is a very large percentage, one-fifth. 
 
 c
 
 34 Return Cargoes frotn Manchester. [Chap. vil. 
 
 of the whole shipping of the port. Now, Mr. Raeburn, the 
 President of the Glasgow Steamship Owners' Association, emphasises 
 this very much. Mr. Raeburn, whose evidence you will find upon that 
 point at Question and Answer 11750, begins to give his evidence upon page 
 783 — he says : A cargo out of Liverpool for an ordinary outside cargo 
 boat is not very common : at even rates I would take the Manchester 
 freight and a Manchester return cargo — an outside boat meaning, of 
 course, a ship that is not a liner, and there he says most distinctly that 
 for such ships a return cargo is not common, and that at even rates he 
 would take the same freight to Manchester. A large proportion of those 
 that either come or go in ballast are those that leave in ballast, showing 
 that the larger proportion sutlers from the want of return cargo. 
 That is what Mr. Raeburn says in answer to Question 11750 : "I know 
 that a cargo out of Liverpool for an ordinary outside cargo boat is not 
 a very common thing ; if I had an inducement, or thought I had an in- 
 ducement, of a cargo out from Manchester, I should certainly at even 
 rates take the Manchester freight and the Manchester return cargo." 
 Then he says again, three questions further on, " My own impression is 
 that I would have as much chance, if not more, of getting a return cargo 
 at Manchester than from Liverpool." And further Mr. Scrutton says, 
 in answer to Question 11893 : " We have not had a return cargo from 
 Liverpool for years." That is Mr. Scrutton, a London shipowner. 
 He says : " We have not had a return cargo from Liverpool for years," and 
 yet he continues to use Liverpool. The truth is, that it is a very common 
 thing to use two ports. So says Mr. Wilson, a Bombay merchant shipper, 
 in page 252, in answer to Question 3606. He says, " It is very customary 
 for vessels to load at two ports," and he says also, " I find it worth my 
 while to use Glasgow rather than Liverpool, although I can only begin 
 to load my ship at Glasgow, and must finish her at Liverpool." So that 
 Mr. Wilson, the Bombay shipper, begins to load his ship in Glasgow, and 
 goes on to Liverpool. Mr. Tallack, again, at Question 12222, says 
 many steamers now load part at Hamburg, in Germany, for Australia, 
 und fill up in London. So that ships not only sometimes use Liverpool to a 
 ■considerable extent without getting any cargo back at all, but it is a very 
 common thing to load up in two ports not only so distant as Glasgow 
 and Liverpool, but so far distant as Hamburg and London, for the 
 common point of delivery, namely, Australia. At page 796, Question 
 11893, Mr. Scrutton is asked : "Surely at present you might have got 
 return cargoes from Liverpool consisting of Manchester and Birmingham 
 goods if you tried?" and his answer is: "No, we have not had a 
 return cargo from Liverpool for years." Therefore, I might really take 
 the hypothesis that it is not necessary to prove such an enormous amount 
 of return cargo, but, yom* Grace, I should think myself weak indeed if, 
 after all the evidence in this case, I allowed myself for a moment to 
 rest content with such an hypotliesis as that. A glance at the map will 
 show that I need not do so. You remember the maps I handed into 
 your lordships which showed Manchester seated in the midst of a large 
 cluster of producing and consuming centres* herself the largest producer
 
 CiiAP. VII.] Return Cargoes from Manchester. 35 
 
 and consumer of all, with a network of railways and canals radiating 
 from her in all directions. 
 
 What article, I may venture to ask, was there in all Sir 
 William Forwood's mixed manifests that Manchester could not 
 attract for the purpose of distribution ? In other words, what was 
 there which any ship that Sir William Forwood took, having collected it 
 at Liverpool, which that same ship if at Manchester could not have 
 taken and collected at Manchester, Manchester being 30 miles nearer to 
 the parts from which she would have collected them ? If Manchester 
 had had a ship navigation, would she not, most obviously, long since 
 have been the centre of distribution on the one hand and the centre of 
 concentration on the other for traffic ? Liverpool, on the other hand, so 
 different from Manchester, is no producer. I admit she is a large con- 
 sumer, but she is cut off from the sea on one side — she is on the rim and 
 not in the centre of a district which has to be served and supplied. You 
 remember the small map, which I have not here now, which showed you 
 radiating lines running from Liverpool and Manchester, and if you take 
 Liverpool as the black dot and centre, the lines can only radiate over the 
 €oast, and the coast running fairly north and south, it is obvious that the 
 Atlantic Ocean at which she looks is practically a blank. Manchester is 
 seated in the midst of large producing and consuming centres, of which 
 she herself is the largest. In fact, Manchester is really the sun in the 
 ■centre of the orrery ; the thing is therefore self-evident. Liverpool is a 
 mere emporium, a great emporium. What has Liverpool that she does 
 not receive ? Why is she an emporium ? Simply because at present she 
 happens to be the nearest and most convenient port ; as between her and 
 Manchester there can be no question of the contiguity of the port. If 
 Manchester had been a port it is obvious she is 30 miles inland, and more 
 contiguous to the districts she has to serve, and which have to give her 
 return cargoes. There may be a question of convenience, but there can 
 be no question whatever that Liverpool does get exports to a very vast 
 extent. Now, where does she get them from ? Whence does she draw 
 them ? Obviously a very large proportion from the places on the road to 
 •which Manchester stands. Manchester's exports, as Mr. Marshall Stevens 
 has told you, are competed for by all the ports. The greater part, says 
 he, of the great exports from the United Kingdom come from the districts 
 around Manchester — that is on page 407. Nobody contests that for a 
 moment. 
 
 Now, surely such a business must be worth conducting. That is the 
 first proposition. And the second proposition is, surely Manchester can 
 conduct it upon terms more profitable to herself and more beneficially and 
 more convenient to the producers than ports which vary from the distance 
 of Liverpool, which is 30 miles further off, to Hull and to London, one of 
 which is 90 miles and the other no less than 200 miles further oft". Mr. 
 Scrutton says again that Liverpool is very bad for return cargoes, in spite 
 of her natural advantages ; and he says that the Liverpool Dock charges 
 and the railway charges make it as well or better worth the traders' while 
 to ship at London than at Liverpool. He says Manchester, being free of
 
 36 Return Cargoes from Manchester. [Chap, yii^ 
 
 those charges, exports that now go elsewhere than to Liverpool would 
 centre in Manchester ; that he says on page 799. You Avill see there a 
 series of questions, of which 11956 is a good type: "The same goods 
 being at Manchester, why would you seek to get them on board your sliips 
 at Manchester when you do not do it now at Liverpool ? — A merchant 
 would consent to the goods coming round in our steamers to London so 
 as to save the expense of forwarding to any port. They would save the 
 Liverpool charges, and they could put them on board the steamers at 
 Manchester. The insurance would be very slight. We should make very 
 little difference in the freight, and the merchant will be the gainer." The 
 whole page refers to that ; and Mr. MacDougall says the same. Mr. 
 MacDougall says that ships that now use Hull, Grimsby, Hartlepool, Liver- 
 pool, London, and Goole would, if Manchester were a port, use Man- 
 chester. My learned friend, Mr. Pope, suggested to Mr. Adamson that 
 the payment of canal dues will prevent this. The answer to that is, No, 
 our canal dues, plus the railway route to Manchester, do not represent, 
 and cannot represent, the cost of railway transit to more distant ports. 
 Besides, even if it did, which I do not admit, remember there are these canals 
 up to Manchester, which form a very cheap route, and which was admitted 
 to be utilisable at a rate of a penny per ton per mile. Nor will our canal 
 rates be equal to the railway rates up to Manchester, if the railway route 
 were used i^his the dock charges at Liverpool, which my learned friend, 
 Mr. Pope, very often forgets to take into consideration when putting 
 relative rates to a witness ; and it will be worth while for both freighters 
 and shippers to use Manchester — the freighters for the reasons I have given, 
 and the shipowners because they will to a certain extent share with the 
 freighters a part of the saving. Mr. George Browne, the Glasgow 
 shipowner and River Clyde Trustee, gives you an indication of that. 
 Upon page 393, in answer to Question 6417, he says that a freight 
 from Glasgow would give him from Is. to Is. 6d. more than a return cargo 
 from Greenock. Why ? Because there is no railway to pay ; he says if I 
 take it from. Greenock there is a railway from Glasgow to Greenock, which 
 is equivalent to a railway from Manchester to Liverpool, and he says, I 
 get a better freight from Glasgow than from Greenock, because the freighter 
 would have the intermediate bit of railway to pay. Mr. Tallack, the 
 shipping and insurance broker, and Custom-house agent in London, on 
 page 812, speaks of the large foreign and coastwise export trade that 
 will be done at Manchester in goods that now go for shipment to London. 
 You cannot ignore the evidence of experts like these. Mr. Charles Ross, of 
 Malcolm, Ross, and Sons, the Manchester yarn merchants, says, I cannot 
 use the sea and the Bridgewater Canal now as a route between Manchester 
 and Glasgow. Why not ? Because of the expense, the delay, and the 
 transhipment— the transhipment being from the small boat going up the 
 Bridgewater Canal into the steamer ; but, he says, if the canal is made, 
 then I get rid both of the delay and the expense of the transhipment. 
 The transhipment, because the ship goes straight away from Manchester 
 instead of the goods having to be transhipped from the Bridgewater 
 Canal boat at Runcorn ; and expense, because I have got the fixed
 
 CiiAP. VII.] Return Cargoes from Manchester, 37 
 
 rates of the Manchester Canal instead of the combination rates of the 
 Bridgewater ; and the dehiy, because there is no delay in transhipment : 
 and he says if the canal is made, all this being got rid of, a daily line of 
 steamers will start between Manchester and the Clyde, and he enumerates 
 the articles which will make up the trade, and that I will ask your lord- 
 ships to look at, because I cannot always keep in my mind the miscellaneous 
 articles which will be produced at Manchester making up the back cargoes 
 which Sir William Forwood thinks so difficult to find. 
 
 Upon page 851, Question 13001, Mr. Ross is asked this, and this is in 
 cross-examination, which shows what a double-edged weapon cross- 
 -examination is : " What would the trade consist of between Manchester 
 and Glasgow, take first from Manchester to Glasgow ? — From Manchester 
 to Glasgow cotton goods, cotton yarn, alum, dyestuffs, hardware, castings, 
 machinery, linoleum, crockery, paper, sizing, flour, wire, cement, hoop-iron, 
 pig-iron, pipes, veneers, cotton waste, and oils of all sorts." I have no 
 doubt Mr. Ross had not a category of all the articles he would take in in 
 his own mind. Then he says upon page 852, in answer to Question 
 13007:- "The list I have got here is based upon what I have 
 got. from the present canal company, the Bridgewater Canal Company. 
 (Q.) And who carry part of the distance from Manchester to Glasgow ? 
 — Yes ; this is a list of articles which I have got from the Bridge - 
 water Canal people that are sent from Lancashire to the Clyde at the 
 present moment by water the whole way." And then two questions 
 after he gives you a list of articles that go in that direction. These, he 
 says, are from their official papers. That is all very strong evidence, and 
 really I think I may plead in the most earnest way that evidence of this 
 .sort is evidence that cannot be rebutted by any generalities such as are 
 suggested by Sir William Forwood. 
 
 Mr. George Hicks, an underwriter, says that the case is conclusive upon 
 this point by one fact, and it is a fact which underlies all this evidence, and 
 is the text upon which I delight to preach. Manchester, he says, will be a 
 port for 4,000,000 of people, giving it an ordinary radius of 30 or 40 
 miles. The total tonnage of imports and exports, says this man, for the 
 United Kingdom, is 75,000,000 tons. It is at page 964, Question 14627, 
 he says : "I took out a table showing that the total net registered tonnage 
 of vessels entering and clearing all the ports of the United Kingdom for 
 foreign ports is, per annum, 52,513,912. My conclusion is that about 
 75,000,O')0 tons" (because he recognised the difi'erence between registered 
 tonnage and burthen) " of cargo foreign and coastwise is shipped and 
 entered to all the ports of the United Kingdom, and my contention from 
 til at is that, taking the population which would be served by the port of 
 Manchester at a minimum of 4,000,0u0, that would give a volume of trade 
 to Manchester of 8,000,000 tons of cargo." It is obvious to your lord- 
 .ships that 75,000,000 is more than twice the 35,000,000 of population in 
 the United Kingdom. Those were taken from the Board of Trade 
 Returns, so that there is no nonsense about it. Therefore, if we were to 
 take credit for such a population, and an average allocation of two tons of 
 import and export per head, we get up to 8,000,000 tons.
 
 38 Traffic Prospects of the Port of Manchester. [Chap, yiii. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 GENERAL TRAFFIC PROSPECTS OF THE PORT OF 
 MANCHESTER. 
 
 But consider this, that the population that we are deahng with is: 
 far over the average population of Great Britain, both in wealth and 
 productiveness, and in powers of consumption, which wealth, of course^ 
 gives. A vast quantity of produce which is now kept off the canals, 
 and so seeks other ports than Manchester or Liverpool, will come to« 
 Manchester. And I will tell you why. To get to Liverpool goods. 
 from the small inland canals must be transhipped into larger boats 
 in order to navigate the Mersey. That is the converse of the proposition 
 stated by the gentleman from Glasgow — that he did not care to use the- 
 sea route, plus the Bridgewater Canal route, between Glasgow and 
 Manchester. So with regard to all these inland canals, of which I have- 
 spoken, as radiating from Manchester, a vast quantity of produce is kept 
 off them and seeks other ports, going by railway, on account of the tran- 
 shipment into larger boats necessary to enable them to get down the 
 Mersey. Now, we should ship it at Throstle Nest DockF, Manchester^ 
 from the small boat which has navigated the canal, and we should save 
 this transhipment ; ei'go, the canals immediately become the usual 
 route, and the Manchester Canal will become the cheapest mode of 
 transit for all traffic seeking export from Staffordshire, Cheshire, and 
 Yorkshire, into which these canals radiate ; not only the cheapest, 
 but the most expeditious ; not only the cheapest, because the 
 rates upon canals are lower obviously than they are upon 
 railways, but also cheaper because we save the cost of transhipment ; 
 more expeditious because we save the time of transhipment ; the 
 cheapest way especially for a large and new trade in coal, both for export 
 and for bunker purposes. We shall intercept (as I shall show you more 
 carefully when I deal with the coal case under another aspect) the Wigan 
 coal at Partington, on its way to Liverpool, Partington being upon our 
 ship canal. The Barnsley coal, you have already heard, is better than the 
 Wigan coal for the purpose of export as hard steam coal ; it is as good as 
 the South Wales, or all but, and far beyond the North Wales coal. Is it 
 not obvious that nothing can prevent, in consequence of its contiguity 
 to us, the South Yorkshire and Wigan coal coming to us ? For South 
 Yorkshire coal Partington would be the port. The idea that the Midland, 
 or the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Companies would try to 
 stifle such a trade is absurd — it would be very profitable to them. Imagine 
 our giving them a traffic of 2,000,000 or 3,000,000 tons of coal, would 
 they refuse it because they send coal to Grimsby ? It would not prevent 
 shipment at Hull or Grimsby, but if they did not send it, the traders and 
 ourselves would soon find a means to make them, but I do not think 
 there will be any need for compulsion in the matter.
 
 Chap, viii.] Traffic Prospects of the Port of Manchester. 39 
 
 And this is an extremely pregnant question, and relates not only to 
 this matter, but to another. One of the railways whose gradients are 
 interfered with by our scheme, is the Cheshire Lines Committee, of wJiich 
 the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Company are the proprietorp, 
 neither they, nor the Midland Company, nor the Great Northern Com- 
 pany, think it worth while to appear against the scheme. By-the-way, 
 they cannot think much of the gradient, and yet we cross their express 
 passenger line ; but secondly, do you suppose, if there was the slightest 
 tinge of jealousy upon the part of the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincoln- 
 shire Company at our setting up Manchester as a port for export for the 
 South Yorkshire coal, on account of their possession of the port of 
 Grimsby, that they would not come here and make five times as much 
 fuss as the London and North- Western Company are making about the 
 gradients in order to cover their hostility to Manchester becoming a port 
 in rivalry to Grimsby ? Of course they would. They were here last 
 year, but they do not come this year. 
 
 Lastly, there is our contiguity to the salt district, where there is a 
 shipment of a million tons of salt coming down the Weaver. Our dues 
 on salt would not represent the extra freight from Weston Point to Liver- 
 pool, which the salt now has to pay, nor the dock dues and other charges 
 there. Surely, therefore, upon that point, common sense, and the evidence 
 of so many witnesses, all of them experts in one direction or another, are 
 enough combined to satisfy all fair and rational minds upon such a point, 
 as this. • 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 MARINE INSURANCE. 
 
 Now, a word or two upon the subject of insurance. I shoald dismiss 
 it very summarily indeed, but for Sir William Forwood, who has 
 given me more trouble than any other gentleman. Mr. Tallack, with 
 large experience upon insurance, says the insurance will be the same, 
 point blank, on page 812, in answer to Question 12226 and the following 
 question. There is not the slightest doubt about it. "A word as to 
 insurance ; do you believe that the insurance rates would be the same to 
 Manchester as to Liverpool ? — Just the same. (Q.) And that you have 
 considerable experience upon ? — Yes." Then, in answer to Question 
 14613, on page 962, Mr. Hicks, of the North China Insurance Company, 
 gives an answer which is worth having. He says, "We make no 
 addition unless the navigation is exceedingly dangerous." He is asked 
 upon what he bases his opinion, and he says, " Because it is not 
 the custom amongst marine insurance companies for a small ad- 
 ditional distance to charge an extra premium, unless there is some- 
 thing about the risk which is exceedingly dangerous." Then he
 
 40 ' Marine Insurance. [Chap. IX. 
 
 gives a long list of the ports to which he charges the same rates. 
 " We charge the same rate of insurance to all the ports of the 
 Mediterranean from Liverpool, beginning at Leghorn and extend- 
 ing to Alexandria. We charge the same rate of insurance 
 to all the ports of Java, Batavia, Samarang, and Sourabaya, though 
 one port may be several days further steaming than to the other 
 ports. We charge the same rate of insurance to Buenos Ayres 
 that we do to Monte Video, and homeward insurances we charge 
 the same rate of insurance to Bristol up the dangerous navigation of the 
 Avon as we do to Penarth Roads in the Bristol Channel." Mr. Hutcheson, 
 a well-known Glasgow shipowner and underwriter, says the same, and Mr. 
 Hutcheson was one of the more important gentlemen, and upon this 
 branch of the trade he is not cross-examined. I must turn once more to 
 Mr. Hicks, at page 962. Mr. Hicks, whose evidence I was quoting a 
 moment ago, says : — " I insure one-seventh of the whole of the exports to 
 India, Ceylon, the Straits Settlements, China, and Japan " — that is to say, 
 he insures £7,000,000 to £8,000,000 out of £56,000,000, which he gives 
 as the total, as large as Sir William Forwood does in his Ime of business. 
 And what does he say ? He says : — I am not giving this evidence on 
 equal insurances without knowing what I am about- he says, I went up 
 from Liverpool to Runcorn in one tide to judge of the navigation, and he goes 
 on to say, I say it will be easier and safer than the Clyde, ihe Thames, or 
 the Avon. The truth is there are no bad turns upon it, as on the Suez 
 Canal, and he says most distinctly he will insure at Liverpool rates. 
 The answer that he gives upon the subject of it not being so dangerous 
 as the Thames, or the Clyde, or the Avon, is given in answer to 
 Question 1 4.616, upon page 963: — "Have you carefully considered 
 whether there would be any danger in the Manchester Ship Canal which 
 would alter the rate of insurance ? — I do not think so. In the spring of 
 last year I went in a steam tug from the bar outside Liverpool in one 
 tide right up to the proposed locked entrance to the ship canal, and so 
 far as I could judge, if we had a low- water trained channel made it would 
 be a much safer navigation I should say than that of the River Clyde, 
 where there are so many bends and turns, and where the view is ob- 
 structed. In the proposed low- water navigation there is an uninterrupted 
 view when you pass Runcorn right down — any vessel going down could 
 see a vessel coming up the whole way ; but upon th^ Clyde there are 
 many bends and turns, and even upon the Thames, I think it is near 
 Woolwich, there is a very sharp turn at an exceedingly risky place, and 
 vessels constantly come into collision there, and the difficulty generally is 
 to tind out which vessel is in fault because the natural risks are so great. 
 (Q.) Therefore you have given the instance of the Avon, the Clyde, and 
 the Thames, and bringing your experience from them to the Manchester 
 Ship Canal, you think there would be no increased rate of insurance as 
 regards danger? — I am sure not. I know the Clyde and the Avon well, 
 and have been up both many times." If that is not evidence of the 
 strongest order I fail to understand what strong evidence can be. Now if this 
 gentleman, Mr. Hicks, who is in such a large way of business as to insure
 
 Chap. IX.] Marine Insurance. 41 
 
 £7,000,000 worth of property, says that he will quote the same rates as to 
 Liverpool, you may be perfectly certain that Sir WiUiam Forwood will do 
 so whatever he says now, unless he carries his hatred of this scheme so 
 far as to cut off his nose to spite his chin. Mr. Hicks says the Suez Canal 
 rates are half what they were when they started, and now they are lower 
 than the Cape rates by that amount. They were equal to the Cape 
 rates, and they have gone down 50 percent., and they are now 50 per 
 cent, below the Cape rates. After that I may say that we shall not fail 
 if you give us our Bill, and pass us into law, at all events, for want of 
 cheap underwriting. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 ESTIMATES OF TRAFFIC BY SHIP CANAL. 
 
 Now, my lords, I pass to the last aspect of the commercial case, 
 the amount of traffic in a general way that may be said to be obtainable. 
 Now this arises under many heads, and there are many classes of it. 
 And here I will say that a good deal has turned upon the speeches of my 
 learned friends, Mr. Pope and Mr. Littler — I do not thitik my learned 
 friend, Mr. Aspinall, was seduced into doing it — but a good deal has 
 turned upon the celebrated Table Pj I of Mr. Marshall Stevens. To 
 begin with, Mr. Marshall Stevens did not volunteer that table. Mr. 
 Marshall Stevens was asked to state, in cross-examination, what he 
 thought the traffic would be, and he was asked if he would tabulate it, and 
 he did tabulate it ; and, though it is tabulated, remember this — it is the 
 amount of traffic wrung from the witness by cross-examination — it is not 
 traffic concocted in the first instance for the purposes of this case. Mr. 
 Marshall Stevens was giving his evidence, and stating in a general way 
 that he thought a very vast amount of traffic would come, and was giving 
 certain instances. Not content with that, the other side rashly drew this 
 table down upon themselves by saying, Formulate what you have to say 
 in a table, and we will take time to cross-examine you. That is done. 
 
 Now let us analyse this general question, keeping in sight nearly all 
 the time this table of Mr. Marshall Stevens, with the comments upon it. 
 It is Table B 1, beginning upon page 858. But, my lords, before I 
 actually turn to the table, let us begin the thing a little systematically, 
 So far as I know, no one has affected to deny the vast importance of the 
 imports and exports of Liverpool. Nobody knows their exact tonnage 
 of goods, but this is conceded upon both sides, that their values, ex- 
 pressed in money, are roundly, for foreign imports and exports, £200,000,000 
 a year. Now the tonnage in and out, therefore, to represent that 
 must be something enormous, because it ranges from the expensive 
 manufacturing products of Manchester, such as Manchester goods, at
 
 42 Estimates of Traffic by Ship Canal. [Chap. x. 
 
 d6100 to £150 a ton down to potatoes. Take salt and pig iron, how- 
 ever, and, of course, coal ranging from 40s. a ton to 10s. a ton. 
 But, your Grace, wo can form a tolerably clear notion of w^hat the 
 amount of ships' tonnage will be from facts which are proved or con- 
 ceded. In the first place, this figure is absolutely conceded, 
 8,527,531 tons, net or registered tonnage, which paid rates and 
 harbour dues in Liverpool in 1882-83. Nobody denies that figure — 
 that is the initial figure. Now these dues are only paid one way. The 
 carrying value of this tonnage everybody again seems to concede is, 
 probably, double, and there is an indication that they are right in so taking 
 it, because (larston, with a net shipping tonnage of 31,800 odd, actually 
 exported and imported 64,653 tons of goods, merchandise and minerals 
 ' — that was in three months, on certain ships only which are enumerated, 
 where the weights of the cargoes are readily ascertainable — if you look 
 a Httle you see the relations between 64,000 and 31,000 are over 
 two to one — the one is twice the other — so that the relation of cargo 
 to net tonnage is shown at Garston— the proportion of net ships' tonnage 
 to cargo tonnage carried is as two of cargo to one of ships, that is 
 at page 1901, it is in the course of Mr. Findlay's evidence. lam particu- 
 larly anxious that your Grace should not think I am exercising any ingenuity 
 or manufacturing a case — that is why I am so careful about the refer- 
 ences. We put it to Mr. Findlay, but Mr. Findlay does not qualify 
 it in any way, and on the following pages, 1902 and 1903, you see the 
 grand total of the cargoes making up the 64,000 odd. That is taken from 
 the Liverpool Custom House Bill of Entry, and there is no question 
 whatever about it. That being the quantity of cargo, turning to page 
 1901, Mr. Findlay says upon the preceding page : — " I have no reason to 
 doubt it." You see, therefore, the relation between cargo and registered 
 net tonnage is rather more than two to one. Then applying this to the 
 8,500,000 odd tons of ships paying rates and harbour dues, either going 
 in or going out of the port of Liverpool, if you multiply it by two it brings 
 it to 17,000,000 odd tons as the figure expressing the relation between 
 the carrying capacity and cargoes positively carried — in other words, 
 the cargoes carried one w^ay, either in or out, to or from Liverpool, on 
 the basis of these Garston results are 17,302,360 tons. Now, if you 
 wanted to get the in and out cargoes, you then would multiply the 
 17,302,360 (tonnage of goods one way) by 2, and that -would bring you 
 to 34,604,720 tons as the total cargoes carried in and out of Liverpool 
 by the ships going in and out. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : I cannot find the question and answer, but I 
 thought Mr. Findlay said that the Garston trafiic was not a fair test, 
 because the Garston trafiic consisted chiefly of coal, and that that always 
 filled up the ship. The net tonnage and the cargo carried you might cal- 
 culate at Garston, because it consisted chiefly of coal, but the general 
 tonnage which was given in was based upon a difi'erent calculation. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : It is not quite that, your Grace, but I was going in 
 a minute to qualify the 34,000,000 tons in this way : I stated that 20 
 per cent, of the ships that entered and left Liverpool entered and left in
 
 CiiAP. X^] Estimates of Traffic by Shij^ Canal. 43- 
 
 ballast, so that I must take one-fifth oflf the 34,600,000 odd— that is, I 
 must take ofi" 7,253,149, and therefore my total of 34,600,000 odd will be 
 reducible to 27,300,000 odd. Now, even if Mr. Findlay did not say 
 what your Grace thinks he did say, discussing the thing as between your 
 Grace and myself, I say at once, if it had been merely an idea in your 
 Grace's mind, I concede some attention must be given to it. 
 
 Mr. POTTER : Upon page 1911, near the bottom of the page, is. 
 what your Grace was looking for — Question 24584. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : I suppose he gave it again, because I have just been 
 shown another question. At Question 24584 he is asked: "You told 
 me that coal and. minerals were three-fourths of the whole traffic at 
 Garston " — he was talking about dock dues there — that is not it. It is 
 on page 1900, I think. What he said upon that point is at the top of 
 the page — he says in answer to Question 24495 : " The traffic of the 
 port of Garston is a question of full shiploads of minerals from the 
 place, therefore it is very likely this return is correct, showing that the 
 actual weight of the cargo is greater than the tonnage weight, but the 
 trade in and out of the docks in Liverpool is not a mineral trade, and the 
 very converse is the fact, i.e., that at Liverpool the actual tonnage would 
 be less than the measurement tonnage." 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : That is what I was thinking of. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : It is perfectly manifest that that cannot be so, and 
 that is only a surmise upon the part of Mr. Findlay. But I think your 
 Grace will see that the presumption is as strong as it can be against any 
 such solution as that, and for this reason : You have the values of Liver- 
 l^ool, which are the same as London, and they between them, London 
 and Liverpool, have got £400,000,000 of imports and exports in value,, 
 against something like £600,000,000, the total for the United Kingdom. 
 
 Lord SHUTE : That is conversation between Mr. Pope and Mr. 
 Balfour Browne — it is not the witness at all. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER: That is so, and I will tell you why I thought it 
 could not be Mr. Findlay, since Mr. Findlay could not say the trade of 
 the port of Garston is in full loads only to the place — that would be absurd, 
 — nobody who knew the place could say its import trade was fall mineral 
 cargoes to it — but, your Grace, I want to be moderate in this matter^, 
 and I admit that some qualification, though not anything like that, must 
 be admitted, similar to that which is in your Grace's mind. I treat it, 
 therefore, as an emanation from your mind, and say at once something must 
 be conceded, but still it leaves the tonnage enormous. Only 14 per cent. 
 of the ships using the Mersey go out in ballast, and though they may not 
 all fill up with an absolutely full cargo, depend upon it they fill upon the 
 average with more than their net register tonnage, and the presumption is 
 very strong that they largely exceed it in cargo. Liverpool and London 
 between them take in values two-thirds of the exports and imports of the 
 United Kingdom. You may therefore suppose in the rough, though it is but 
 presumption, that they take two-thirds of the tonnage. Now give Liverpool 
 one-third of the tonnage of the United Kingdom, which is what she has in 
 values of the imports and exports, viz., £200,000,000. Now give her
 
 44 Estimates of Traffic by Ship Caned, [Chap. X. 
 
 one-third in tonnage as well as in values, and in all human probability 
 you get at the figure of 25,000,000 tons of cargo at least. But remember 
 that as a matter of fact, in the earlier part of the case, we did not base our 
 case upon anything so big as that. Upon page 419 Mr. Marshall Stevens 
 ^ave a very careful answer, in which he does not care to put the thing 
 above 15,000,000 ; but I have very little doubt myself, if I may say so, that 
 if as a matter of fact you find Liverpool with one-third of the values, 
 if you could get at it, you would find her with one-third of the tonnage. 
 If the tonnage be 75,000,000 she gets 25,000,000, but I do not care to 
 put it so high as that. I am content to rest with the 15,000,000 which 
 Mr. Marshall Stevens mentioned upon page 419 of his evidence. I see my 
 learned friend, Mr. Pope, says in his speech : "I have no doubt the trade 
 in and out of Liverpool will reach an amount of 13,000,000 to 15,000,000 
 tons." I am contented to take anything between those two enormous 
 figures, or even the lower one. Now I ask, whether it is 15,000,000 or 
 whether it is 25,000,000 tons that come in and out of Liverpool. Where 
 does it go to ? If it is export, where does it come from to Liverpool ; if 
 it is import, in what direction is it going ? Liverpool does not consume it. 
 The map is the answer. By far the greater bulk must go either to Man- 
 chester itself or the districts immediate!)^ around Manchester, or to the 
 j)arts of England eastward and beyond Manchester ; the proposition is a 
 very simple one, and it is stated in many ways by many witnesses — it is 
 stated notably by Mr. J. C. Fielden, to whose evidence I cannot refer in the 
 shape of question and answer, because it was largely based upon statistical 
 evidence, given rather in the shape of a connected essay by a very able man. 
 But remember that for all this vast traffic, even taken at the lowest figure, 
 which must be going inland and eastward to Manchester, and to places 
 round Manchester, and beyond — for all this vast traffic you shift the 
 seaboard 30 miles, or vice versa. You either put them upon the sea or 
 take the sea to them. Tnat is a general proposition to which the other 
 side have never ventured to address themselves, because they could not. 
 They have done their best to make out that water flows uphill, but they 
 cannot attack anything so palpable to everybody as that. From Liver- 
 pool to almost all quarters of the compass, Manchester is 30 miles on the 
 road. I cannot say that too often or impress it upon you too much — it is 
 half-way between Liverpool and the West Riding — 30 miles out of the 60 
 miles to Halifax. And remember this 30 miles shifting tha seaboard involves 
 a change of transit from the most expensive railway journey in the wide 
 world to nothing for the railway journey, and in place of it only the canal 
 charges, which are 5s. to 6s. at the outside ; and in many cases besides 
 the avoidal of the most expensive railway journey in the world, the avoidal 
 of transhipment, because a great deal of traffic we shall take is within 
 cartage distance of Manchester, and there will be no transhipment at all. 
 
 Now, your Grace, I pass to another head. We say we have proved 
 most abundantly that, taking the existing circumstances into considera- 
 tion, Liverpool does not do all the traffic she might do from the district 
 which she at present serves. Mr. Adamson gave you a figure which is a 
 very pointed illustration of this. The total value of the cotton exports
 
 Chap. X.] Estimates of Traffic by Ship Canal. 45 
 
 from Great Britain, which is practically going from Lancashire, is 75 and 
 three-quarter millions, the exports from Liverpool are only 43 and 
 a quarter millions, the balance between the two being £32,553,000, which 
 now represents cotton exports from London, Hull, Southampton, Grimsby, 
 and elsewhere. Why do not they go from Liverpool — it is the natural 
 port, 30 miles off? That is £32,553,489 for Manchester to export for 
 herself when she becomes a port and controls her own trade — that is in 
 money value without touching Liverpool at all. Under any 
 circumstances I am free to admit there is much export and import from 
 Lancashire and for Lancashire, from Yorkshire for Yorkshire, and from 
 Cheshire for Cheshire, that must and will always be done via London and 
 other southern ports, like Southampton — it will go on to the end of the 
 chapter, and neither Liverpool nor Manchester can expect to monopolise 
 everything. But this trade which I say will be so carried on, and is so 
 carried on from London and Southampton, and other ports of that sort, ig 
 now done very expensively by railway. This ought not to be. Liverpool 
 imports and exports nearly the same in money value as London — that is 
 foreign £203,581,610, as ' against London £201,093,777. I believe 
 Liverpool just topped London, but yet London has, in addition, a 
 coasting trade of 4,500,000 tons of shipping, whereas Liverpool only 
 has a coasting trade of 2,700,000 tons, a little more than half. 
 That is distinctly stated upon page 410 by Mr. Marshall Stevens, 
 and it has never been contradicted. Why is that ? I think we shall see 
 presently. Liverpool being as great a port for distribution and for con- 
 sumption as London, and equally accessible from all parts of the United 
 Kingdom as London, why is it that, whereas London does a coasting trade 
 of 4,500,000 tons, in other words, sends that amount of trade round the 
 coast by sea, Liverpool can only send something like half the amount ? 
 Mr. Spencer, of Rylands and Company, is the first witness who says any- 
 thing upon this point. You will find what he says upon page 74, in 
 answer to Question 939. He says, "If the canal was established in 
 Manchester we should send goods by boat down the canal and round 
 the coast to the boat at Southampton or London." Why does 
 not he send them from Liverpool now ? Because sending them by canal 
 means sending by water. The present cost, he says, by railway to 
 London is 25s. a ton, and if I sent them by water I could do it for half or 
 two-thirds of the cost. Why does not he do it now ? As you will find 
 abundantly a little further on, he does not do it now because it is so 
 inordinately expensive, owing to transhipment at Liverpool, and he 
 sends by railway. It is not worth his while to take the cheaper 
 route by water. What he says as to the expense of sending 
 it by railway is corroborated by other witnesses, and again I 
 turn to Mr. Marshall Stevens, and Mr. Marshall Stevens, on page 
 410, in answer to Question 6675, says this : That the railway rates from 
 Manchester for Manchester goods are to London, 40s. ; Bristol, 35s. ; 
 Plymouth, 46s. 8d. ; Newcastle, 35s.; Leith, 40s.; Cardiff, 43s. 4d.; 
 Penzance, 55s. ; Dublin, 25s. ; Cork, 42s. 6d. ; West Hartlepool, 
 42s. 6d. ; and Dundee, 45s. ; and, says Mr. Marshall Stevens, I will
 
 46 Estimates of Traffic by Ship Canal. [Chap. x. 
 
 -carry for 15s. There would arise there, it is perfectly obvious, a large 
 trade, both home and foreign, with an immense saving. 
 
 Now, Mr. Findlay admits, in his answers to questions upon pages 1905 
 ■and 1906, those rates. He says the rate by rail to London for cotton 
 ^oods for export, including dock dues, is 25s., and for local consumption 
 40s., although steamers from Liverpool carry at 12s. 6d. to 15s. 
 per ton. Why is not this done now ? Why, if Mr. Marshall Stevens 
 <jan carry at 15s., which is the rate for all goods going as high as 
 -SSs. to Penzance, is it not done now? If Mr. Reuben Spencer, 
 the managing partner of Rylands and Company, knows this perfectly well, 
 .and says I can save half of what I pay to London and Southampton by 
 railway, why is it that that is not done ? The answer is perfectly 
 obvious ; partly because of the excessive dock dues at Liverpool, and 
 ^Iso more because Liverpool is the point of distribution to which they 
 must get to use the water route at all, and this without anything upon 
 the part of the Liverpool Dock Board can only be arrived at by a railway 
 journey, and when you add the expensive railway journey from Manches- 
 ter and the district to Liverpool, and then pay such Liverpool Dock 
 ■dues, cartage, and other transhipping charges as there are, and then 
 pay the freight from Liverpool round to these different towns, London, 
 Southampton, Cardiff' and the rest, you get the rate which is paid 
 overland by railway, or such a little difference that it is not worth the 
 trouble. In fact, the advantage of the sea freight is absorbed by the 
 antecedent journey between Manchester and Liverpool. There will be 
 no antecedent journey when Manchester is a port. Therefore you see the 
 disability which we remove, which disability is the fact that it is 30 
 miles from the point of production before the sea route can be used, 
 that disability we remove, and that forms the cause of the coasting trade 
 •coming to us. 
 
 A third cause there is for the creation of this coasting traffic to Man- 
 -chester, Manchester being the centre of a network of canals, as well as 
 •of railways, the canal would concentrate traffic for shipment at Manches- 
 ter, whether for foreign or coastwise traffic, in a manner most impossible 
 .•at Liverpool, because they are narrow inland canals, only navigable by 
 boats that cannot navigate the estuary of the Mersey in 
 safety. Therefore, to take advantage of a sea route, there would 
 be a double transhipment necessary — a transhipment into the 
 ship at Runcorn, at the Bridge water Canal, to get down to 
 Liverpool, with a subsequent transhipment into the big ship at Liverpool, 
 which was going to take them round the English coast or away to 
 America — in this case round the English coast. Moreover, and though 
 last not least, the reason why even this cheap canal method of navigation 
 down, the Mersey and so to Liverpool, even if it were not for the 
 ■double transhipment, cannot be used, is because the canals are not 
 -emancipated, as we shall emancipate them, from the domination of the 
 railways. That is an answer to all such arguments stated by my learned 
 friend, Mr. Pope, or stated by Sir William Forwood, or stated by Mr. 
 JFindlay, in whatever shape they are stated, against the arising of this
 
 Chap. X.] Estimates of Traffic by Ship Canal, 47 
 
 coasting trade, and which arguments, I will say, are typified in the cross- 
 examination of a witness, Mr. Scarborough, the President of the 
 Hahfax Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Scarborough was speakin^ 
 of exportation and importation, via Manchester, of wool and the 
 manufactures of wool, and my learned friend, Mr. Pope, su^aested 
 this to him : he says. You have got your present railway rate 
 between Liverpool and Halifax. Yes, says the witness. What is it ? 
 says Mr. Pope. J 6s. 8d. says the witness. Well, says Mr. Pope, now 
 you have a railway rate from Manchester to Halifax, what is it ? Mr. 
 Pope puts 14s. 2d. upon him. Then Mr. Pope adds to it the canal dues, 
 6s. 9d., and he says, When you have got it, you send your goods for ship- 
 ment to Manchester, at a total of 20s. lid. against what you could do it for 
 to Liverpool. Now, there are one or two things which my learned friend 
 Mr. Pope, forgot— he forgot that the amount he gave, even if right, was the 
 total charge via the railway to Manchester, and then from Manchester via 
 the canal, the total charge upon the Manchester route.* But the Liverpool 
 route must be charged further with the Liverpool charges, which, if you 
 turn to our table 14, you find upon such articles as he was talkino- of to 
 Mr. Scarborough, is 7s. 2d., so that the total rate on the Liverpool route 
 to be compared with the 20s. lid. upon the Manchester and the canal 
 route would be, not IGs. 8d., but 16s. 8d. plus 7s. 2d., which is 23s. lOd. 
 or showing a saving upon the Manchester route of 2s. lid. ; but that is not 
 all. Neither he nor the witness remembered the canals of which 
 I have been speaking from all the Yorkshire and Midland towns • 
 it is abundantly clear that the conversion of Manchester into a 
 port for sea-going vessels is by the complete utilisation of inland 
 canal system alone, going to confer an immense benefit upon the trade of 
 that part of England. But the witness, Mr. Scarborough, did insist that 
 when the canal was made he would obtain a lower railway rate in the 
 nature of a through rate. 
 
 CHAPTEE XL 
 THROUGH RATES AND TOLLS. 
 
 And that leads me to say what I have to say, and, fortunately, it is 
 not much, upon the subject of the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1873. 
 My learned friend, Mr. Pope, was to have argued it, but he did not. 
 Now I will tell you exactly how the matter stands. My learned friend 
 
 *NOTE. — This railway rate to Manchester from Halifax is also for local 
 consumption only, whereas the rate to Liverpool is for export. When Manchester 
 becomes a port she will be entitled to export rates. For explanation of the difference 
 between local and export rates see the rates from Manchester to London.
 
 48 Through Rates and Tolls. Chap. XI. 
 
 Mr. Pope, tliouglit I was putting the matter outrageously high. I have 
 reason to think Mr. Pope did not understand the position I was taking 
 up. Just let me, with perfect fairness, act upon such a matter as this, 
 rather as amicus curice, than an advocate. I have the Act in my hand. 
 Now a railway company and a canal company in the Railway and Canal 
 Traffic Act are defined as: " Any person being the owner or lessee 
 of, or working, or entitled to charge tolls for the use of any canal in the 
 United Kingdom, constructed or carried on under the powers of any Act 
 of Parliament," not bound to be a carrier, but entitled to charge tolls for 
 the use of the canal. Now, when you come to see what the purpose of 
 the Act is in the nature of getting through rates, you have to turn to 
 what is known as Section 11 of that Act. Section 11 recites a certain 
 Act, and an older Act, called Lord Cardwell's Act of 1854, which 
 enjoined upon railway .and canal companies to give what are called due 
 and reasonable facilities for forwarding traffic from the lines of canals 
 of the one to the lines of canals of the other, and, having recited that 
 Act, this Act goes on to say that : " The said facilities to be so afforded 
 are hereby declared to and shall include the due and reasonable receiving, 
 forwarding and delivering by every railway company and canal company 
 and railway and canal company at the request of any other such 
 company of through traffic to and from the railway or canal of any other 
 such company at through rates, tolls, or fares." Now, forgive me for 
 venturing to explain to your lordships what may seem elementary, but it 
 may not be in your lordships' minds, the difference between rate and toll. 
 The rate is that which a company gets which carries upon its own line or 
 canal as a carrier including toll ; the toll is the payment which the railway 
 or canal company get for the use of the line or canal when they are them- 
 selves not carriers, but other folk are. Therefore, it stands to reason, as 
 the clause says, the canal company may insist from another canal company 
 upon a through toll, that the forwarding company need not be carriers, 
 otherwise the word " toll " would not be used in the Act at all. If you say 
 I am entitled to ask for a through toll, it contemplates the idea that I, 
 who am asking for it, am not a carrying company, because " toll " does 
 not refer to any but a non-carrying company. Therefore, my position is 
 that we, as a canal company, forming part of a link of canals, for these 
 canals are joined on to us, will be able to ask against these canal companies, 
 and any one controlling them, through tolls. A trader cannot ask either 
 for a through toll or for a through rate ; that protection^in 1873 was given to 
 the railway and canal companies, but a trader can apply under the section of 
 the Act of 1854, which I told your lordship is recited in and embodied in the 
 Act of 1873, against anything which is undue preference of one trader over 
 another — if that is to say one person gets what are unreasonable and 
 unfair rates having relation to the rates which are appropriated to other 
 persons, he can apply, not under Section 11, but under Section 2, of the 
 Act of 1854, for an injunction against this undue preference of the other 
 person ; and therefore against the undue disability to himself being 
 continued ; the words are :" Nor shall any such company subject any 
 particular person or company or anj^ particular description of traffic to any
 
 Chap. XI.] Through Rates and Tolls. 49 
 
 undue or unreasonable prejudice or disadvantage in any respect what- 
 soever." That is generally known amongst lawyers as the undue 
 preference clause under which traders may apply. 
 
 Now upon that point I want to suggest this to you : My learned friends 
 had a good deal to say about geographical position, and difference of 
 distance not enabling anybody to get a differential rate — they are wrong. 
 And here I have the celebrated case which was mentioned by one of them, 
 called the Denaby Main Colliery Company against the Manchester, 
 Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway Company, and this is the marginal 
 note : "If a railway company charge the same rates for the same traffic 
 going to the same destination from places differing considerably in distance 
 from that destination, this is prima facie evidence of an undue preference. 
 Where there is evidence of a preference whether or not it is an unreasonable 
 or undue preference within the meaning of Section *2 is a question of fact." 
 But to carry the same traffic to the same place at a great difference 
 of distance at the same rate is jorzwrt/rtcz^ evidence, says that case, of 
 undue preference ; ergo, if a Manchester man having goods to send to 
 Halifax could go to the Railway Commissioners and say, It is 30 miles 
 from Manchester to Halifax — it is 60 miles from Liverpool to 
 Halifax — yet they charge me for the 30 miles as much as they 
 charge the Liverpool man for the 60 miles, he would have brought forward 
 prima facie evidence of an undue preference, and then they 
 would inquire into the circumstances to see whether that 
 prima facie evidence was eventually final or not. Then it says : 
 " Upon an application to the Railway Commissioners' for an order 
 restraining an infringement of the provisions of Section 2 of the 
 Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1854, it is not necessary to prove 
 actual damage if damage can be inferred from the circumstances. 
 As a general rule charges on traffic using the same railway under the 
 same circumstances ought to be after the same rate per ton per mile, 
 but the rule is not so rigid that any scale that is not in conformity 
 with it is illegal, nor are charges that are unequal or that cause prejudice 
 and disadvantage prohibited by Section 2 of the Railway and 
 Canal Traffic Act, 1854, unless they act in that way unduly and un- 
 reasonably." In other words, though, prima facie, you ought to have 
 the same mileage rate ; there is a certain margin of licence, and a certain 
 consideration of general convenience given. Then comes the particular 
 case in point. " A railway company charged a uniform rate for 
 traffic from an entire district or coalfield, the collieries were grouped 
 because they all worked the same bed of coal and the grouping 
 applied compulsorily to a coalfield extending 20 miles and 
 covering an area in which some of the collieries were 
 that distance apart. Collieries in one part of such district paid no 
 higher rate than collieries in another for their coal traffic to any 
 particular station, all of them paying one uniform rate irrespective of any 
 difference in their actual distances from such station." The difference 
 in distance there was only 20 miles, and here it is 30 miles. " Upon 
 complaint by a colliery company in the district that the effect of the
 
 50 Through Rates and Tolls. [Chap. XI. 
 
 uniform rate was to subject their coal to a higher charge per ton per 
 mile than coal from other collieries, and to depri\e them of the advantage 
 of their greater proximity to places to which the coal was sent, it 
 was proved that the applicants were charged the same rate for conveyance 
 of their coal to a particular station as was charged for coal sent 
 from other collieries in the same district, although the additional distance 
 to be run was 10 or 15 miles. Held that the grouping system as it 
 affected the applicants subjected them to an undue and unreasonable 
 prejudice and disadvantage, and that the railway company ought to carry 
 the applicants' coal at a rate per ton per mile not exceeding that charged 
 to other coal owners of the district in ascertaining the mileage rate an 
 allowance of Is. per ton in all cases being first made for fixed expenses." 
 Now that is the Denaby Main case ; there was a similar case called, 
 the Nitshill colliery case, in which I was, but I need not refer your 
 lordships to that. The Manchester men will say, We want to send wool 
 to Halifax — I use your railway for 30 miles; Mr. Jones, of Liverpool, 
 uses it for 60 miles. You must not charge me what you charge Mr. 
 Jones — that is the Denaby Main case. You are not bound to charge Mr. 
 Jones twice what you charge me. That kind of margin the Railway 
 Commissioners will allow. If you charge me 3s. you are not bound to 
 charge him 6s., but you must charge him something more than me ; or, 
 to put it in this way, I do not ask you to raise his rate, but you must 
 lower mine — you must make a difference to me in consequence of my 
 geogi^aphical position. I think that is a fair exposition of what we may 
 do. Turning back to the position of the Canal Company under the 
 statute, I did not say this, which I think is what my learned friend, Mr. 
 Pope, thought I meant to say. I did not say that a non-carrying canal 
 company from Manchester to Runcorn could ask for something which 
 was a mixed through toll, and through rate. I did not say they could 
 say to the London and North- Western Company : We carrj^ from Halifax 
 to Manchester, and from Halifax to Liverpool ; you charge now 16s. 8d. 
 per ton rate from Halifax to Manchester, I charge 5s. for my toll from 
 Manchester to Runcorn; you shall consent to an aggregate made up 
 partly of the rate you are to receive, and partly of the toll I am to 
 receive — the whole thing amounts to £1 ; you shall get 14s. as your 
 apportionment of the £1, which wjII be the rate to you, and I will get 
 6s. of the £1, which is the amount of toll to me. I did not say the Canal 
 Company could go to the Railway Commissioners and'make that demand 
 under the statute. I did not say they could not, and I will not be sup- 
 posed to think they could not. I have not formed an opinion upon the 
 subject yet — it is an entirely new point; nobody has raised it, and I will 
 not undertake to say whether they could or not. I am not satisfied they 
 could not ; but because I am not satisfied that they could, I will not 
 plead that they could. But I say they could insist successfully 
 beyond the shadow of question upon a through toll over the lines 
 of canals converging on to Manchester ; that is to say, the 
 canals from Leeds, from Halifax, from Bolton, from Rochdale, from 
 Stoke, from whence you will — that is too clear for argument. The
 
 Chap. XI.] . Through Rates and Tolls, 5 1 
 
 Railway Commissioners would deal with the refusal of the canal in a 
 minute, especially if it is under a railway, we should get a through 
 water toll settled, and when we got a through water toll settled, even if 
 the traders failed, which I do not think they would, to get a cheap rate 
 between Halifax and Manchester, under the Denaby Main case, do you 
 suppose that the high rates from Manchester to Halifax would last a 
 moment ? Give me a cheap water toll from Halifax or Leeds to Man- 
 -chester to combine with my canal toll all over the world, and the high 
 rate from Halifax to Manchester will not last an hour. Competition will 
 bring it down. 
 
 Then I might be met with this suggestion : Yes, but the moment that 
 •competition brings down the rate between Halifax and Manchester, it will 
 reduce the rate from Halifax to Liverpool too, which will keep the sea 
 payment on a par with the other. Why should it ? There 
 would be no compulsion upon the London and North-Western Company 
 to carry from Halifax to Liverpool for 14s. because it carried from Hali- 
 fax to Manchester for 14s. No Liverpool company could take them 
 before the Commissioners and say, I suflfer because you carry for 30 miles 
 for 14s., whereas you carry for 60 miles for 14s., as the case may be ; no 
 railway company would prefer to carry 60 miles for 14s. when it can 
 carry 30 miles for 14s. If they can get 14s. for taking goods from Man- 
 chester to Halifax, to say that instead of taking them to Manchester we 
 will take them 30 miles on to Liverpool is absurd. They would take them 
 at a higher rate, because they like to carry 60 miles instead df 30 miles over 
 their lines, but they would insist on being paid for it. The thing is too clear 
 for argument. But quite apart from the technical argument, your lordships' 
 common sense, as lay gentlemen of ability, will see that it is impossible to 
 suppose that equality of shipping rates with these canal rates in exis- 
 tence, plus the inland canals, can ever be kept up between Manchester 
 and Liverpool ; it cannot be done, it will take all the ingenuity and ob- 
 stinacy, and all the hate of all the railway managers m Grreat Britain to 
 try it, and then they will not succeed. How can you do it to Liverpool 
 to and from places to which Manchester is 30 miles en route '? 
 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 PROSPECTS OF REVENUE. 
 
 But I am afraid I may be frittering away the general effect of the 
 evidence upon this subject of general estimated traffic by going into 
 details. Therefore I turn at once to what I am afraid I promised to do 
 long ago — to these tables of Mr. Marshall Stevens, which, as I say, he 
 only put in when tempted under cross-examination ; therefore they are 
 doubly in my favour and doubly against the other side. Now let us
 
 52 Prospects of Revenue, [Chap. XJr. 
 
 examine them, and test them by the other witnesses whose evidence,, 
 directly or indirectly, supports them, and test them by my learned 
 friend Mr. Pope's criticisms, and Mr. Littler' s cross-examination. They 
 were not worth Sir William Forwood's serious consideration. I dare say 
 not, but they may be worth ours. 
 
 The principle upon which these tables go is well laid down in the 
 first of them, upon page 858 — he calls it "Estimate of traffic and 
 revenue." " Manchester is the centre of the largest consuming and pro- 
 ducing district in the country." Note this: "It is not assumed that the 
 volume of trade indicated will be immediately established upon the 
 canal, but rather that the trade will grow with the construction of the- 
 canal works commencing with barge traffic to and from Liverpool 
 until depth is obtained for sea-going vessels. Coasting and continental 
 trades will then be developed, and will be followed by other foreign 
 trade until the completion of the works will open the canal to the trade 
 of the world." Now let us see what he does — he gives you the foreign 
 imports, the foreign exports, coastwise traffic, barge traffic to and from 
 Liverpool, and local traffic in the canal. The two last are of small 
 importance — the important ones are the imports and exports, foreign and 
 coastwise traffic, and they amount altogether to a total of 9,650,000 tonSy 
 and the revenue, £1,491, 5C 5 ; in other words, practically a million and 
 a half sterling, and then he gives you the reserve revenue of which I have 
 spoken more than once on the ship dues which, as I told you, we have taken 
 no account of, but which is a very large sum, because we were rather com- 
 paring our revenue and the cost and the saving from the point of view 
 of what is done now at Liverpool. But, as a matter of fact, we have 
 ship dues at Liverpool, therefore there is nothing to compare,, 
 and we left it out of the calculation. But never forget that upon 
 3,000,000 of tons only foreign, and 1,500,000 coastwise, a vast deal 
 less than he has taken, there is £187,500 a year, which must be 
 added to all calculations of revenue. Now, Mr. Marshall 
 Stevens had accepted from Mr. Browne that Manchester was the 
 centre of one-fifth of the population of the United Kingdom ; but 
 supposing we made a very handsome reduction, and took it as the centre 
 of 3,000,000 instead of 7,000,000, that would be one-tenth of the United 
 Kingdom. Now, then, we have not taken anything like one -tenth of the 
 tonnage. It is on the same page, 858, of Mr. Marshall Stevens' evidence. 
 "The tonnage of vessels entered and cleared with cargo in the United 
 Kingdom in 1882 w^as 102,529,134 tons." Then he speaks of the 
 increment. Now just see what we take out of that. If our population 
 was one-tenth, we should have one- tenth of the total tonnage fairly 
 applicable to that. In other words, we should have 10,000,000, which 
 would be one-tenth of 102,000,000 ; but if the registered tonnage be 
 only half of the actual tonnage, you have to multiply the 102,000,(!00 
 by two, and bring it up to 204,000,000. If the registered tonnage of 
 the United Kingdom really means half the actual trade done, and the 
 trade done were 200,000,000 of all kinds and descriptions, then it is 
 perfectly obvious we have only taken 5,000,000 out of the 204,000,000,
 
 Chap, xti.] Prospects of Revenue. 53 
 
 which is only l-22nd of the whole amount ; so that we do not take one- 
 tenth in proportion to the population of the tenth, but only half the 
 amount. But as to coastwise traffic, note this : What do we claim ? 
 Mr. Marshall Stevens says of coastwise traffic, 3,000,000 tons is what I 
 think may eventually come on to the canal. Is that prima facie excessive 
 after all I have said ? Liverpool at present does 2,700,000, only 
 300,000 tons less, with all its disadvantages, in spite of its dearness, 
 and in spite of the other disadvantages mentioned by the witnesses 
 whose evidence I referred to, and that 2,700,000, as Mr. Marshall 
 "Stevens says, is only net registered tonnage of ships, just as the London 
 4,500,000 tons was only net registered tonnage of ships. What we 
 take is the tonnage of the traffic we do. If you turn ours into registered 
 tonnage, as compared to Liverpool 2,700,000, we should have to divide 
 our shipping tonnage coastwise by 2, and turn it as he does, when he talks of 
 fillip dues which he takes, into 1,500,000, so that you see all that we are 
 asking for upon Mr. Marshall Stevens' table there, if you compare it with 
 the actual registered tonnage of coastwise traffic done at Liverpool, is 
 1,500,000 registered tonnage of ships, against 2,700,000 registered 
 tonnage of ships at Liverpool. Therefore, we are extremely moderate, 
 because we conceive that we shall have very great advantages as 
 compared with Liverpool in developing the coastwise traffic. 
 
 I have dealt a good deal already with the question of coastwise traffic, 
 but let me give one or two illustrations from one or two witnesses which 
 suggest how it will arise. I take the Irish cattle. Mr^ Wharton, of 
 Salford, says, I have been sent here by all the j)rincipal cattle dealers. 
 That is at page 394, Question 6433. Now, on the same page he says, 
 The consumption of Salford alone is in cattle head 152,527, and sheep 
 446,865. On page 394 again he says they are mostly Irish. Then he 
 goes on to say that the saving per head upon cattle will be 2s., and on 
 sheep 7|-d., the aggregate being about £15,000 a year upon the cattle and 
 £10,000 a year upon the sheep. That is to Salford alone. Now, just 
 conceive that here is a trade coming from Ireland of that gigantic 
 character. If he can use my canal, he can save £25,000 a year in transit. 
 Do you suppose he will not ? Of course he will. There is a trade in 
 American dead meat to a large extent — 165,000 quarters of beef and 
 14,000 carcases of mutton. That is a large trade, but it is foreign. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Do you assume that this cattle trade is to be 
 marketed at Manchester ?<* 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : He says so. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Then it would be confined to Irish cattle. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : That particular trade is three-fourths Irish cattle. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Are you aware that no foreign cattle can go there ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER: He says: " There were imported into Liverpool from 
 Irish ports last year (1883), 248,662 cattle, 253,623 sheep, and 143,214 
 pigs. (Q.) I will not ask you the number of Canadian cattle. What was 
 
 * The Salford Cattle Market, the greatest in the north of England, is about a 
 quarter of a mile from the proposed docks.
 
 54 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. XIL 
 
 the total number of cattle, sheep, and pigs during that year at Salford ? 
 — We had in Salford market during the year 1883, 152,527 live cattle 
 and 446,865 sheep. (Q.) What proportion of the sheep that came to 
 Salford Cattle Market came from Ireland ? — Three-fourths of them, and 
 the cattle the same." So that three-fourths of the trade is Irish trade. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN ; It could not be any other. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : No. I am talking of the coasting trade now. Then 
 he goes on to say this, that the saving would be 2s. a head upon the cattle^ 
 and 7jd. per head upon the sheep, and that multiplied out works out at 
 £15,000 upon the cattle, and £10,000 upon the sheep. And it is obvious 
 that it would be so, if your Grace pauses for a moment, because 2s. per 
 head upon the cattle is one-tenth of £1, so that if you divide the head 
 of cattle by a tenth you get what I have taken, and in the same way, if 
 you divide the sheep by 40, to get it into sixpences, though he said 7jd. 
 a head, you get £10,000 saved upon the sheep. 
 
 Now that is an enormous sum — you are dealing with the provisions of 
 a mighty population, and upon the one item that I am now speaking of, 
 not to mention the grain trade, there would be £90,000 a year saved, 
 but upon the import of coastwise Irish cattle and sheep to Salford, 
 one market only, there is a saving of £25,000 per annum. Now 
 upon page 387, Mr. Stanley, of Manchester, who is in the fish 
 trade, and a large dealer in Irish and Scotch salmon, says the rate 
 for Irish and Scotch salmon by goods train to Liverpool is 20s. 
 per ton, and by passenger train it is 30s., it is the last question 
 upon page 387. " What does it cost you ? — It costs about 2s. 
 a box taking all the charges together. (Q.) Can you give it us in 
 tons how many boxes go to a ton ? — About ten boxes to a ton, that is 20s. 
 (Q.) You have a place of business in Liverpool ? — Yes. (Q.) Is there a 
 special fish train from Manchester to Liverpool ? — No. (Q.) What class 
 of train have you to use ? — Principally goods trains, or we have a wagon 
 put on behind a passenger train — principally goods. (Q.) What is the 
 rate by them ? — The rate by goods train is the cheapest ; we pay 3s. a 
 box by passenger train, 30s. a ton." And he says then, I should save 
 10s. a ton on salmon if I had it water-borne up to Manchester. It is put 
 to him it is 9s. 7d. a ton. I have not taken it upon passenger train, but 
 9s. 7d. a ton against the 20s. a ton by goods train is rather over the 10s. 
 saving I mentioned. Now he says it will be a saving to him, but he says it 
 would not only be a question of saving to me, but it woitld be an increase in 
 the value of my fish, because the water-borne fish as a rule fetches a 
 better price, because the fish that comes by rail is frequently changed,, 
 and there is a good deal of tilting, and the fish gets underneath the ice a 
 good deal, and the scales get rubbed ofi". I dare say your Grace 
 remembers that that is in answer to Question 6333, page 388 : " Would 
 any other advantage accrue to you by bringing it by canal ? — Yes, there 
 would be great advantage, all the water-borne fish as a rule fetches a 
 better price, because the fish that comes by rail is frequently changed, 
 and there is a good deal of tilting- up, and the fish gets underneath 
 the ice a good deal and the scales come ofi" it. We can tell when
 
 Chap, xil] Prospects of Revenue, 55 
 
 we have the fish brought in the market which way it comes and the 
 buyers can do the same because the fish looks Hghter and cleaner." 
 Your Grace does not agree with him upon this point ? 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : No, I do not. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : I do not feed upon salmon entirely. I have a clause 
 in my indentures providing that I shall not be called on to eat salmon 
 more than twice a week. If there is a saving of 10s. a ton upon the 
 rate, do you suppose we shall not get the trade ? Your Grace may be right 
 in what you think, but he is a merchant, and he knows what the merchants 
 get. There is something that would not appeal to your Grace and to me, 
 but which does appeal to them, and which makes them prefer the water- 
 borne fish. It is obvious, therefore, that it would be an ingredient in the 
 reasons for our getting the trafiic. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : I am a merchant, and do a good deal in that way. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : You do not go to market and see the fish unpacked ? 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : No, but I know what they produce. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Before I leave this gentleman, Mr. Stanley, he said 
 a thing which astonished me, but which the other side has not contra- 
 vened — that is, that Manchester is the largest fish market in the north of 
 England — that is, I believe, in re- examination by Mr. Balfour Browne : 
 "Is Manchester the great market for fish in the north of England? — 
 Yes. (Q.) Is it the largest fish market in that part ? — Yes ; it is larger 
 than London." That astonished me. Mr. Capper, at page 386, supports 
 him, and he gives the fish rates from Liverpool to Manchester, which 
 did strike me as being most extravagant. He says the rate from Milford 
 Haven to Manchester for fish is 2d. per ton per mile, and the rate from 
 Liverpool to Manchester for fish is Is. per ton per mile. He says the 
 rate from Y''oughal, in Ireland, to Liverpool is £4 10s., and the rate from 
 Youghal to Manchester is £7 ; he says the Cork rate to Liverpool is 
 £3 lOd., and the rate from Cork to Manchester is £5 ; and he says it 
 takes 30s. to get a ton of fish from Liverpool to Manchester. Now the 
 fish steamers, he goes on to say in 6293, would get cargoes. He says, 
 " At the present time there is a syndicate who have their own steamers 
 chartered to follow the fishing fleet engaged in what is known as the 
 Kinsale mackerel trade, and they send at present the steamers to Milford, 
 but the gentlemen who belong to it assure me that they would send to 
 Manchester direct because they should lose no time and they could get 
 return cargoes." 
 
 Now I pass from the fish trade. With regard to the potatoes and fruit 
 trade, all these are subordinate matters, but they are all coasting trades, 
 and though subordinate to the great figures, they are not unimportant in 
 themselves. Mr. Harrison says, at page 380, It is an enormous trade. I 
 myself alone pay £1,000 a month in carriage to one railway company. 
 *' I have paid to one company as much as £1,500 a month. (Q.) What 
 is the average payment? — Say about £1,000 a month. (Q.) Do you sell 
 on commission ? — Yes. (Q.) Do you purchase large quantities of produce 
 bought in Germany, Belgium, Holland, France, and other parts of the 
 continent ? — We do. (Q.) And are you large importers of potatoes from
 
 56 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. Xll. 
 
 Ireland ?— Yes. (Q.) And Scotland ?— Yes. (Q.) If the Ship Canal was 
 made would you get the potatoes direct to Manchester ?— Yes, all from 
 Ireland." I believe the coasting trade would suit us at present, he says 
 it is not worth doing, and it is not worth doing for these reasons : first, 
 the railway transit from Liverpool, and secondly the dock dues. Now 
 this gentleman gives you an instructive figure which shows you that in 
 fruit and potatoes, which are a very important coasting trade, we shall 
 have the trade. He says, in Answer 6192, page 381, " I have got now 
 from Dundee to London a rate and a route for 10s., and I expect something 
 of the salme sort to Manchester, plus the canal dues." Now Mr. Nicholls, the 
 previous witness, put the canal dues at 4s., so that this gentleman says I 
 expect to get 10s. from Dundee to London, plus 4s. the canal dues — in 
 other words, the rate for Scotch potatoes from Dundee and any other port, 
 of course, to Manchester will not be more than the same rate that I get 
 from Dundee to London, and the canal dues to pay. I shall, therefore, 
 get a rate from the Scotch ports for potatoes to Manchester of 14s. The 
 present rate from Ayr to Manchester is 25s. — that is in Answer 6195. 
 Now that is a saving of the difference between 14s. and 25s., which is 
 lis. a ton — it is pretty much as far as I remember, getting on to the 
 value of the potatoes themselves. You may think that I am taking too 
 much pains with traffic of this kind, but the trafiic is very large. If 
 you|turn to the next page you will see the enormous amount that it 
 comes to. He says at 6210, I have known a regular arrival of 340 tons 
 of potatoes per day for six months at a time. 
 
 Lord SHtJTE : This gentleman says he would charter his own steamer 
 to bring it up to Manchester — that is at page 382. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : He says, I would immediately set up steamers and 
 bring potatoes from Ayr to Manchester. Then to show what a trade this 
 is, he says, at Question 6210 : " I have known a regular arrival of 340 
 tons per day for six months. (.Q) How much is it for the six months ? 
 — Assurning that 255 tons of those would come by canal that would 
 be 40,000 tons. (Q. ) Was the six months you are mentioning an ex- 
 ceptional case ? — No, it is not an exceptional case. (Q.) Has it happened 
 in your experience more than once to have as many as 340 tons ar- 
 riving continuously in Manchester for about six months ? — I have 
 known 70,000 tons come in one year to our station from Scotland and 
 Ireland, and a few from Yorkshire. (Q.) If the 40,000 tons came by 
 canal at the saving of which you told us, namely, 5s., it would be £10,000 
 a year saved upon potatoes alone in the six months." These figures, even 
 if they were subordinate ones, get to a magnitude you never hear of in 
 other cases. Then upon the next page he is asked : " Have you received 
 quantities of potatoes from the Warrington district ? — Yes. (Q.) Would 
 the canal save you there again railway rate, for the carriage of potatoes 
 from the Warrington district into Manchester ? — Yes. (Q.) How much 
 in the course of the year?— About 1,000 tons a week for six months 
 came from there." There you have 1,000 tons multiplied by half the 
 year — call it 26,000 tons. Remember, ours is also a barge canal, it is 
 not merely a ship canal, we have a towing path and barge locks — we
 
 Chap. XII.] Prospects of Revenue. 57 
 
 shall do a large barge traffic, and this traffic will be barge traffic from 
 Warrington to Manchester on the route of the canal itself. We have 
 given several landowners wharves upon the canal for the express purpose 
 of traffic of this kind. He goes into the general import of fruit traffic, 
 and he goes into grapes and oranges from foreign countries, and the fruit 
 traffic generally to show the water rate. And Mr. Nicholls is equally- 
 good upon the fruit trade, and Mr. Marshall Stevens told you he had a 
 regular line of steamers from Jersey and the Channel Islands for the same 
 class of traffic — they are running every day up to Garston. 
 
 Now, I have spoken also a good deal about wool and iron ore, and 
 I will just mention with regard to wool — it is not necessary to dis- 
 possess London of the wool market to get a coasting trade in wool. 
 When they talked of dispossessing London of the wool market, it was 
 when they were talking of foreign wool being imported from Australia 
 straight to Manchester for Halifax ; that would involve the question, to 
 a certain extent, of dispossessing the wool market in London. But what 
 I am on now is the question of the coasting trade in wool or woollen 
 manufactures, so that you may consider wool as having arrived in 
 London from Australia, having to find its way from London up to 
 Halifax, Bradford, and what not, and you may consider the woollen 
 manufactures as going from London to Australia, finding their way 
 back to London for the purpose ; that is the sort of coasting trade we 
 shall set up, and that we shall do without dispossessing the London 
 market. Without going into the manufactures, see wh^t we shall get 
 as coasting trade in wool. The consumption of the wool-working dis- 
 trict is given by Mr. Garnett at Question 5289. Mr. Garnett gives 
 the total annual consumption as 100,000 tons — he gives the saving upon 
 a page a good deal further back, page 322, Question 
 5136: "What railway rates would it have the efi'ect of reducing? 
 — If wool were brought to Manchester instead of being brought to 
 liondon and if facilities were given for handling the wool we should save 
 £1 a ton in carriage alone as between one place and the other." And 
 he says all the Irish wool imported from Ireland into England comes by 
 Liverpool, and is used up in Bradford, and he says that is 9,000 tons, 
 and he gets at that 9,000 by saying it might be brought in coasting 
 vessels up to Manchester, and sent by canal to the places of consump- 
 tion. Mr. Garnett sums up the chances of diverting the traffic in wool. 
 He says, upon page 331, Question 5283 : '* If you can see that by bring- 
 ing the Australian wool to Manchester or Liverpool a saving of some- 
 thing like £100,000 a year will be obtained by that process we think 
 it is a natural consequence that whatever barriers are raised these must 
 eventually give way and the wool will find its shortest and cheapest 
 access to the market for which it is intended." A wool market was 
 established at Antwerp, and sent thence to Yorkshire via Hull, as two 
 or three witnesses told you. Why ? Because it was found to be the 
 cheapest port to send from to the places in which it was consumed. 
 That is how wool will contribute to the coasting trade. 
 
 Then there are the machinery and Iron Trades which I alluded to
 
 58 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. XII. 
 
 yesterday under the savings which Mr. Piatt and Mr. McNiell said would 
 accrue to those branches of industry. The canal will be preferable, as it 
 will be safer than Railways for the conveyance of machinery intended for 
 export ; and as these trades are almost next in importance to the cotton 
 goods as manufactures of Lancashire and the West Riding, a large share 
 of that traffic may be expected. Pig Iron from Scotland and Cumberland 
 now brought part coastwise and part by rail, will largely come by the 
 canal to Manchester at a considerable saving. 
 
 In timber imports a large traffic may be expected ; as well as in timber 
 made goods for export via London, Southampton, &c. 
 
 Mr. Bradford, a manufacturing engineer, on page 333, gives instances 
 shewing that when the Canal is opened he could send his productions 
 of wood and domestic machinery intended for shipment from London or 
 Southampton to the Colonies hj canal coastwise, in the first instance, 
 instead of overland by rail at a cost of 25s. a ton. On his timber imports 
 he would also save by using the canal. 
 
 I do not pretend to have exhausted the materials for forming a coasting 
 trade — I have gone over a few items, not always the most important. I 
 should be sorry if your Grace should accuse me of the ordinary forensic 
 trick of saying I have taken a few haphazard, and I had far better 
 instances behind ; but your lordships will see that I have not picked and 
 chosen. I have taken a few samples, some very important, of the way 
 in which the coasting trade will arise, and I ask you to believe it will 
 arise. What I claim to have done is to have said enough to warrant 
 the question, are we immodest in estimating our coasting trade at 
 3,000,000 tons of goods — 1,500,000 tons net registered, if you look at it 
 from the shipping side ? in other words immodest in putting our coasting 
 traffic at a little over half that which Liverpool must carry, especially as, if 
 you turn to Mr. Marshall Stevens' Table B 3, upon page 861, you will find 
 that the tonnage of vessels cleared coastwise from the Tyne was 3,100,000 
 odd, representing therefore a coasting trade of double the amount of cargo, 
 and the tonnage of vessels entering and clearing at Glasgow was 4,000,000 
 tons, representing, therefore, a still larger tonnage of cargo. Now, after all 
 I have said, are we immodest in asking you to believe that we shall have half 
 the coasting traffic of Liverpool and far less than half the coasting traffic 
 of the Clyde or the Tyne ? If not, then without any doubt, your lord- 
 ships must accept the fact which is proved on that table of Mr. Marshall 
 Stevens, that on that head alone we shall get an income of 2s. 6d. a ton 
 upon 3,000,000 tons, which is an income of £375,000 per annum, making 
 almost, from that point of view alone, an income large enough to pay 
 for the expenditure upon the canal. And that 2s. 6d. is only half the 
 maximum tolls. We know that this coasting trade can only be achieved 
 by giving a cheap rate, therefore we only take credit for 2s. 6d. instead 
 of 5s., which is the maximum, but are we immodest in supposing that 
 from those figures we shall get the income we claim ? 
 
 And now for the estimate of foreign traffic. Upon that we turn to our 
 Table B. 1. After postponing their cross-examination for a day upon 
 the table which they had elicited themselves, the opponents immedi-
 
 Chap. XII.] PrGspects of Revenue. 59 
 
 ately select their points of attack. They did not do as I did with Sir 
 William Forwood, get up on the spur of the moment and deal with his 
 figures and statistics as well as I could, but they asked for time to 
 examine the table, and they took it ; and having taken their time with 
 deliberation, they chose their points of attack. What are those points 
 of attack ? What points have they passed by ? What have they fore- 
 borne to attack ? I will take the latter first. They have foreborne to 
 notice what I have pointed out to your lordships so often, that the Liver- 
 pool district is a semi-circle, Liverpool being situated upon the sea ; they 
 forgot that the Manchester district is a circle in which Manchester is in the 
 middle ; they forgot that for everything east of Manchester, Manchester, 
 as a port, will be supreme, until it reaches the point at which the eastern 
 ports and systems are equidistant from the points of consumption. It will 
 be supreme at Halifax, because Halifax is 67 miles from Hull. Taking 
 Halifax first, you must find some point between Halifax and Hull at 
 which an equidistant point will be, at which Manchester will come into 
 competition for anything eastward of it. They forget all that. They 
 forget also this, that looking down that table, with the exception of 
 cotton, flax, tea, woollen yarns, brimstone and rice, every single item 
 for which we take any credit is now a subject of import at Liverpool and 
 at Hull both. I had thought there were certain articles in our table 
 not imported at Liverpool. Mr. Marshall Stevens says, I am mistaken 
 that they are treated in a different way by the Board of Trade KeturnSy 
 and he has not included them, but that is all in my favour. They forget 
 also that Mr. Marshall Stevens very seldom claims for Manchester more 
 than a fraction, and a small fraction too, of what is now taken by 
 Liverpool. It is only very occasionally that he credits himself with the 
 same amount that Liverpool carries ; j^rima facie, therefore I say there is 
 no very great immodesty or want of moderation. If you look down the 
 table you see all the way through that we very seldom take the same 
 amount of any article that Liverpool is now known to carry. Further, 
 they forget, which I must ask your lordships never to forget — 
 that we do not want anything like the 9,^600,000 tons of 
 goods, or an income of £1,500,000 to make our canal worth 
 doing and profitable. They forget that I never claimed one-third of 
 the amount of the trade of Liverpool as suggested on the other side as the 
 amount to be done at Manchester. I have only based my estimate of the 
 profit on one-fifth of the lowest estimate of trade done at Liverpool 
 viz., 15,000,000 tons of goods. I have always said — Give me 
 3,000,000 tons of traffic and I am content. I do not want anything 
 like 9,600,000 tons, and we never volunteered this sort of evidence, 
 but when Mr. Marshall Stevens was cross-examined, and was put upon 
 his mettle to find out what we could do, he set to work to find out, and 
 found out what we could do, and he said, If you want to know what we 
 shall do, this is it, I have not gone into it in this way before, but now that 
 you ask for an estimate, he says, There it is. Therefore we do not want it, 
 but now that they have drawn it down upon themselves let us see how far 
 they have been able to reduce it. Thej^ pass over the fact of the incre-
 
 60 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. Xli. 
 
 ment, the legitimate increment, of 25 per cent, in eight years, an 
 increment only taken at 10 per cent, upon cotton, which is the principal 
 article ; and finally they forget and take no notice of that very large 
 reserve income from dues upon ships, which, as I said before, are the 
 dues actually now paid by ships at Liverpool. Now they are ready to 
 attack us after 24 hours ; " The world was all before them where to 
 choose," as Milton says, what have they chosen ? My learned friend, 
 Mr. Littler, took bones, flax, jute, tea, wool, yarns and rags, alkali, 
 clay and manure, out of the export list. Now I leave out coal 
 and salt which my learned friend took, because I will deal with those 
 carefully afterwards, and the list I have now given, including coal and 
 salt, covers all my learned friend Mr. Pope's items, export as well as 
 import, except coal and salt. Now, excepting coal and salt, and reserv- 
 ing them for separate treatment, taking my learned friend, Mr. Littler 's 
 bones, £950 is the income we take from bones — 4,223 tons is the ton- 
 nage : flax, £3,885, tonnage 11,284 tons ; jute £2,895, tonnage 11,777 
 tons; tea £1,646, tonnage 4,700 tons; wool yarns and rags £4,077, 
 tonnage 12,080 tons ; that is all. 
 
 Now I add together the whole of my learned friend, Mr. Littler's list, 
 which he compiled, after having had time to prepare himself, assisted by 
 the ubiquitious Sir William Forwood and Mr. Findlay, and if I gave them 
 all in and said — " Take them out of the list we will undertake never 
 to carry them," what should I lose ? I should lose a tonnage of 154,000 
 tons out of a tonnage of 9,650,850 tons, and I should lose an income 
 of £33,000 a year out of an income of £1,491,505. May I not well 
 say, "Take them all and welcome;" and taking them all they take 
 two per cent, from our prospective income. Even to remove the 
 coal and salt would not be fatal. Coal, you find, is £116,666, 
 and salt £12,500, making an income of £129,166 altogether — 
 call it £160,000 ; I have not any intention of sacrificing salt or 
 coal, but if I sacrificed the whole I should lose £160,000 a year, and 
 still Mr. Marshall Stevens' table would remain, like the warrior in the old 
 ballad, to "fight upon its stumps;" the stumps representing over a 
 million of money ; but I have no intention of giving up these articles. 
 As to bones, my learned friend, Mr. Littler, may take them, but let us 
 take flax. I am careful to do this for this reason ; as I say these are the 
 selected points of attack. Do you suppose if they had any better cases they 
 would not have taken them ? Of course they would. There was no hurry 
 about it. My learned friend, Mr. Pope, misapprehends the situation, he 
 talks as if the flax imported into the kingdom was 11,284 tons. The 
 total of flax imports are 98,000 tons. All we say is that we are as well 
 fitted to supply the consuming districts between the east and west coasts 
 as Goole is. Goole is upon one side of the island and we are on the 
 other ; we are 32 miles from Halifax and Goole is 44 miles ; HuU is 67 
 miles. Why should not we be better able to do the business of 11,284 
 tons than either Goole or Hull ? My learned friend, Mr. Pope, says : 
 " What is the use of your expecting to carry any flax ?" Flax is used to 
 make linen, he says ; there is no seat of linen manufacture in Man-
 
 Chap. XII.] Pvospects of Revenue, 61 
 
 Chester. Why should there not be ? I am not aware. There is 
 no seat of linen manufacture at Goole. The question is : Where is 
 it that Goole carries flax to? Obviously to some place in the West 
 Riding, or others in Lancashire, like Rochdale. I say that we are 
 just as likely to carry as Goole, and though there is no linen manufac- 
 tured at Manchester, at Barnsley, 30 miles off from Manchester, there is 
 the largest linen manufactory in England, having a warehouse in Man- 
 chester itself, it has its offices in Manchester, and does its trade in 
 Manchester. Why should not it do its purchases of flax in Manchester ? 
 It must get them apparently from London and Goole — Manchester is 
 the natural port for it. Why not from Liverpool ? The answer is that 
 Liverpool cannot compete with from Goole say to Halifax or Barnsley. 
 Liverpool is 60 miles away — Goole is much nearer. But we shall be 
 only 80 miles away, and shall be in a position to do a trade which 
 Liverpool has not found itself in a position to do. Now, remember this, 
 the saving on flax, as on everything else to Halifax would be far greater 
 than the saving upon any article from Liverpool to Manchester, because, 
 when you come to places Hke Bradford, Halifax, ]..eeds. Stoke, or any of 
 those places to which there is canal navigation, can you compare a cheap 
 water rate for so many more miles of transit ? Supposing Halifax is 30 
 miles from Manchester, and I have an article going from Liverpool to 
 Manchester by a cheap canal route, I not only save upon the 30 miles 
 between Liverpool and Manchester, but an article going all the way from 
 Liverpool to Halifax saves upon a cheap canal route — all the way — 60 
 miles ; therefore the contrast is a contrast of 00 miles of theap water car- 
 riage against 60 miles of dear railway carriage, whereas in dealing with 
 Manchester it is a contrast of 30 miles of one as against 30 miles in the 
 other — being 32 miles from Halifax, are we too immodest in believing that 
 we shall supply Halifax with flax and Barnsley with flax ? A Barnsley 
 man now finds Manchester a place to do his sale business, why should 
 not he find it a place to do his purchases ? 
 
 Now take tea. That is a trumpery matter after all — £1,645. What 
 are our chances of getting the tea. We say ; " Credit us with getting 5 
 per cent, of London ;" that is all we claim. Now the present mode of 
 doing the China trade is obviously inconvenient ; it is admittedly stated 
 by everybody that the tea ships now come round in ballast to Birken- 
 head to load up with Manchester goods for China ; and that as a tea 
 ship, arrives in London, she discharges her tea and goes in ballast to 
 Birkenhead and loads for China. If there was a market at Manchester, 
 would it not be best for the ship to take the tea to Manchester straight, 
 and load up with Manchester goods from Manchester, instead of having 
 an extra journey in ballast from London to Liverpool or Manchester ? 
 However, I am ready to admit that the tea market is certainly in 
 London at present, and probably, the tea import, looked at as a 
 great entity, will remain in London after the canal is made, and the 
 financing, and the general condition of commerce, which I am not 
 commercial enough to enter into, have no doubt, much to do with it, but 
 the Liverpool high charges have had something to do with it, and
 
 82 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. XII 
 
 on this we may apply to Sir William Forwood's evidence in 1881, 
 At page 89 of the evidence he was asked : " You said the China trade 
 was leaving you ? — It has left us. (Q.) And the Indian trade? — The 
 import trade to a large extent. (Q.) How do you account for that? — 
 We account for it to a large extent as I have already stated in conse- 
 quence of the high railway charges between Liverpool and the points of 
 consumption. (Q.) Supposing London is a larger market for tea than 
 Liverpool why should tea be taken to Liverpool ? — 25 years ago Liver- 
 pool was a considerable market for tea. (Q.) That was rather a flash in 
 the pan, was it not ? Before the company's charter there was no great trade 
 in tea to Liverpool ? — My memory does not extend to the company's 
 charter, but 25 years ago we had a trade in tea to Liverpool which has 
 all gone." So that 25 years ago they had what he has called a con- 
 siderable tea market, but he says it left them in consequence of the high 
 railway charges between Liverpool and Manchester. Of course he would 
 not admit it is the dock charges. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Did he say that the tea market had left Liver- 
 pool in consequence of the high railway charges between Liverpool and 
 Manchester ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Yes. He is asked : " You said the China trade v,ras 
 leaving you ? — It has left us. (Q.) And the Indian trade ? — The import 
 trade to a large extent." Then he is asked, "How do you account for 
 that ? — We account for it to a large extent, as I have already stated, 
 in consequence of the high railway charges between Liverpool and the points 
 of consumption. (Q.) Supposing London is a larger market for tea than 
 Liverpool, why should tea be taken to Liverpool ? — 25 years ago, Liverpool 
 was a considerable market for tea." 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Between Liverpool and the points of consumption ; 
 that is between Liverpool and other places. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Manchester among the rest ; that is to say, I get the 
 tea to Liverpool. Liverpool does not consume all the tea, and when you 
 come to distribute it inland from Liverpool, whether at Manchester or 
 elsewhere, the rates between. Liverpool and the places of consumption are 
 so high that we lose it. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : I did not gather from the way in which you read 
 the question that he said in so many words that it was the rate between 
 Liverpool and Manchester. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : No. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : That was what caught my attention. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : If I said that he said it was in consequence of the 
 rates between Liverpool and Manchester, 1 am wrong ; at the same time, 
 it would mean the same thing; the rate between Liverpool and Man- 
 chester would be part of the greater whole of which it is part. 1 read 
 the right words ; I commented upon them and said " between Liver- 
 pool and Manchester," because that is so much in my mind. The reason 
 he gives for this being done is the high rates between Liverpool and the 
 points of consumption wherever they may be; the larger the number 
 of the points of consumption to which Liverpool did send tea the
 
 Chap. XII.] Prospects of Revenue, 63 
 
 better for me. But I was content to take Manchester ; he does 
 not merely emphasize the rate between Liverpool and Man- 
 chester, but the points of consumption. That is my authority for 
 saying that there was once a tea market in Liverpool which Sir William 
 Forwood, who I, for this purpose, will call a good judge, says was con- 
 siderable. " We lost it," he says, " on account of the high charges," but 
 I will admit it was not only high charges. I will admit that there were 
 other reasons which concentrated, to a certain extent, the tea market 
 upon London, and if I were to decrease the charges from Manchester or 
 up to Manchester — which is practically decreasing the charges from 
 Liverpool to the most important point of consumption for tea, I will 
 admit that I should not get the whole tea market from London, or a very 
 large amount of it. I admit that there would be numberless places to 
 which, apparently, I might compete with London for tea, though London 
 will be the market, because London is the money centre; but if any- 
 thing is true in Sir William For wood's evidence, may not the high 
 charges which he says lost a considerable market re-create a small one ? 
 That is all we ask. Why not ? That is a modest proposition on our 
 part, especially as it must be convenient for the tea ships to come 
 straight and be re-loaded. Let us suppose that Sir William Forwood 
 was right to some extent when he said that the high charges were 
 the cause of the loss of the tea trade. Let me put the high charges at 
 l-20th, that is 5 per cent, of the causation in the change of the 
 market, and the trade conditions the other 95 per cent, of the causation. 
 Give to the lower charges, which I will recreate to Manchester, the power 
 of forming one-twentieth, and give me a 5 per cent, market in Manches- 
 ter, is it such a very immodest request ? And that is all we ask ; and in 
 asking that I make an addition of £1,600 a year. Where is the " wild- 
 ness " spoken of by my learned friend, Mr. Pope ? It is so easy for some 
 gentlemen to be eloquent : I find it difficult. I should like to know 
 where is the extreme enthusiasm of bringing back a portion by a cheap 
 charge of that which Sir William Forwood says that he lost by a high 
 charge. 
 
 Now for jute : the income again there is only £2,800. Of jute, the 
 total imports are 296,000 tons, as shown by the Board of Trade 
 Keturns — the return takes 11,777, we ask for 10 per cent, of London. Is 
 that immodest ? Jute is proved to be on page 946 now really used for 
 curtains, carpets, ropes and string, and other matters, but especially for 
 curtains and carpets, in conjunction with and instead of wool. Think 
 of Halifax as the great carpet-making district of the West Riding, and 
 all the cognate manufactures carried on in a neighbourhood like that, 
 in which jute could be consumed — I believe, and it will be known to 
 my learned friend, Mr. Pope, that there are large rope manufactories 
 close to Manchester, those of Messrs. Briggs and Company, of Broughton. 
 If that is so, if we have Halifax to think of, and Rochdale to think of, 
 and other places, I do not know, as consumers of jute, why it is so wild 
 to suppose that we may import one-tenth of what is imported into Lon- 
 don. Not one-tenth of ths whole import, we do not take more than
 
 64 Prospects of Revenue. Chap. xil. j 
 
 one-thiitieth of the whole import. Where is the extreme wildness of 
 that jute assertion ? I cannot see it. 
 
 Now as to rice. My learned friend, Mr. Aspinall, thought the line 
 of cross-examination to be suggested was — You have no rice mills at 
 Manchester ? Well, I dare say we have not, because we are not 
 a rice port. It is well known that the rice mills exist at the rice 
 ports. A great deal has to be done with the rice before it is fit for food ; 
 they have the large covering husk taken off, and other things, reducing 
 its bulky weight considerably. Therefore it is no use carrying it with 
 all these useless things upon it a yard further than is necessary. Ergo, 
 rice mills spring up at a port where rice is brought. Rouen is a place 
 at which rice is brought, therefore rice mills are at Rouen. Liverpool 
 and London are ports to which rice is brought, and you find rice mills 
 at Liverpool and London. Amsterdam and Genoa again, and you do not 
 find any at Manchester. No, because Manchester has not been a rice 
 port. Why do not people think about this sort of thing in cross- 
 examination ; but as soon as Manchester does become a port, rice mills will 
 spring up. My learned friend, Mr. Aspinall, suggests that it takes 
 £40,000 to build a rice mill. I do not know whether it does or not, but 
 if people build a rice mill for £40,000, they do so because it is worth 
 their while to convert rice into the condition for consumption ; and if 
 rice is brought to Manchester, it will be as much worth while to do it at 
 Manchester as at Rouen, Genoa, Liverpool, London and Amsterdam. 
 Any flour mill, says a witness, on page 441, may be turned into a rice 
 mill. So that my learned friend Sir. Aspinall's £40,000 need not be 
 spent. Mr. Marshall Stevens is asked : "Is there a single rice mill in the 
 country except in Liverpool and London ? — No I think not, but any 
 flour mill can be turned into a rice mill." And note the marginal note 
 against what we claim for rice, to the effect that the consumption of rice 
 has doubled in Great Britain in the last 10 years. In the centre of an 
 enormous population with an article, one of the prime articles of consumption 
 of food, which has increased 100 per cent, in 10 years, are we unduly 
 sanguine if we suggest to you that with such a centre we may expect to 
 supply 10 per cent, of what London supphes ? 
 
 Now I pass from that as from a small matter about which I said I did 
 not care very much, but which I have established a fair claim to — to the 
 salt, which, was the first of the two last important items with which we 
 ventured to deal. There my learned friend, Mr. Pope,' was very strong 
 on wildness, and I should like you — because I know my learned friend's 
 eloquence is very seductive — he is a very fair man in a general way, he 
 is impulsive and an impressive speaker, and there is a look of earnestness 
 about him which I would give a great deal to imitate. But my learned 
 friend, Mr. Pope, was extremely strong upon the wildness of the sugges- 
 tion that we should take salt. Very funnily, our contention was estab- 
 lished more than any contention I have been striving for the last few days, 
 by Mr. Findlay, my learned friend Mr. Pope's own witness. Mr. Findlay 
 tells you that the rate to Liverpool by water, for salt, was 3s. 6d. ; by 
 railway, 3s. 6d. also, but at that price he could not get it, the people
 
 CiiAP. XII.] Prospects of Revenue., S5 
 
 prefer to send it by water. He told us of the carriage to Widnes. Mr. 
 Findlay began at page 1895 with a manner that is as taking in its way as 
 Mr. Pope's : " You do not seriously put the question of salt — it is 
 ridiculous — nobody who knows anything of the salt business of Cheshire 
 would suppose for a moment that a ton of that salt that comes down the 
 Weaver would ever come up the canal paying toll to get freights, to go 
 foreign, and paying toll coming down again, when from the moment 
 they join the River Mersey it is a free river down to Liverpool. 
 It is ridiculous to talk of it." Now, if your Grace will turn to 
 page 1895 we will see what he says. On pages 1895, 1896 and 
 1897 you will find all the evidence about that. He begins on page 1895 
 by saying: "If you make the little dock at Warrington and the little 
 branch railway if any craft or coasting vessels go into that little dock we 
 should carry coal to it no doubt." This was his former evidence, which 
 my learned friend, Mr. Balfour Browne, put to him in the form of a 
 question, and his answer is : " Yes, if we require to carry it," But sub- 
 sequently he says: " We did begin to make it so ridiculous." At page 
 1896, Question 24468, he is asked : " If it goes past Walton it must go 
 over the canal at some point ? — Yes if you assume again that you make 
 your dock and want salt carried from Winsford to the dock if the dock 
 is made we should carry the salt. (Q.) At what rate ? — At a reasonable 
 rate." Then he says : " The carriage to Widnes now is Is. 7-Jd." That 
 is in answer to Question 24471, and he says that the carriage to War- 
 rington would be Is. 6d. " It appears to me that having failed in 
 proving the fact by the river now you are going to pr^e it by railway. 
 The distance is not very great, and it might not exceed Is. 6d. per ton, 
 probably the same rate as to Widnes." I will take Is. 6d. a ton ; they 
 suppose that the salt comes for Is. 6d. a ton to Warrington. In Table 
 B2, put in by Mr. Marshall Stevens, you will find that what we ask 
 for salt for export is Is. Now add the Is. which we shall charge for 
 salt to Mr. Findlay's Is. 6d. to Warrington, and I get the total rate made 
 up by what he takes for his rate, and what I take for my toll from the 
 salt district to Winsford to our Warrington Dock — from the salt pan 
 to the ship's side for 2s. 6d. That is against the 3s. 6d. rate charged 
 for the export of the same salt from Liverpool. We shall have no 
 export duty for salt. Therefore it is clear, supposing I had to depend 
 upon railway carriage for the salt from Winsford to Warrington, and 
 that is the most expensive way of bringing it, and you add my own Is., 
 it would be this, that I could say to the producer of salt at Winsford, I 
 would put your salt at the ship's side at Warrington for 2s. 6d., whereas 
 if you take it to Liverpool it will cost you 3s. 6d. Do you suppose he 
 will not do it? But, says my learned friend, Mr. Pope, with some 
 ingenuity, mentioning the name of a gentleman who has not been called, 
 Mr. Falk, who is one of the largest saltmakers in the Winsford district. 
 My learned friend, Mr. Pope, speaking for Mr. Falk says, "Do you think 
 Mr. Falk can send his salt to Warrington ? Why, he makes profit in 
 sending it to Liverpool ; he said so in another room." Mr. Falk did say 
 in his evidence in another room this : "I make a profit in sending the 
 
 £
 
 66 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. xii. 
 
 salt to Liverpool. I deliver it in barges of my own from my own works 
 to the ship's side. I charge the public 3s. 6d., and I make something 
 out of it, and in bad times it is profitable to me when the salt is at a low 
 price. But then there are the dock dues at Liverpool to be charged." 
 He says, Do you suppose that Mr. Falk will send to Warrington when 
 he can send to Liverpool ? The answer is, He will make a profit by 
 sending to Warrington ; it may be if he sent further to Liverpool he 
 might make more profit in the longer journey ; but there is no reason 
 why he should not send by us instead of by railway, and that he should 
 not make a proportional profit on the salt delivered to us at Warrington. 
 He will send it if there remains a profit by bringing it down in his 
 ■own barges to Warrington and delivering it to the public at a fixed 
 price, as he would if he took it to Liverpool and delivered it there — let 
 me add 2d. or 3d. a ton to make it worth his while to send salt to Warring- 
 ton. As to Liverpool, there will still be a larger margin. Make the total 
 amount 2s. 9d. — it does not cost Is. 6d. to bring it down ; it cannot cost 
 as much to bring it to Manchester by Warrington by water as to bring it 
 by land — but if it did, if his natural rate to Warrington was Is. 6d., 
 and that it was rather a leaner matter of profit than taking it the longer 
 distance down to Liverpool, let him add a trifle and turn our rate for 
 salt into 2s. 9d. or 2s. 8d. ; it will be 2s. 8d. or 2s. 9d., against Liver- 
 pool export rate of 3s. 6d. Besides, if Mr. Falk sells this salt to the 
 public and does the carrying for the public, will the public let him 
 still charge 3s. 6d. to Liverpool when he might charge 2s. 6d. putting 
 it upon the ship's side at Warrington ? They will get somebody else to 
 do it if he will not do it. Besides, there are lots of saltmakers in Wins- 
 ford who do not use their own barges, but use the barges of the public, 
 and we shall get their salt ; if he charges too much, his competitors in 
 trade will bring it there. The thing is self-evident, and it is amusing to 
 hear Mr. Findlay, who began by asking us if we were serious in setting 
 up the salt traffic after Sir WiUiam Forwood's intermediate admissions, 
 and by saying that if the dock is made we shall carry the salt. 
 
 Now, that leads me to the last of these attacks — the last attack was 
 on coal — we only ask for 2,000,000 tons of coal of all sorts, both for 
 bunker purposes and export. Here is little Garston, with its 14 acres of 
 dock, our little Warrington dock being 30 acres, with its bad approach to 
 the water, and its confined area, does 1,000,000 tons of export of coal — 
 more than half of what we are claiming for ourselves,* and yet it is an 
 ■extravagant claim they say. There are one or two distances that are 
 instructive distances ; from Wigan to Garston is 22 miles distance ; from 
 Wigan to Partington (which is upon the line of our canal), that is nine 
 niiles — why should not we ship Wigan coal just as well as Garston folk, 
 who are more than twice as far away ? Moreover, you have heard 
 from the witnesses that the coalfield is extending to Leigh ; Leigh is only 
 ■six miles from us. And, further, there is the Worsley Coalfield of the Duke 
 of Bridgewater's Trustees, which is only three miles from us. Mr. Mayhew 
 says, at page 458, that the northern seams of the Wigan district are getting 
 exhausted, and that Leigh will be the future centre of the coalfield.
 
 Chap. XIL] Prospects of Revenue, 67 
 
 Now the Wigan coal goes to Liverpool for shipment in large quantities 
 mci Garston, and it costs 2s. lid. altogether. The railway rate, includ- 
 ing tipping 2d., being Is, 5d., and the lighterage from Garston being 
 Is. Gd., making a total of 2s. lid. Now we shall certainly get it at 
 Warrington or Partington for at most Is. 5d., on the principle of the 
 Denaby Main case, and a great deal less, because it is not easy to suppose 
 that they could maintain nine miles from Wigan, or six miles from Lei<yh, 
 or three miles from the Duke of Bridgewater's Collieries, a Is. 5d. rate 
 which they give to the Wigan people for Garston, 22 miles ; but on the 
 supposition that they do, we shall get to Partington from Wigan for Is. 3d. 
 at most, with a canal charge of Is. 2d., which is a large canal charge, 
 making 2s. 7d., or an advantage of 4d., even if the Denaby Main prin- 
 ciple had never applied. Shall we not get it ? Why not ? What answer 
 is there but an affirmative one to the question ? 
 
 Now, as to the South Yorkshire coal. I see Mr. Hartley's evidence is 
 given on page 442, and those following. Mr. Hartley is a man of large 
 experience. He is manager of very large collieries, and he gives you the 
 extent of the South Yorkshire field, which is hardly relevant. He 
 states it to contain 23,000,000,000 tons of un worked coal. He says, at 
 page 443, that the Barnsley bed consists of admirable house and gas 
 coal, whilst the South Yorkshire steam coal is a hard coal, very little of 
 it at all inferior to the South Wales coal — that is at page 446 — and it 
 ought to be kept borne in mind that the value of the Barnsley hard 
 steam coal has been only lately recognized, but it is nowj-ecognized as 
 being very little inferior to the South Wales coal, and a deal better 
 than the North Wales coal, which cannot compete with the South 
 Wales coal. There is hardly any of this coal exported now, which 
 seems very strange. The Yorkshire fields contain both capital house and 
 gas coal, and capital steam coal, and yet scarcely any is exported ; 
 whereas Durham exports 37 per cent, of its coal, and South Wales 
 exports 50 per cent, of its coal. Why should it be ? Obviously, by 
 the map, it is in consequence of the relative proximity to the coast of the 
 Durham and South Wales coal. What does Mr. Hartley say ? He 
 says : " We could send gas coal to California if we could get to the 
 coast," and he says : " I have sent 15,000 tons to California as it is " — 
 that is on page 443, and he further says on the same page : " The rail- 
 way rates prevent us exporting to every part of the world where gas is 
 made." That is in answer to Question 7202. Now test what he says 
 there, of the value of the coal and the inability they are under to export 
 it, by one or two of the facts that he gives about distance. He says that 
 the coal is 60 miles from Hull, it is 70 miles from Grimsby, and 74 miles 
 from Liverpool. The railway rate to Hull and Grimsby is 3s. lOd., and 
 to Liverpool 4s. lOd. I assume that something must be added for dock 
 dues, but we shall reduce the distance by from 38 to 40 miles— in other 
 words, getting very fast on for halving the distance. This gentleman 
 says, I expect to get a total rate of 2s. 4d. to 2s. 6d — there would be Is. 
 canal toll paid by the shipper. Ships must, of course, pay dock dues 
 wherever they go, but we, if we find the imposition of Is. upon a ship
 
 68 Prospects of Revenue. [Chap. XIT. 
 
 would hamper the trade, have got a large reserve in the ship dues of 
 income for which we have never taken credit, and upon which we can 
 draw — in other words we can say, " You shall not pay Is. on ship dues, 
 only (id. or 9d., or even nothing if it will bring about export." Mr. 
 Hartley says that in the canal we shall take 3,000,000 of tons of the 
 South Yorkshire coal ; that is on page 446. Mr. Hartley may be over 
 sanguine, but if you divide this by half there would be 1,500,000 tons 
 out of 2,000,000 total, and we only take credit, through Mr. Marshall 
 Stevens, for 2,000,000 tons of coal of all sorts, from Lancashire, York- 
 shire, and Staffordshire. Mr. Hartley says further that the West 
 Yorkshire coal, having cheaper water rates, kept the South Yorkshire 
 coal out of Goole. So there they are, they are kept out of Goole by 
 the water carriage which takes the West Yorkshire coal against them ; 
 they are kept out of Grimsby, and Hull, and Liverpool by the distance, 
 and hence, of course, the great balance against them in the percentage 
 of export, when you compare them with the Durham and South 
 Wales coal. Now we will redress that balance. We put them for 
 the first time in their history within 40 miles of a port, instead of 60 or 
 70 miles from a port, and doing that we shall do a trade with them, to 
 their great profit and ours. My learned friend, Mr. Littler, said, Do you 
 suppose that the Manchester, Shefiield, and Lincolnshire will foster 
 Manchester against Grimsby ? Why, of course they will — Grimsby is 
 not the only port they carry to now ; in this very year I have been 
 opposing them in a Bill they succeeded in passing through the House of 
 Commons ; a Bill for making a line connecting their system near Chester 
 with the Connah's Quay Port upon the Eiver Dee, and the evidence they 
 gave was. We want to send coal for shipment, and salt as well, to 
 Connah's Quay. I put Grimsby to them, and they laughed at it. Why, 
 they said, do you suppose we cannot hold two ports as well as one ? Of 
 course, they get profit in sending coal, and the very men who have got 
 the line now to send to Connah's Quay, and thereby compete with 
 Grimsby, would be very glad in a similar way when there is a line to 
 Partington by which they can bring coal to our Manchester canal to ship 
 at our coal staiths there, just as well as at Connah's Quay. Besides, do 
 the railway companies think — I do not believe they do — it is their 
 Counsel think, that it is worth while saying that they think — they can 
 keep coal away from a port 40 miles ofi" where it wiints to go ? It is 
 ludicrous. Do they want to torture the proprietors of the Manchester 
 Ship Canal when it once comes into existence, and the coal owners of 
 South Yorkshire in the same way as the North Eastern Co. tortured the 
 coal owners of South Yorkshire with Hull, until they made a new coal 
 line from South Yorkshire to Manchester, as they are now doing from 
 South Yorkshire to Hull ? They had better look out — they may do it. 
 But no one comes from the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire 
 Railway to talk that nonsense. 
 
 Then lastly upon the subject of coal, there is Mr. Hewitt, who speaks to 
 the North Staffordshire coal. He says that the coal is 37 miles from 
 Manchester ; the Barnsley coal being 32 miles from Manchester, and
 
 CiiAP. XII.] Prospects of Revenue. 69 
 
 40 from Partington — the collieries are starving for want of market — Liver- 
 pool is 50 miles off, and the rate is 3s. 6d. plus the dock dues. Now I say,, 
 supposing that the North Staffordshire people are anxious to send, and our- 
 selves anxious to get a North Staffordshire railway between us and them only 
 too anxious to carry, that we shall not combine on the rate, let alone the 
 canals running from North Staffordshire to Manchester by which we could 
 take the coal. Mr. Hewitt's evidence is at page 4()2. Of course the trade will 
 come from North Staffordshire as from South Yorkshire, and pro tanto the 
 ships will be assured a back cargo. And remember this, you must not for- 
 get that I have all along been talking of coal for export ; but 
 there is the bunker coal. That is half of the 2,000,000 tons that 
 we want. Now, what I have to say about the great table of Mr. 
 Marshall Stevens is this : it overlies and overlaps a great part 
 of the commercial case, no doubt. I repeat again I do not want 
 this income, though I believe in it. We originally did not state it, 
 although when we were put upon our mettle we found it. We have 
 been put upon our mettle. It has been attacked, and I venture to say 
 uusuccessfdly, in any particular point worth your Lordships' thinking of. 
 But give me one-third of it— give me £500,000 out of the £1,500,000 
 spoken to by Mr. Marshall Stevens. Let my working expenses, instead 
 of being 15 per cent., be a round figure of 20 per cent. ; 20 per cent, is 
 one-fifth. Take one-fifth off an income of £500,000, and you leave me 
 with £400,000, and £400,000 is 5 per cent, upon £8,000,000 ; so that I 
 do not rely on that table at all, though I hope it and believe it. 
 With one-third of it I can get 5 per cent, upon £8,000,0D0, which is a 
 good thing commercially — a very good thing. And, by-the-bye, let me 
 remind you of the Bridgewater Canal, which will pay for itself. The 
 railways have not ruined it, and I do not think we shall. There is an 
 income of £1,500,000 to pay the Canal. There is really no need of any 
 serious deduction. Mr. Marshall Stevens is probably right that, some 
 day or another, not at once, but eventually, something like that traffic 
 will arise, and Manchester will become a huge emporium, and a large seat 
 and centre of manufacture that would at once cause traffic and be a recep- 
 tacle of traffic —the creator and the receiver of traffic, which Liverpool has 
 never been; and that is where the great advantage of Manchester will be. 
 And think, your Grace, of this — if an advocate had adopted our witnesses, 
 and had proved, a generation ago, in pleading for the vast docks at Liver- 
 pool, the probability of the vast traffic which has since actually arisen in 
 the course of one generation — if he had ventured to tell the Committee in 
 1857 that in the year of grace 1884, the imports and exports of Liverpool 
 would have been £200,000,000, would anybody have believed him ? Not 
 for a moment — it would have sounded ten times as extravagant as any- 
 thing that Mr. Marshall Stevens has suggested in that table. It would 
 have been ten times more sanguine, according to our ideas then, and ten 
 times more questionable, but the result shows the £200,000,000 as a fact, 
 and shows how mistaken it would have been of any tribunal at that time 
 to have acted in the face of anybody prognosticating £200,000,000 from 
 any feeling of hesitation or incredulity.
 
 70 Working Expenses. [Chap. xill. 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 WORKING EXPENSES. 
 
 Now, your Grace, I want to dispose of a little matter which comes; 
 v&ry well as a bit of fringe to all I have been saying about the com- 
 mercial case ; which is the question of working expenses. We allowed 
 15 per cent, after the most careful consideration. We allowed it last 
 year, and we have adopted it this. It was not necessary for us to da 
 it, for I have shown that if we had chosen to take 20 per cent., calcu- 
 lating our income at £500,000, we should have still an income of 5 per 
 cent, upon 8,000,000 of money ; and 8,000,000 of money is not by any 
 means a necessary expenditure. The estimate for the canal and channel 
 is under £7,000,000, the payment for the Bridgewater and Mersey and 
 Irwell Navigations being separate and additional. We do not want to- 
 give £3,000,000 for the Bridgewater unless the arbitrators say 
 so, so that it is not a question of finding £8,000,000 of capital^ 
 and then £3,000,000 for the Bridgewater ; but we have plenty 
 of margin.* If we found ourselves in the wrong last year, we 
 could have raised our working expenses from 15 per cent, to 20 per 
 cent., or even more ; but, as a matter of fact, we looked about 
 and made further enquiries, as Mr. Leader Williams told you, and 
 found cases comparable to ours, and saw in the case of others, such an 
 expenditure as we thought we might fairly incur, and then we fortified 
 our previous conclusions. Remember, we do not put the 15 per cent, as a 
 mere figure to present to Parliament in arranging the details of a scheme 
 like this. What the promoters naturally do is to consider whether the 
 thing is worth doing, and therefore they want to find out before they 
 can make up their minds whether it is worth doing, not whether it is a 
 thing that will be presented to Parliament fairly well, but whether they 
 will go into it or not. These gentlemen are commercial gentlemen. 
 They are not speculators ; they are not the engineers and lawyers, 
 whom Sir William Forwood called them ; putting forward a scheme 
 which it is their only ambition to pass through Parliament, so as to> 
 sell to somebody. It is not like a marauding engineer finding a little 
 hole in the district between two railways, and filling it up with a line 
 and making it, and then hawking from one to the other. People who 
 want to get a scheme of that sort through Parliament put their estimates 
 down to the smallest point, and their working expenses down to the 
 smallest point. We are not in that position. We came for this scheme,, 
 because we want it, and wanting it we made up our minds that it is 
 worth having. The essential item for our consideration is what will the 
 working expenses be ? How much of the gilt will come off the ginger- 
 bread before we begin to enjoy it ? I say it was not for the purpose of 
 presenting the probability to our own minds that we got the informa- 
 tion leading us to say the working expenses will be 15 per cent. Now,. 
 
 * The L. & N,-W. Ey. Co.'s Land Valuer in evidence put down the estimated price 
 as £1,320,000.
 
 Chap. XIII.] Working Expenses, 71 
 
 the only case comparable at all to ours is the Suez Canal. The working 
 expenses upon the Suez Canal are 9 per cent. only. We, taking into 
 consideration the general elements in which the Suez Canal may 
 differ from ours, and that the Suez Canal has not got a dock, said 
 to ourselves, Now, out of our total receipts from the dock and canal 
 taken together, we must consider that the receipts earned upon the dock 
 will be earned at a larger rate of expenditure than the receipts upon the 
 canal. Therefore it will not do to consider ourselves as a canal only, 
 but a canal j)lus dock. If we were only a dock our expenses might be 30 or 
 40 per cent., according to our traffic, but the canal expenditure is very 
 small ; and looking to the probable expenditure upon the dock and then 
 the expenditure upon the canal, watering as an adulterator the expense 
 upon the dock by the general expense upon the canal, we work it out 
 altogether, in our own minds, at 15 per cent. The cases cited of docks 
 are not apposite. Noboby denies that docks are expensive to work, but, 
 upon the other hand, nobody denies that canals will cost little or nothing 
 to maintain. The ordinary expenses of railway working scarcely exist 
 upon a canal. A waterway once constructed remains, and there is as 
 little to be done upon it as there is in the maintenance of railway embank- 
 ments or cuttings, or viaducts, which are all things which, when once 
 made, subject to repair, are there for ever. 
 
 Now, our dock is not a tenth part of our capital expenditure. The 
 capital for our dock altogether is about £1,000,000, the expenditure upon 
 the canal is six times that, so that the relation between the dock capital 
 and the canal capital is one sixth — and if you suppose the dock receipts 
 are in anything like the same proportion to the canal receipts, you find 
 the dock receipts, the docks being worked at a high percentage, are only 
 a small amount of the receipts of the whole undertaking, worked at a small 
 percentage, the major part of the receipts being upon the canal, worked at 
 a low percentage, it enables you to do a sum of average bringing 
 down the percentage to a very low amount. If you could allocate 
 the dock receipts to dock expenditure, it would be a high relative 
 percentage, but if you allocate the expenses of the canal to the canal 
 which has six times more expenditure than the docks, you would find 
 a very low percentage indeed, and, in all human probability, it 
 would be something like this : Say the Suez Canal expenses are 9 
 per cent., supposing our canal expenditure in working expenses was 9 
 per cent., if you have 9 per cent, upon five- sixths of our capital 
 and dock expenses, 40 or 5(J per cent., it would be 40 or 
 60 per cent, upon one-sixth ; if on five-sixths the expenses are 9 per 
 cent., and on the other one-sixth 45 per cent., you find you have some- 
 thing like 15 per cent. I do not pledge myself to the exact figures,, 
 but that is the principle upon which the argument rests. It is no use, 
 therefore, citing as instances docks having no canals to pull down the 
 working expenses between receipts and expenditure, or instances 
 where docks are owned by railway companies, who forego the dock 
 dues to get the traffic by rail ; nor is it useful to cite canals 
 whose expenses are small and in the hands of a railway com-
 
 72 Working Expenses. [Chap. xiii. 
 
 pany, nor is it pertinent to cite cases where the canal companies are 
 carriers, because there they have many incidents of a railway company. 
 A great deal of the working expenses of a railway company is incident 
 to the fact that they are carriers carrying at a very small margin of 
 profit. When you lump the maintenance of the railway and working 
 expenses of the traffic together they get to a very high percentage, 
 and that is true of canals that are carriers. And it is equally inapposite 
 to take the case of a canal whose traffic is very small. I will use the 
 analogy used by the other side — of the Huddersfield Canal. Mr. Findlay 
 says the working expenses on the Huddersfield Canal stand at £300 a 
 mile, the receipts upon the Huddersfield Canal are ridiculously small. It 
 is obvious that the receipts bear a poor ratio to the working expenses : 
 but supposing you quadruple the receipts upon the Huddersfield Canal, 
 you would lower the percentage of working expenses to a remark- 
 able degree. Now as to the Manchester Canal, let us suppose, 
 instead of having to pay £300 per mile a year to maintain the 
 Manchester Canal, I should have to pay ten times as much. 
 Multiply your £300 a mile by ten; it is not ten times the size 
 of the canal, but let us make it ten times the size of the canal, and 
 let us say it will cost me to maintain the Manchester Ship Canal lined 
 with stone and on a rocky bed, if I spend £8,000 per mile upon it per 
 annum, which is radically impossible. It is 21 miles long. I will 
 multiply the £8,000 by 20, that is £60,000 a year. £60,000 a year 
 would equal 12 per cent, only upon £500,000. So that if I were to say I 
 will undertake to spend 10 times as much per mile as you spend upon the 
 Huddersfield Canal, it will bring it to £60,000 a year working expenses ; 
 so that you see the Huddersfield Canal, so far as it is an analogy at all, 
 you may treat it in that oftliand kind of way, and find that after all said 
 and done it shows we have given an ample margin in our 15 per cent. 
 
 Mr. Pope, who is always candid, and perfectly easy to do business 
 with, admits the irrelevance of these dock comparisons — he says, in the 
 course of the cross-examination of Mr. Findlay on page 1909 : " I dis- 
 tinguished between docks and canals purposely yesterday, I gave you 
 credit upon the canal of being a toll taking and not a carrying company. 
 Your expenses qua canal would be limited to maintenance but not qua 
 docks qua docks you must work as well as maintain qua canal that is not 
 so." That is the line they take. It was especially -unfair to take 
 Garston in taking the docks, because 75 per cent, of the traffic at Garston 
 pays no dues at all — Mr. Findlay says so at Question 24588, page 
 1911 : " May I take it for the purpose of calculation that coal and 
 minerals are nearly three-fourths of the whole traffic ? — The figures speak 
 for themselves. I said that yesterday, (Q.) Are there any dock dues 
 upon chemicals ? — If that is important I will give a list of what the 
 dues are." He said it in another shape that fully three-fourths of the 
 traffic at Garston did not pay any dues at all, and the expenses as he 
 shows you in his table on that same page, 1911, include all the terminal 
 disbursements at the railway station, so that the expenses at Garston of 
 course look heavy, it is not only the dock but the railway station, and in
 
 CriAP. XIII.] Worhing Expenses. 73 
 
 considering the disbursements at Garston yon consider, not the disburse- 
 ments proper to the dock only, but to the railway ; it is as though at 
 Liverpool the terminal expenses of the railway companies using the Liver- 
 pool Dock were added to the Liverpool Dock expenses proper to get the 
 ratio. The total expenditure at Garston represents the expenditure on 
 Garston as a dock proper, and also a railway terminal station, and 
 1) asides that the railway company only charge dues there upon 25 per 
 cent, of their trade. 
 
 My learned friend, Mr. Pope, suggested to Mr. Findlay a figure which 
 is also instructive upon the matter of working expenses. Mr. Pope said, 
 Suppose they did as good a trade as Hull, what would they make ? and 
 the answer is, £130,026 a year. That is in answer to Question 24157, 
 page 18(36 — that is net income. Now Mr. Pope was wrong, or rather Mr. 
 Findlay was wrong, in suggesting that if we did as good a trade as Hull, 
 we should only make £130,000 a year, and he was wrong for this reason, 
 that our dock rates and wharfage are higher than they are at Hull, and 
 therefore if we do the same trade as they do at Hull we should make a 
 larger income — that is one thing. But Mr. Pope forgot a still more impor- 
 tant item than that. I will not lay any stress upon that, and I will 
 take his figure of £130,000 for the dock, but he forgot that besides the 
 £130,000 of Liverpool Dock dues ships must use the canals to use the 
 docks. Now the rates per ton upon the canal are far higher than in 
 docks, both for goods and ships. I have a list of what they are there, 
 including such articles as raw cotton, white lead, sugar, imported timber, 
 guano, pig iron, chemicals, manufactured cotton, cotton yarns, hard- 
 ware and earthenware, and so on, and I will take one which is a fair 
 average, cotton. I see the cotton pays wharfage Is. 9d., which is 21d. 
 I see it will pay for the canal toll -is. yd., which is 51d., therefore, strik- 
 ing out the two ones, the relation of payment to the dock in regard to 
 a ton of cotton, and the relation for payment to the canal in regard to a ton 
 of cotton, is as two to five, or the canal five to two of dock — that is a 
 fair average one. If that is so, to get at what we should earn upon our 
 undertaking, if our trade was as good as the trade done at Hull, if I give 
 up the fact that our wharfage is higher than at Hull, the rule of three 
 sum would be this : As 21d. is to 51d. so is £130,000, which I should 
 make upon my dock, to what I should make upon my canal. I 
 mean that if a certain amount of the trade coming into the dock 
 would bring £130,000, that same amount of trade must have 
 brought five to two in coming up my canal, in canal dues, whereas Hull 
 has only her docks to depend upon, the same tonnage of trade giving 
 her £130,000 giving us more, because our wharfage is higher ; it gives 
 us a far higher figure again, because we have the canal which the ships 
 must use, but Hull has no canal which the ships must use. Now take a 
 ton of cotton as an average thing, what it would pay upon my canal 
 would be as 51d. is to 21d.— as 21d. is to 51d. so is £130,000 odd to the 
 result required, and the result is £315,777; therefore, with a trade like 
 Hull, I shall earn £130,000 at least subject to the addition I have not 
 counted, and that my canal represents £315,000 odd more, with a trade
 
 74 Working Expenses. [Chap. xill. 
 
 such as that at Hull my docks and canal would earn me £445,803.* 
 That shows the rashness of putting such questions to Mr. Findlay. The 
 £445,000 is net, and for this reason that the £130,000 at Hull was net, 
 and I have done the proposition in this way : as the net receipts, 
 £130,000, are to the net receipts £315,000, by using the canal ; so the 
 net receipts of the dock are to the net receipts of the canal, that is the 
 rule of three, so that, according to that, if I can do the same trade 
 as Hull, I get a net receipt of £445,000, which is 5| per 
 cent, upon a capital of £8,000,000. In fact, on a ton of cotton, by being 
 a canal as well as a dock company, where Hull only gets 6d. we get 
 6s., because our wharfage on the cotton is Is. 9d., and the canal toll 
 4s. 3d, — so that we get twelve times the gross traffic receipts that 
 Hull gets, even if we do not obtain a greater bulk or quantity of traffic. 
 I am compelled to take the net traffic in the docks the same as the net 
 traffic of Hull, and then say the net traffic is as five to two, the net 
 traffic upon the dock ; that gives £445,000 upon £8,000 000, which is 
 6J per cent. Therefore, I may say this, that upon the subject of work- 
 ing expenses, without troubling you to go into the question whether or 
 not I am right upon the 15 per cent., if I did the trade at Manchester 
 which they do at Hull, I should get a net result, and that net result 
 would be achieved by getting that as the net result after a deduction of 
 the dock expenditure at Hull, which is 48 per cent. I see Mr. Leader 
 WilHams told you how he got at 15 per cent. — he says at page 619, in 
 answer to Question 9269, " I think from my experience upon other 
 rivers that 15 per cent, per annum would be a very fair rate to allow 
 for maintenance. (Q.) That is 15 per cent, of the gross takings ? — 
 It would be a very large amount ; the percentage must vary with the 
 amount of revenue — it would be more at starting and gradually 
 would get less ; that is the great advantage of a waterway ; on 
 all other systems of carriage, railway road or tramway, the 
 wear andtear increases precisely in the ratio of the traffic, but in a 
 waterway it is not so, so that as you increase the traffic you may lower 
 the rate if you wish to do so." That is so. Water does not wear out, 
 that is the whole truth. You have made your canal in the first instance 
 and filled it with water, and as long as the skies and the artesian wells 
 provide you with water, your waterway maintains itself. Your water- 
 way is the permanent way of the railway, and that is, where the ex- 
 penses go. Therefore, I say even if I were to take some of their false 
 analogies like the Hull Docks, I get an uncommonly good profit, even 
 supposing I pay the outrageous percentage which I shall never pay, for 
 working expenses, and if I take another false analogy like the Hudders- 
 field Canal, and say by rule of thumb I will spend ten times what you 
 spend, I do not even then get up to 15 per cent. That is all I can say 
 as to working expenses. You cannot expect to have the same amount 
 
 * Note. — In the articles named the average charges for Ship Canal toll and 
 ■wharfage combined would amount to about 12 times the income at Hull from 
 wharfage alone, or, following Mr. Findlay's method of calculation, £1,560,000.
 
 Chap. XIII.] Working Expenses, 75 
 
 of evidence or analogies upon a point of that kind which, to a certain, 
 extent, must be problematical ; but you have enough to lead you to th© 
 point that we, attempting in our minds in a wise manner before we came 
 for the scheme to see what the working would cost us, have not gone 
 far afield in fixing upon the 15 per cent. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 WAREHOUSES. 
 
 Another small point is the point of warehousing. We have not 
 provided warehouses to any extent upon the canal, we provide lots of sheds^ 
 but warehouses we have not gone into, we are going to buy some - part 
 of our total expenditure will involve the purchase of a large number of 
 warehouses belonging to the Bridgewater Canal. People who oppose a 
 scheme like this bring everything they can in evidence against it. They 
 say, You have not allowed anything for warehouses ; 4;hen they sa,y, 
 There is an immense amount of warehouses in Liverpool, which cost 
 £5,000,000; the trade of Liverpool is carried on upon the basis of 
 having warehouses for the storage of 1,000,000 tons of merchandise 
 in the town. Very likely. The warehouses all over Liverpool are- 
 commensurate with the Liverpool trade — there are plenty of ware- 
 houses available about Manchester, and plenty more will spring up» 
 The warehouses at Liverpool have gradually sprung up as the trade 
 of Liverpool has gradually increased. No one thought it necessary 
 to twit the people coming for docks at Liverpool in the first instance^ 
 with the fact that they had not provided an unheard-of sum for 
 the trade that might some day arise, and require warehouses. The 
 warehouses at Liverpool have gradually grown up by private specula- 
 tion — that is upon page 1878, in answer to Question 24291 : *' Private 
 persons build warehouses in Liverpool, and persons wanting to use them 
 pay rent for them in respect of goods stored in them. The same pro- 
 cess may be carried out in Manchester, a private company may 
 build the warehouse and the merchants may have the use of it."" 
 That is a hypothetical question put by my learned friend, Mr. Balfour 
 Browne, to Mr. Findlay — then what does he say : " Granted all the same 
 conditions in Manchester as in Liverpool, probably the same result would 
 ensue, but I cannot assure the same conditions." What condition is likely 
 to be diflerent ? If there is a large dock at Manchester, forming a terminus- 
 of import traffic into Manchester, why should not private people erect 
 warehouses to accommodate the traffic, just as private persons erected
 
 76 Warehouses. [Chap. XIV. 
 
 private warehouses for the import traffic to Liverpool ? Mr. Lyster and 
 Mr. Hornby said the same thing — that private enterprise provided ware- 
 houses in Liverpool. I say private enterprise would provide them at 
 Manchester. You had a long list of warehouses empty which might be 
 used at present, or might be arranged for the storage of cotton-or other 
 goods. Mr. Lyster and Mr. Hornby, I believe, one or both of them 
 said what is perfectly true, that the Dock Board have spent nothing 
 under the Act they obtained 11 or 12 years ago, in 1872 or 1873, on 
 warehouses. They took power to spend £100,000 in case they might 
 find it advisable to do so, but they have not done so — they find it more 
 advisable to let the public provide their own warehouses ; and what is 
 true of them as a Dock Board, has proved true of the 
 Clyde Trustees — they took power to spend more money upon ware- 
 houses, but they have not done it — they have found that private 
 enterprise conducts the warehouse business better than dock 
 companies or pubhc trusts can do. And to show how completely this 
 is relegated to private enterprise, Bristol has the same thing ; none of the 
 docks at Bristol , or at the mouth of the River Avon, own warehouses ; 
 none of those own any warehouses. The railway and canal warehouses 
 taken together, says Mr. Findlay, at 23,985, only hold 177,000 bales of 
 cotton — 177,000 bales of cotton, or 35,000 tons ; that is, not one- 
 twentieth part of the annual import. Mr. Findlay also says, which shows 
 the non-necessity for warehouses for the cotton trade, that only 55 per 
 cent, of the cotton imported is warehoused at all ; that is at page 1845, 
 Question 23987 : " Can you give me the percentage of the cotton received 
 from the Lancashire and Yorkshire by you which is warehoused against 
 that sent to the mill ? — It has been ascertained after some inquiry to be 
 55 per cent." And though that is the fact, that their warehousing power 
 is so small, and that only 55 per cent, of the cotton required warehousing, 
 it is worth observation upon the general subject of the charges that 
 the trade has to pay, that they give no rebate on the cotton rate which 
 includes warehousing for two months, if the warehouses are not used. 
 Now, the moral of all that is that the warehousing business is not a dock 
 company's business — it is a private business of its own, and exists as a 
 private business in all these great cities, and I may add in London as well, 
 though there are dock warehouses in London, the East and West India 
 Docks. Here you have three great cities, Bristol, Glasgow and Liver- 
 pool itself, where the warehousing is not done at all by the dock authorities, 
 but is left entirely to private enterprise. I am wrong. There are some old 
 dock warehouses in Liverpool under the Act to which I referred. At 
 Liverpool for the last 11 or 12 years, I venture to say that the dock 
 authorities have apparently arrived at the determination to leave the 
 building of dock warehouses alone, and now have been built in con- 
 nection with the large New North Docks.
 
 Chap. XV. J The Capitcd. 77 
 
 CHAPTEK XV. 
 
 THE CAPITAL. 
 
 Now, I pass to a subject which I approach with considerable satisfac- 
 tion to myself, and that is the question of the consensus of the monied 
 classes and the capital question. I confess for some time I have been 
 pretty eager to get to that, and I approach it with a light heart. We 
 will take the consensus of the monied classes first. Now what does the 
 denial of that consensus mean ? What does my learned friend, Mr. Pope, 
 who started this idea last year first, and has harped upon it this year, 
 mean by what he says ? It savours to me somewhat of affectation, as 
 though there were some clique apart in these manufacturing districts 
 from the rich capitalists engaged in trade, the rich people out of trade, 
 who perhaps have been in trade, or whose grandfathers have been in 
 trade, a sort of aristocracy of the trade, who sit apart as censors of an 
 attempt like this, to patronize it on the one hand or condemn it on the 
 other. I know no such class apart in the manufacturing counties. But if 
 there were it might be said as to their approval or disapproval, it is ahke 
 worthless. I should say then that they were men whose days of energy 
 were over ; I should say they were the timorous rich men of Manchester 
 with established investments, with which a great scheme like this 
 would be in conflict ; the Mersey Dock Bonds or the London and 
 North-Western Debentures, perhaps, or they would be the sons or 
 grandsons of people in that condition, who rather have grown up to 
 look down upon trade, and, knowing nothing about it, say, for 
 the same reason, " I have got my investments, and I became rich 
 under a happy state of things, and I see no reason for the altera- 
 tion, and I will have nothing to do with it." That would be the sort of 
 people. But I do not believe in the existence of such a class. The only 
 class I recognize in the manufacturing districts as having anything to do 
 with this are the rich people who are engaged in trade ; and those I have 
 got to a man pretty nearly. What do you say now, for instance, in 
 considering the question of the monied classes and the important classes en- 
 gaged in trade, to the resolution last February of the Manchester Chamber 
 of Commerce ? Do they represent the monied classes engaged in trade ? 
 What do you say to the resolution of the Associated Chambers of Commerce 
 in London ? Do they represent the people engaged in trade, or will they 
 represent the unthinking masses, which is the phrase my learned friend, 
 Mr. Pope, adopted ? What do you say to the general consensus of the 
 meeting of the Salford ratepayers where £:^,000 was subscribed rateably ? 
 There was no subscription from the Chamber of Commerce, because, of 
 course, there are no corporate funds, as has been explained to you ; l3ut 
 members have subscribed, and a great number of them. Then, what do 
 you say to the Manchester Corporation subscribing £10,000 ? And, lastly, 
 look at the list of the Committee. That contains many, if not most of the 
 great firms in Manchester, and the associated towns through some
 
 78 The Capital. [Chap. XV. 
 
 Tepresentative member or other. Look at the class of witnesses we 
 'Called. Mr. Spencer, representing Eylands and Company ; does he 
 i:epresent a firm which may be called one of the monied classes 
 ■engaged in trade ? He has subscribed ^500 to the Parliamentary 
 expenses, and he says, Mr. John Rylands himself has also subscribed 
 de2,000, and is ready to take £50,000 of the capital, and the firm will 
 also subscribe to the capital. He declared that the scheme is growing in 
 favour with the monied classes, and he and Mr. Rylands believed in its 
 financial success. Again, does Mr. Walmsley, the President of the 
 €otton Spinners' Association, alone representing at least 37 milhons of 
 capital, belong to the monied classes engaged in trade, or is he one 
 of the unthinking masses ? " I will ask the same question of Mr. 
 Bradbury, the managing director of J. H. Gartside & Co., Limited, 
 To which class may he belong ? I repeat the question of Mr. Andrew, 
 the Secretary of the Oldham Master Spinners' Association, or Mr. Joshua 
 Eawlinson, Secretary of the North-East Lancashire Cotton Manu- 
 facturers' Association. Whom do they represent ? The substantial 
 people engaged in trade ? Whom do all these people represent — the 
 substantial people engaged in trade, or the "unthinking masses?" 
 Then I come to Mr. Alderman Hopkinson, of Manchester. What does 
 •he say ? He said that the monied classes, though they were slow to 
 €ome in at first — and rightly — till they had thoroughly looked into the 
 scheme, because of competing investments — although they were slow to 
 come in— from the caution which all people show when they begin to grow 
 j^ich — he says they have come in now, and they were well represented at 
 the Manchester's town meeting in November, 1882. Now I ask you 
 to set what he distinctly says against my learned friend, Mr. Pope, 
 upon the subject. He calls it the largest representative meeting 
 of the monied classes ever held. At page 180, in answer to 
 Question 2550, he says : " You must remember that we had one 
 of the largest representative meetings of the monied classes in 
 Manchester, over which I presided in the Town Hall, which was 
 crammed full with numbers of representatives of the monied classes, and 
 resolutions in favour of the canal were carried unanimously without a single 
 dissentient. Resolutions were proposed and seconded, the whole of 
 them by men representing enormous interests, and they themselves of 
 enormous wealth." What is the use of people going about, by way of 
 prejudice, having no sound argument against a scheme of this sort, to talk 
 in that rash way ? Then Sir Joseph Heron, the present Town Clerk of 
 Manchester, surely a representative man, says that no less than 40 members 
 of the Manchester Corporation have subscribed, and he read the resolution 
 of the 5th of March, on page 184, which has been brought before you. 
 Mr. Mackinson, again, the Mayor of Salford, speaks to the resolution of 
 the Corporation and the ratepayers to subscribe one penny in the pound 
 upon the rateability of Salford. Mr. Hall, of Ashton, the agent and trustee 
 of Lord Stamford, speaks to the general feeling in favour of this scheme, 
 a-nd my learned friend, Mr. Pope, elicited from him that Messrs. Mayall, 
 the largest firm of spinners of Mossley — indeed in the world — are in
 
 Chap, xy.] The Capital. 79 
 
 favour of this scheme. Then comes Sir Joseph Lee. Was Sir Joseph 
 Lee made a knight because he was one of the " unthinking masses," or 
 because he assisted and advised it in the Foreign Office on Commercial 
 Treaties ? He is a cotton spinner and manufacturer, and he comes 
 to represent the Chamber of Commerce of Manchester by resolutions 
 of the members, and speaks as to the importance of the general 
 feeling. Mr. Crossley, of Halifax — I wonder whether he and his firm 
 are members of the monied classes, or whether they are units among the 
 *' unthinking masses ? " Then comes Mr. Samuel Ogden, a well-known 
 merchant and manufacturer in Manchester. He says the scheme grows 
 in favour, and he said : "I never knew the Chamber of Commerce to 
 take such an interest in any scheme before." That is upon page 310. 
 Then there is Mr. Baerlein. Is he one of the unthinking ones ? He 
 exports, however, 25,000 tons a year. Mr. Piatt, of Oldham, a name 
 that I have heard before, whose father sat for Oldham for a long 
 time — I wonder whether he is a member of an important or an 
 unimportant firm. They are only the largest people in their own way, 
 as machine makers, in the United Kingdom, employing about 9,000 
 workpeople. He comes representing the feeling of Oldham people and 
 the Corporation, and he says the Corporation of Oldham want a clause 
 enabling them to subscribe a penny in the pound of the rateable 
 value to the scheme. Then comes Mr. Leech, of Manchester, yarn 
 merchant, a member of the Town Council and of the Chamber of 
 Commerce. He says that he mixes largely with the commercial men, 
 and he says that the feeling is almost unanimous in favoui'of the scheme. 
 At page 910, at Question 13880 he is asked : " What reasons can you 
 give to the Committee for your opinion as to the finding of the capital ? 
 — The very favourable reception which the scheme has had altogether, and 
 that it is supported by the largest employers of labour and the wealthiest 
 men in the district." And then he is asked at Question 13886, " Have 
 any promises been made to you with respect to taking shares in 
 reference to the capital ? — No ; in conversation I have gathered that shares 
 would be taken because the men have said that they were perfectly willing 
 to take shares and to a large extent. (Q.) To what extent generally ? — 
 Roughly speaking £150,000. (Q.) That is merely amongst your own 
 personal friends? — Yes." Then Mr. James, of the firm of Michaelis 
 James and Co., large merchants in Manchester, says the same thing as Mr. 
 Leech. Mr. Hicks, underwriter, at page 966, is asked, at Question 
 14651: " There have been some questions asked as to whether the 
 general body of subscribers to this scheme as far as it has gone are many 
 of the wealthiest men in Lancashire or not, what is the case ? — It is most 
 astonishing that such statements could be made. They include nearly all 
 the monied men of the Lancashire district so far as I know them. (Q.) 
 You mean the subscription list to the preliminary expenses includes nearly 
 all the wealthy men in Lancashire ? — Yes ; it includes all the wealthy men 
 in Lancashire— the people that I have any knowledge of." Then Mr. 
 Jacob Bright, the member for Manchester, says that the feeling is general 
 in every class. He speaks as to the growth of public opinion in the
 
 80 The Capital, [Chap. xv. 
 
 monied classes. That is at page 974, and at page 975, at Question 
 14737, he is asked by my learned friend, Mr. Pope, " Can you distinguish 
 in these cases between those who subscribed last year and those who 
 renewed their interest in the present year ? — With reference to this list 
 [a list of the leading subscribers to the Bill] it contains, I believe, 
 by far the larger part of the most eminent firms in Manchester, 
 men of all kinds of businesses and occupations ; I believe it con- 
 tains by far the larger part, and if anybody who knows Manchester 
 well were to go through this list — and there are such men — if you were 
 to get an intelligent Manchester banker and ask him what he thought of 
 the money which this list represented, or perhaps I should say, what he 
 thought of the millions of money represented by the names in this list, he 
 would tell you that it is such a list as probably had never been seen in 
 Manchester before in connection with one single object. Mr. Pember : 
 What shall I put it at, 40 or 50 millions of money ? — I do not like to 
 say," showing that the figure does not frighten him at all. He says, 
 even Mr. Armitage, M.P., has changed his mind, and is now thoroughly 
 in favour of the scheme ; Mr. Armitage, who did damn us with faint 
 praise last year, but whose evidence my learned friend, Mr. Littler, gave 
 us the substance of, so that I do not mind being twitted with him. 
 
 Now, as to what Mr. Bright says at Question 14754 about Mr. 
 Armitage, just let me read you what he told the Committee : " The 
 prospect of the ship canal being made will depend upon the monied 
 classes, will it not? — I presume it will. (Q.) And they are at all events 
 less enthusiastic than the working classes ? — They are not fully persuaded 
 yet of the desirability of the scheme — that is to say of the practicability of 
 the scheme I should say. (Q.) When you talk of the practicability, I 
 suppose you mean the practicability of making it a financial success ? — 
 I mean by that that we shall both materially reduce the rate of freight and 
 also make it beneficial and remunerative to the investors. (Q.) Those are 
 the points upon which the monied classes are not fully convinced? — 
 Yes. (Q.) Have you considered the financial prospects of the canal ? — 
 I have not. (Q.) Not at all ? — Not so as to give an opinion as to the 
 point upon which I last spoke that is to say as to the profitableness of 
 the adventure and also as to the reduction in the rates of freights. (Q.) 
 So that at at all events, Mr. Bright, I may take this, that though Mr. 
 Armitage's name appears upon this list, its appearance there must not be 
 taken (because this evidence was taken after that) as eltpressing his view 
 at the time of the financial prospects of the undertaking ? — I heard Mr, 
 Armitage give that evidence, and I have no doubt it is correctly reported 
 there, and I should think there is very much truth in what he said. He 
 said that the monied classes of Manchester were not yet fully convinced, 
 and so on, that there were certain doubts, and that he was amongst that 
 class, and also had those doubts. I am happy to say that the doubts in 
 Mr. Armitage's mind have been removed." When people cross-examine 
 they must look out what answers they get ; and then my learned friend, 
 Mr. Pope, who was the inventor of this notion that the monied classes 
 were out of it, and that the unthinking masses alone were the persons who
 
 Chap. XV.] The Capital. 81 
 
 were enthusiastic about the measure, says this, in answer to Mr. Bright, 
 to whom I was putting the list of the subscribers and asking him what sort 
 of people they were, and getting that answer that they represented millions 
 of money, my learned friend, Mr. Pope, says : " I admit that if it were a 
 list of subscribers to the undertaking, then I would undertake to say it 
 would be as remarkable a list as ivas ever formulated.'" Is it not astounding 
 that people can be so inconsistent ? He says, again, " Of course, I am not 
 going to discredit so remarkable a list as that in the least:'' *' I should be 
 doing myself an injustice, and you, too, if I did not acknowledge that there 
 is a very widespread interest in the scheme at all events whatever that may 
 amount to." What it amounts to is this, that all these gentlemen became 
 combined in as remarkable a list as was ever formulated. All they have 
 done is to subscribe £100,000 to get the Bill. But does it or does it not 
 show the consensus of the monied classes in favour of the measure ? 
 And what is my learned friend Mr. Pope's phrase ? "I admit if this were 
 a list of subscribers to the undertaking, then I would undertake to say it 
 would be as remarkable a list as was ever formulated." That is an 
 admission made by my learned friend Mr. Pope after, I was going to say, 
 audaciously suggesting to Mr. Holt that there was no one in it whom he 
 and Mr. Holt would understand as having a balance at his bankers except 
 Mr. Rylands. That is at page 961. He is asked : " Tell me, except Mr. 
 Kylands, whose letter was read yesterday, anybody else that you and I 
 would understand in Lancashire as a man with a balance at his bankers," 
 and the next morning he positively says " that is as remarkable a list as 
 ever was formulated ; and if it was only subscribers to the scheme instead 
 of preliminary expenses, I should say so in every sense of the word." 
 Now that is the consensus of the monied classes. What are they sub- 
 scribers for ? For the fun of getting an Act of Parliament ? For the 
 amusement of deluding the '* unthinking masses," or do you suppose they 
 would spend £100,000 for that, or are they spending £100,000 because 
 they are fully convinced that if they are successful before your lordships 
 they will get a scheme which is thoroughly well worth their having for 
 themselves and for all the trade of Lancashire too ? They are, instead of 
 deluding the unthinking masses, coming forward as champions of their 
 own interests and of the population of Lancashire to boot. Such are the 
 class of men who have combined in most unusual numbers, in hundreds, 
 to ask for this measure, after long thought as to their needs, and 
 long and careful investigation as to the feasibility of the thing ; they did 
 not go into it in a hurry — they spent £65,000 in one year in 
 attempting to get it, and, unfortunately, unsuccessfully ; they ascertain 
 that £35,000 more will renew the contest, and give them the chance of 
 being successful in the second year, and they find it — this £66,000 was 
 not wanted the second year, because the surveys were made and the 
 scheme was prepared subject to a few alterations. Now, for what do you 
 suppose they found the money ? For the mere pleasure of getting an 
 Act of Parliament — to go back to Manchester with something on the 
 Statute E^ook ? Surely a statute is a poor toy to spend £100,000 for. Of 
 course, they mean to carry the scheme out. Not to mention all the other 
 
 F
 
 82 The Capital. [Chap. XV. 
 
 trades, there is £100,000,000 invested in the cotton trade alone. 
 In our iron and machinery manufacture, in the timber, and coal trades, in 
 our merchants and shippers, in our grain, provision, and miscellaneous 
 trades, in our cotton spinning manufactures of various sorts, we must have 
 called a representative of at least that aggregate capital, or I am much 
 mistaken. Do you suppose that such a commercial caste as that cannot 
 find the money ? Quite lately Oldham has invested some millions of money 
 in cotton spinning mills, and the evidence that such a caste as that will find 
 the money is positively overwhelming. You do not expect to find 
 sovereigns on the table. The days of subscription contracts are over. 
 Parliament used to insist upon subscription contracts years ago. Parlia- 
 ment no longer asks for a subscription contract ; all that it demands is 
 indications that the capital will be forthcoming. No one now thinks of 
 making arrangements for capital for any measure large or small, whether 
 JIJ100,000 or £5,000,000, or £10,000,000 until the Bill passes, and the 
 larger the capital the surer they will be not to make any arrangement. 
 Therefore when you come to a sum like £6,000,000, £7,000,000, and 
 £8,000,000, it must be raised in a certain way ; it must be raised 
 in a perfectly methodical and scientific manner ; it is no use 
 putting Mr. A. in the box saying that he will take £50,000. I 
 do not want to say anything about Mr. Rylands's £50,000 ; I am quite 
 ready to let that pass. I found myself, before I knew where I was, 
 pledged to say there was a letter of Mr. Rylands's with respect to sub- 
 scribing capital ; but if I called a dozen men to say they were going to 
 give £50,000, if I called 20 men to say that they were going to give 
 £50,000, it would not be much out of £7,000,000 or £8,000,000, and I 
 should still be open to the reflection that I had only shown a small 
 percentage of the capital required. What you want is a general illus- 
 tration of the fact that the people who are behind this measure are 
 first of all in earnest ; and, secondly, that they have got the 
 ability to find the money. I say go through the length and 
 breadth of Great Britain or the world, you could not find a 
 caste more able to find the money. As to their earnestness, what 
 do they spend £100,000 for ? What do they come here day after 
 day and week after week dawdling before this Committee daily 
 until they are called, leaving their business behind them ? If they 
 are in earnest, what further indication do you want of their in- 
 tention to find the capital ? What stronger indication 'can a Committee 
 of Parliament have than the declaration of capitalist after capitalist, 
 functionary after functionary, mayor after mayor, alderman after alder- 
 man, president after president of Chambers of Commerce, or other public 
 bodies, trader after trader, that the money will be raised, and raised easily ? 
 and they all tell you that ; if you do not believe them I cannot conceive what 
 group of men you could believe upon the subject. If you are simply going 
 to be frightened by the fact that it is £8,000,000 of money, there are 
 tolerable proofs that £8,000,000 will be found in other ways. They say 
 that the Suez Canal cost altogether £20,000,000 of money. It was thought 
 as wild a bubble as my learned friend, Mr. Pope, accused me of blowing,
 
 Chap. XV.] The Capital, 83 
 
 and not only is the £20,000,000 found, but it is used, and they want 
 ^68,000,000 more, to increase the size of the canal, and they will find it. 
 What more do you want ? We have called no fewer than 30 witnesses, all in 
 different capacities, all gentlemen entitled to great weight, who have 
 given the strongest evidence on the point. I will read their names : 
 Mr. Daniel Adamson, the chairman of the Provisional Committee ; Mr. 
 Spencer, representing Messrs. Rylands and Company ; Mr. E. Walmsley ; 
 Mr. J. Walthew; Mr. S. Ogden (a Director of the Manchester Chamber of 
 Commerce, and a leading merchant, and chairman of several important 
 companies) ; Mr. Fielden (Mr. Fielden is not very wealthy, but he 
 is, on the other hand, a cotton manufacturer and a public man, not well 
 known among us in the south, but well known as a great statistician and 
 authority on the Cotton Trade in the North of England) ; Alderman 
 Hopkinson ; Sir Joseph Heron ; Alderman Bennett ; Alderman Thompson ; 
 Mr. Joseph Leigh ; Alderman Makinson, the Mayor of Salford ; Mr. 
 Henry Hall ; Mr. McNeil ; Mr. Robert Wilson ; Mr. S. Mendel ; Mr. Moir 
 Crane ; Mr. Alderman Husband ; Mr. Piatt ; Mr. Stevens ; Mr. Leech, 
 Mr. Boddington ; Mr. Bailey ; Mr. James ; Mr. Holt ; Mr. Hicks ; Mr. 
 Jacob Bright, member for Manchester ; and Mr. John Slagg, the other 
 member for Manchester ; Mr. Arnold, member for Salford ; Mr. Si 
 Andrew, of Oldham ; and Mr. Rawlinson, of Burnley. Are you going to 
 disbelieve these people, and to say that the caste which they 
 represent, and in a great measure who represent hundreds of 
 millions of money invested in businesses whioh they see 
 stagnating or pining, and they believe conscientiously to be in a de- 
 -cline, cannot find a tenth or a twentieth part of the money invested to 
 save what they have already invested ? The notion to me is too absurd 
 for argument. But let us see what they say, I do not suppose it is all 
 here ; but I will see what a few of them do say. Says Mr. Adamson : 
 *^ There will be no difficulty in finding the money for this canal. If I 
 had doubted it," says Mr. Adamson. (It seems to me he speaks with 
 uncommon good sense.) " If I had doubted it I would not have given 
 my time and money to pursue this matter." Capitalists, manufacturers, 
 and merchants are supporting us more this session than last." Then he 
 admits that nothing is subscribed to the undertaking. Mr. Reuben 
 Spencer, director of Messrs. Rylands and Sons, says, " Mr. John Rylands is 
 prepared to support the scheme with capital at the proper time." " Much 
 larger support from capitalists this year than last." *'I have no doubt 
 in my own mind that the capital will be raised." " Mr. John 
 Rylands and I are both prepared to invest in the company." " A 
 reasonable dividend may be expected from the traffic placed on the 
 canal." Says Mr. Walmsley, the President of the Cotton Spinners' 
 Association, " It will be a financial success ; " " The capital will be forth- 
 coming ; " "I shall take shares certainly." Mr. John Walthew, a large 
 cotton spinner, says, " I have no doubt whatever the capital will be raised ;" 
 *' we take it for granted the millowners will be in favour of the scheme, but 
 taking the population outside the millowners they are largely in favour 
 «fit." Mr. Fielden says, "Some of the oldest merchants whojhavo
 
 84 The Capital. [Chap. XY. 
 
 made the greatest fortunes and conduct large businesses thoroughly 
 approve the scheme. There is not the slightest doubt it will be carried 
 out if sanctioned. " Mr. Andrew says, " There will not be much diffi- 
 culty in raising the capital ; they will be bound in their own interest ta 
 support the canal in order to have cheap traffic." Mr. Andrew is the 
 secretary of the Cotton Spinners' Association at Oldham, and he repre- 
 sents many millions of capital. " One of the largest representative meet- 
 ings of the monied classes," says Mr. Hopkinson, "ever held in 
 Manchester passed resolutions at the Tow^n Hall unanimously in favour 
 of the scheme. The resolutions were proposed and seconded by men 
 representing enormous interests and of enormous wealth." " No 
 meeting could be more representative of the monied class 
 than the Chamber of Commerce meeting." Then there is 
 Sir Joseph Heron, the Town Clerk of Manchester, who surely 
 knows something of the monied classes and of their intentions. 
 Surely he knows something of what their powers are. He says^ 
 *' I have not the slightest doubt the money will be raised." 
 
 " Look at the trade of the district — the wealth. When we see what is 
 raised in the district from time to time, the idea that there could be any 
 difficulty in raising even £10,000,000 could hardly reasonably be enter- 
 tained." Then let us take Mr. Alderman Bennett, a Director of the 
 Manchester Chamber of Commerce. He says : " The capital will come 
 in without difficulty, there is such a universal feeling all over Man- 
 chester and the district in favour of the Bill, and the canal is so much 
 required to cheapen the carriage of raw material from Liverpool." He 
 has the sanction of the Chamber of Commerce to say that the canal 
 is so much required. "I have the greatest confidence it will be a 
 financial success," says Mr. Alderman Thompson. " I do not think there 
 will be any difficulty in obtaining the capital," says Mr. Joseph 
 Leigh. " I do not think there will be any difficulty in raising the 
 capital ," says Mr. Makinson, the Mayor of Salford. " I feel no doubt 
 whatever that the necessary capital will be forthcoming." Says Mr. 
 Henry Hall, the agent and trustee of the late Lord Stamford, " I have no 
 doubt whatever that the money will be found ; there is plenty of money 
 awaiting investment, and if the Bill passes the money will be forthcoming." 
 Says Mr. McNeil, ' ' I believe the capital would be raised certainly — I 
 have not the slightest doubt of it." " One friend of mine intends to take 
 d650,000. I have heard other friends speak of smaller sums." I do not 
 care twopence what anybody says and will suppose. It is the universal 
 consensus of the monied classes that I want that the money will be found. 
 Says Mr. Mendel, " I think the capital will be subscribed." " I have 
 heard people in Manchester say they will be without limitation, take an 
 interest in the venture — I mean in the undertaking. Many persons whom 
 I have met have said so." Then Mr. Moir Crane says, "I suppose I 
 shall take shares." 
 
 Mr. Ogden says, " If I may judge from people's conversation I should 
 say the probabilities of their subscribing have grown decidedly since last 
 year." Mr. Alderman Husband, says, " I never had any doubt that there
 
 Chap. XV.] The Capital. 85 
 
 would be very little difficulty in finding the capital. I have not the slightest 
 doubt of its being raised by people who will put it in as an investment 
 and expect a return." " There is a general disposition on the part of 
 persons of moderate means to take shares. I have been told by a 
 number of persons that they intend to take shares." Says Mr. Piatt, of 
 Oldham, the great machine maker, " I think decidedly a large amount 
 of capital will be subscribed in Oldham." " I think the shares would be 
 a good investment, and shall probably be inclined to go heavily into it." 
 Mr. Marshall Stevens tells you , " We have asked as yet for no capital, 
 only subscriptions to the expenses." Mr. Leech says : " I have no doubt 
 whatever the capital will be found" — "I think so because of the very 
 favourable reception the scheme has had, and that it is supported by the 
 largest employers of labour and the wealthiest men in the district." " No 
 one has yet been asked officially to subscribe to the capital, only to the 
 preliminary expenses." "I believe a large number of shares would 
 be taken up. I think so from mixing up with a great many business people 
 and from the current conversation." "Among my own personal friends 
 I think £150,000 would be taken." " I am authorized to speak on 
 behalf of Mr. John Rylands." (" After discussion the witness is allowed 
 to read Mr. Rylands's letter, in which he states his intention to subscribe for 
 at least £50,000 of shares.") Other similar letters he was not allowed 
 to read. "I intend to take a substantial number of shares." "I 
 thoroughly beheve the investment will pay." "The Bridgewater 
 Navigation pay 8 per cent., the Leeds and Liverpool 20 percent. The 
 Aire and Calder do not publish their accounts, but rumour says they 
 pay a large dividend," — there is no doubt whatever about their paying 
 a good dividend. Mr. Boddington says, " I think there will be no 
 difficulty in raising the capital," " I intend to take £10,000 worth of shares. 
 I believe that where there is such a vast population the canal must in- 
 evitably pay." Says Mr. Bailey : " I think the capital will be subscribed in 
 three or four days." "I shall take a few thousand pounds. If the 
 project is not mutilated it might alter my opinion." A noble lord said that 
 the amount actually subscribed is only £70,000. It is not so. Mr. Rylands 
 has said he will subscribe £50,000 ; Mr. Boddington has said he will also 
 subscribe £10,000 ; and Mr. Bailey a few thousand pounds — Mr. Piatt, 
 of Oldham, intends to go heavily into it — Mr. Leech personally and 
 friends bring the matter considerably above that. But I do not lay any 
 stress whatever upon the exact sums promised in an individual case here 
 and there. All I can say is, that here you have got an accumulation 
 of evidence, not as a matter of opinion, but so overwhelming, that I never 
 remember anything like it in a private Bill in Parliament before. Then 
 Mr. Bailey says, " 1 shall take a few thousand pounds. If the project is 
 not mutilated it might alter my opinion." The Chairman says it cannot 
 be mutilated. " The monetary classes and the manufacturing classes have 
 given the strongest possible support." Then he says again, if it were 
 worth mentioning, " I can bring half-a-dozen who can put in £200,000 
 or £300,000 if need be, and who have said so." So that it goes 
 a good deal beyond the £70,000 in your lordships' mind. Then
 
 86 The Capital. [Chap. XT, 
 
 Mr. James says: "I and my partner intend to take shares, and know 
 a number of gentlemen who are prepared to do so. My firm will take 
 £5,000 worth of shares." " I think the capital would be subscribed in a 
 short time, perhaps five or six months" — " I think if the Bill was passei 
 conditionally on £8,000,000 being bond fide subscribed in six months the 
 money would be forthcoming." " I think the shares would be taken up 
 mainly in Manchester and the neighbourhood." Says Mr. Hall, " I believe 
 the money would be forthcoming." " I personally know several who 
 would subscribe. I and my partners are prepared to " — " I should take 
 a few thousand." Says Mr. Hicks : " I have no doubt about the capital 
 being found." " A lot of monied men who would not subscribe last 
 year have subscribed this year. After the question had been discussecl 
 39 days in the House of Commons last year, and the Committee without 
 any asking on our part, inserted a clause in the Bill that the canal woulcK 
 be most valuable for the interests of Lancashire and ought to be 
 sanctioned," a great many have come round to its support. ** I would 
 take shares, because I believe it would be a profitable investment." 
 Says Mr. Jacob Bright : "I should say that the statement that the 
 monied class and capitalists of Lancashire were not supporting the 
 scheme was untrue." Then says Mr. Bright again, truly : " The under- 
 taking not having become an Act of Parliament we cannot deal with it in 
 the way of subscription." "If the Bill passes, of course the Canal will be 
 made." " If I find there is generally great faith in a powerful community 
 in favour of an enterprise, I should assume absolutely that the capital 
 would be raised and the enterprise completed." Then Mr. John Slagg; 
 says : " I think there would be very little hesitation on the part of 
 the financial public in finding the necessary capital;" "I think the 
 capital will be subscribed." 
 
 That, your Grace, without saying that it is exactly every word 
 that has been said about the capital is really quite enough for my 
 purpose, so that I will add very little more. Through the whole 
 breadth of it there is only one statement that I call rash, and it is this 
 one: I think it was a rash thing of Mr. James to say, *'I 
 think if the Bill was passed conditionally on £8,000,000 being 
 bond fide subscribed in six months the money would be forthcoming.'* 
 I will tell you why he was rash — not that I think under ordinary cir- 
 cumstances of the money market it was not perfectly true. But we do 
 not know what may happen in any particular period of six months ; for 
 instance, circumstances over which we have no control — the ambition of 
 France, the restlessness of Russia, and one or two other matters of doubt 
 and danger in the political world — might, between this and six months 
 hence, bring about, if not a European conflict, that kind of rumour and 
 fear of a European conflict which was prevalent in the country just before 
 the Treaty of Berlin, when the Indian troops were brought to Malta and 
 the £6,000,000 of money voted by ParHament, and the English fleet sent 
 to the Bosphorus. It is clear if anything of that kind were to transpire 
 in the course of the next six months it would be difficult for this, or any 
 other enterprise, to get capital. Therefore Mr. James was wrong in
 
 Chap. XV.] The Capital, 87 
 
 suggesting that he was quite sure the capital would be raised in any- 
 particular six months. But I will wind up what I have got to say about 
 the capital with this : So sure are we that we are right, so completely 
 do we believe what these men have said, we ourselves, indeed, being 
 some of them, that you shall do this if you like. If you give us this 
 Bill, in order to show that there is no danger upon the subject of capital, 
 you shall put a clause in that we shall not turn a sod until £5,000,000 
 of money has been subscribed. I do not mean that the £5,000,000 
 shall be paid up ; it is no use paying up £5,000,000 until you want it. 
 Subscribe and " raise " mean two different things. 
 
 Mr. POPE : Do you mean by a contractor ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : No ! I mean a clause to that effect, and I mean no 
 reservation about it that the Company shall not turn a sod till £5,000,000 
 of money has been subscribed. Now after that I think nobody need say 
 we fear the capital question. If you did that you would do something 
 never done before, and considering we are about as substantial a caste of 
 promoters as ever brought forward a measure to Parliament, I should say 
 that provision would not only be unheard of, but needless ; and I should ' 
 say that it was an undeserved slight upon the abilities and intentions of 
 the promoters, but I simply throw it out, as a proof of the complete con- 
 fidence that the promoters have in the soundness of the undertaking 
 financially, and their own ability, earnestness, and intention to carry it 
 out, and so I leave the question of capital. 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 WATER; FLOODS. 
 
 Now just a question or two upon the water question. I take these 
 little points because I do not like to leave any little matter behind me 
 unfilled up, though I agree with my learned friend, Mr. Littler, it is not 
 likely you will throw out the case upon the question of water, just as 
 my learned friend, Mr. Pope, candidly said there is not much upon 
 the question of masts. The water question divides itself into two 
 — quantity and quality. Now as to quantity, it seems to be practically 
 uncontested. Mr. Barham Foster (Sir Humphrey de Trafford's engineer), 
 admitted point blank that there is plenty of water. 
 
 «* «:^ * >;> c^ «* m ^ 
 
 As to floods, our cure of the floods is undoubted, and admitted on 
 all hands. I say, therefore, that both in the improvement which 
 we shall undoubtedly make in the water and in the floods, two great 
 indirect benefits will be conferred by us upon this part of Lancashire, 
 Mr. Foster says, " I did not go into the calculation of the water because 
 I never disputed that there was ample water."
 
 88 Past Legislation — Swing Bridges, [Chap. XVII. 
 
 CHAPTEK XVII. 
 
 PAST LEGISLATION— SWING BRIDGES. 
 
 Now there are one or two points which I might venture to call atten- 
 tion to in my learned friend's speeches. There is just one in the speech 
 of my learned friend, Mr. Pope. Mr. Pope dwelt some little time upon 
 the statutes by which, as I said in opening, and which I read to you 
 fairly enough, Parliament might be said to have safeguarded this measure. 
 Mr. Pope pointed out with great care what the statutes were, that they 
 were to submit to a swing bridge at a particular place, in case the 
 Mersey and Irwell Company, or anybody representing them, came to 
 improve the navigation up to Manchester. That is true of all the Acts 
 except one. It is not true of the Grand Junction Act, which is now the 
 London and North Western Act, which refers to the first place we cross ; 
 there they are bound to take the swing bridge at any place, not merely a 
 place where they are, and at the bidding of all comers. The bridges in 
 that case, as indeed in all other cases, are to be made at the company's 
 expense. 
 
 Mr. POPE : No ; in the case of the Grand Junction, it is to be made 
 at the expense of those proposing the bridge ; that is the distinction 
 between that and Warrington. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : I did not know that ; you quoted the Grand Junc- 
 tion Act before I came into the room— then that is not so. I thought 
 the question of the expense of the line ran through them all alike ; the 
 difference is this : They are to submit to the bridge at any place, and at 
 the bidding of all people, but it is to be done at the expense of any- 
 body asking them to do it, but I have never put the question of swing 
 bridges as high as my learned friend, Mr. Pope, seems to think I put it. 
 I never said Parliament looked forward to this scheme, coming in the 
 hands in which it comes, going in the direction in which it goes, and 
 saying you shall put a swing bridge at any point where the scheme shall 
 happen to cross you. What I am entitled to say now is, I am the Mersey 
 and Irwell, I am the Bridgewater Canal, I, who speak at this moment, 
 represent those if the Bill passes, and we are arguing upon that 
 hypothesis. I, who argue, am the representative of the Mersey and 
 Irwell, and therefore that whatever the Mersey and IrWell were entitled 
 to ask you, I am entitled to ask you ; but I do not put it that the 
 Mersey and Irwell are entitled to ask exactly at the spot where we 
 are now crossing their river for the purpose of improving 
 the navigation between Runcorn and Manchester. I have never put it 
 that we are entitled at that point to demand a swing bridge. What I 
 put is this : All the then railways are at least under this condition. Par- 
 liament has given you your lines on condition that you must, to a certain 
 extent named in your statute, consent to a swing bridge if the Mersey 
 and Irwell Navigation is improved. I pass by the Grand Junction Bridge 
 Act, which says that it must be done at any point, but it is enough for
 
 Chap. XVII.] Past Legislation — Swing Bridges. 89 
 
 my argument that the particular position at which we cross the existing 
 stream was the position in which they could be turned into the swing 
 bridge. Now I say that was the condition. If therefore, I, representing 
 the Mersey and Irwell, or the Mersey and Irwell antecedent to my pur- 
 chase, had come and said, tortuous as it is, we are going to improve the 
 Mersey and Irwell as well as we can, but we shall always cross you at 
 the same point at which it crosses you now, therefore submit to a swing 
 bridge, you would have had to do it, and what I say is, accepting my 
 learned friend, Mr. Pope's dictum, that it was all very well in 1850 odd, 
 or in 1860 odd, but ParHament would be sure not to make you fulfil 
 it to the letter now. I say, I too come and forestall Parliament, 
 saying we will not have the bond, and nothing but the 
 bond fulfilled, and I oflfer you something far less than 
 I might have asked you for. I might have said. Put 
 me a swing bridge, and you could not have helped it— and if 
 I had been the Mersey and Irwell, and had been doing what I am going 
 to do within the limits of my existing powers, so that I need not have 
 come to Parliament for it, there would have been no power in life 
 short of a fresh statute, to prevent my forcing your putting a swing 
 bridge. What I say to the railway companies is this — the penalising 
 condition under which you were put when you got your Act is not 
 exacted by me— instead of making you put the swing bridge where you 
 are bound to put it, I will give you somewhat severer gradients lower 
 than a fixed bridge. That is not exacting from you oup-tenth of the 
 conditions upon which Parliament passed their Bill — they are perfectly 
 fair — and then I have put in a clause to the efi'ect that the expense of 
 the deviations shall be matter of arbitration. 
 
 Now, let us see how the thing stands. An arbitrator shall say 
 exactly how much of this expense i« to be borne by us, and how much 
 by them — he will look at the Act of Parliament — if he finds in an Act 
 of Parliament that they are to do the whole thing at their expense, he 
 will take it into consideration — if he finds they are put to any serious 
 expense by me, he will say, Now I will consider that too — I will consider 
 all the ;pros and cons — I will look into the whole thing, and whatever is 
 right and fair I will do — he may make me pay the whole expense of the 
 deviation — he may make the railway companies pay the whole expense of 
 the deviation, or he may divide the expense between us in such propor- 
 tions as he thinks fit. I do not think that at the present moment any 
 Committee of Parliament would be in a position to say who should bear 
 the expense wholly or in part — that is a thing which ought to be left to 
 the Arbitrator as we leave it. 
 
 There is one other point in connection with these statutes where 
 my learned friend, Mr. Pope, misunderstood them. My learned friend, 
 Mr. Pope, was under the impression that all that Parliament was con- 
 templating when it put these enactments in the Statute Book, namely, 
 to submit to swing bridges at these particular points, was a barge canal. 
 Now, to begin with, I cannot see what a swing bridge would be wanted 
 for for a barge canal. There are no barges — even those that have masts
 
 90 Fast Legislation — Swing Bridges, [Chap, xvil 
 
 that have not come under conditions in which they could lower them. It 
 was a barge canal as it stood when the bridges were fixed, therefore it is 
 absurd to say that it was merely a barge canal which Parliament was 
 contemplating. And there are one or two ways in which that is shown. 
 My learned friend, Mr. Pope, thinks the towing paths show it was a barge 
 canal. But in 1851 the waterway was to be 40 feet wide. What on 
 earth did they want 40 feet wide for for a barge canal; two years 
 after that it was made two feet wider, and in 1865, though at the point 
 where they crossed the waterway would be narrowed to 42 feet, 
 Parliament said the width shall be 60 feet, as though they said I know 
 I have created a gut to a certain point which is 40 feet. I agree 
 that that is a gut through which big vessels can pass at all times, but I 
 will have the waterway just here 60 feet. What could be the meaning of 
 having 60 feet of waterway for a barge canal ? And remember that in 1851 
 there was not a single ship having so broad a beam as 40 feet. I do not 
 believe there was a ship existing outside Her Majesty's navy that could 
 not have gone up that canal 40 feet wide. There might have been one 
 or two, the " Great Britain," and one or two ships of that sort, or the 
 " Great Eastern " might have been in existence at the moment, but the 
 enormous percentage of the sea- going ships of the world could have gone 
 through a canal 40 feet wide, and a fortiori through one 60 feet wide. 
 But I do not want all these inferences — when I look at the 9th and 10th 
 Victoria, chapter 261, what do I see— I see a clause having this marginal 
 note: *'If application is made for a Bill to render the Mersey 
 navigable for sea-going vessels, &c. Grand Junction Company not to ob- 
 ject to the opening of a certain swivel bridge for the passage of vessels." 
 The enacting clause is : " And be it enacted that in case at any time 
 hereafter any application be made to Parliament for a Bill to render the 
 River Mersey east of Warrington Bridge navigable for sea-going vessels, 
 or to make a river or canal navigable for such vessels from any part of 
 the said River Mersey in the above direction to Manchester." Certain 
 things shall take place, and it is called a " ship canal " in the same section of 
 the Act further down. That is proof positive upon the point. So much 
 for my learned friend, Mr. Pope. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 COMPETITION WITH RAILWAYS.. 
 
 But, as far as my learned friend, Mr. Littler goes, there is very 
 little to say about him. Mr. Littler seemed to me to make one point, 
 which he worried as a terrier worries a rat — that is, the impossibility we 
 have in competing with the railways. He seemed to think, because the 
 railway companies have got £260,000,000 of capital, and we have only
 
 Chap. XVIII.] Competition tvith Railways, 9X 
 
 £10,000,000 of capital, we could not possibly compete — that the little 
 boy could not fight with the big man. To begin with, we cannot be 
 killed. A waterway once made is made for ever. A waterway once 
 made must be kept open. It is not Hke a railway that nobody can use. 
 It is not like a railway where, if you take the locomotives oif it, and the 
 rolling stock, and allow the permanent way to decay, nobody can take 
 their traffic over it, because people do not carry for themselves 
 upon railways. People are in the habit of carrying for themselves upon 
 canals, and there would be a waterway existing along which the traffic 
 could go. Nor can we be forced, as has been suggested, to join the railway 
 conference. Look at our schedule of maximum rates. Even in your Grace's 
 mind, at one time, there was a slight misapprehension upon that point. 
 We cannot go beyond the maximum in our Bill, and our schedules 
 are 50 per cent, below railway and Liverpool Dock prices on goods ; 
 therefore, we cannot join the railway conference. The Bridge- 
 water Canal could, because the Acts of the Bridgewater Canal 
 were so drawn that, as carriers upon their canal, they could charge 
 what they liked for carrying. We cannot carry upon our canal 
 in that way from America to Manchester for the purpose of joining 
 the railway conference. Our canal is open to the navies of the worfd, 
 and will not join the railway conference. Besides, the railway companies 
 have no real object in killing us. £500,000 of traffic, of which my 
 learned friends speak, is important even to the railways, and it will come 
 off their net revenue. If they carried for nothing their working expenses 
 would not be reduced a single sixpence, so that the £^0,000 would 
 come off their net revenue, which is an important thing, and more than that, 
 it would all fall upon the ordinary shareholders ; the preference shareholders 
 and the debenture holders who represent such an enormous proportion, 
 would be perfectly safe. £500,000 is not a flea-bite in the gross revenue 
 of the railways — it is a substantial part of the net revenue which goes to 
 pay the dividend upon the ordinary shares, and would be a very serious 
 thing to the shareholders, and the shareholders would not stand it for a 
 moment. But the idea is preposterous — look at the enormous benefit to 
 the trade if they did go on, and they must go on for ever. Look at what 
 the trade would gain — the trade would never allow the canal to be shut 
 up — if they could get their trade carried for nothing they would keep the 
 canal going — it would be the finest horse the trade ever rode. The argu- 
 ment is silly — one is obhged to meet it, but the argument is silly. 
 My learned friend, Mr. Littler, says to your Grace, the Bill, if your lord- 
 ships pass it, will receive the imprimatur of Parliament. What does he 
 mean by imprimatur of Parliament ? Does he know the meaning of the 
 word imprimatur ? All Bills get the imprimatur of Parliaments ; all 
 Bills have a declaration previous to their passing that the preamble is 
 proved, and the preamble always says it would be a wise and a beneficial 
 thing that such and such a measure should be passed into law, and such 
 and such a railway made — in that sense it will have the imprimatur of 
 Parliament in the sense of every Bill which has passed your Lordships* 
 House.
 
 92 Competition with Railways, [Chap.xviii. 
 
 Then again, my learned friend says : Look at the Hull and 
 Barnsley — a lot of innocent people lost their money — they have 
 not lost a shilling here — the line is not opened to-day. The true 
 history of the Hull and Barnsley, as I was counsel for the Bill, I 
 know, which is this : The original scheme was really a good and 
 excellent scheme, a scheme from the coal district at Barnsley to Hull, 
 and the cost of that with a large dock was to be four millions of money, 
 and when they went to ask for it, Sir Edmund Beckett talked in the 
 same way of the impossibility of raising capital as my learned friends 
 talk of the impossibility of raising capital for this, and they persuaded 
 the Committee of Parliament to give them what they asked — ^they 
 asked for three millions in shares as a first instalment, and were 
 offered eight millions. They got that capital, and the line is nearly 
 made, and the dock nearly completed. Unfortunately, smitten by 
 ambition, the Chairman of the Hull and Barnsley Company conceived 
 the notion of an enormous extension in mileage, and the very 
 following year he came for powers to double the length of his 
 railway. He got the Bill, and he tried to get the capital for it. The 
 scheme was not so sound as the antecedent scheme, and he failed to get 
 the capital ; it frightened people, and down went the shares of the Hull 
 and Barnsley, not to the point that my learned friend, Mr. Littler, so often 
 said of 15s. a share. If you look in the ordinary Stock Exchange 
 Eeports you find they are £4 a share at the present time. Now I will tell 
 you another reason why the shares of the Hull and Barnsley Company are 
 temporarily gone down — they were under the impression that by a certain 
 manipulation of the Acts of Parliament they could pay interest upon capital 
 during construction. They came to me, and I told them they could not 
 do so ; and what is more, I said I did not consider it was part of the duty 
 of Counsel to advise them how to do it. They thought they were 
 wiser than I — they thought they could, and they made a contract 
 with their contractor by which the contractor was to pay interest upon 
 capital during construction, he getting back the money in meal or in malt, 
 in the price of his contract. An enemy, one of the kind of gentlemen who 
 sow tares amongst wheat, generally supposed not to be unconnected with 
 the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Company — one of the principal 
 opponents of the Bill, put up somebody to bring an action against the 
 directors for illegally paying interest upon capital, during construction, 
 and he was successful. They were no longer allowed J;o do it — the con- 
 tract was re-let, and the interest not paid. The consequence is that a 
 great number of people who invested their money in shares, under the 
 impression that they were going to get interest during construction, said, 
 I do not like this, and the weak holders began to sell, and down went the 
 price of shares. In fact, attempt after attempt has been made to injure 
 the Hull and Barnsley — it has partly succeeded, while the railway is 
 unopened ; wait till the railway is opened and see what the traffic will be, 
 and see what the price of the shares will go to. The cream of the traffic of 
 the North-E astern Railway they are going to compete for, and I believe 
 they will get a very large amount of the cream.
 
 Chap.XVIII.] Competition with Railways. 93 
 
 There is only one word more upon my learned friend, Mr. Littler's 
 speech. He said we shall not earn a shilling till we spend ten millions of 
 money. That is a specimen of the rash way in which people talk. We 
 have never disputed that our canal can be made for the £7,000,000, there- 
 fore there is no reason to suppose that we shall spend £3,000,000 more 
 unless we spend it in buying the Bridgewater Canal ; we shall not spend 
 as much in buying the Bridgewater Canal, but when we step in the posi- 
 tion of the Bridgewater Canal, which is one of the first things we shall do, 
 we step into £60,000 a year net income before our canal is opened, before 
 there can be any question whether we damage it or not. Now, all I say 
 is this : I take it as the test of the kind of statement which is made to you 
 as a matter of prejudice, and which is supposed to be relevant in throw- 
 ing out the Bill. It is perfectly irrelevant, and I would not deal with it 
 unless it was so inaccurate and unfair. 
 
 I have nothing to do to-morrow but to touch upon the question of the 
 estimate, which Mr. Leader Williams has said he considers will be ample ; 
 but as long as your lordships do not express any opinion upon it, I must 
 speak upon ii. After that I shall come to the estuary, and I shall then 
 finish everything before the moment at which your lordships usually 
 adjourn. 
 
 (Adjourned till to-morrow at 11 o'clock,)
 
 94 Engineering Estimates of Cost of Works. [Chip. XLX. 
 
 CONTINUATION OF REPLY OF MR. PEMBER, Q.C. 
 
 THIRD DAY.— THUESDAY, 22nd MAY, 1884. 
 (BEING THE 40th DAY OF THE HEARING OF THE CASE.) 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE ENGINEERING ESTIMATES OF COST OF WORKS. 
 
 ]^ Mr. PEMBER : Your Grace, as I said yesterday, I have now got at 
 all events to the last two topics of the case ; the last but one being a 
 small one about the estimate, and the last one being by no means the 
 least important — the one about the estuary. 
 
 [Note. — The following part of Mr. Pember's speech, comprising pages 
 327-345, relating solely to the differences between the estimates of the 
 cost of the works as shown by the Promoter's Engineers and those of the 
 opponents, is left out of this reprint as being of too minute and 
 too technically scientific a character for general reading. The 
 Engineers who gave detailed evidence in support of the Promoters' 
 estimates were : Mr. James Abernethy (Past Pres. Inst. Civil Engineers) ; 
 Mr. J. Brunlees (Past Pres. Inst. Civil Engineers) ; Mr. E. Leader 
 Williams; Mr. A. Giles, M.P., Mr. P. J. Messent, Mr. James Deas, 
 Mr. John Fowler (Engineers respectively of the rivers Tyne, Clyde, and 
 Tees) ; Mr. L. B. Wells (Engineer river Weaver), &c. The principal wit- 
 nesses who gave evidence against the Bill, so far as engineering estimates 
 were concerned were Mr. Lyster (Engineer Mersey Dock and Harbour 
 Board,) and Mr. F. Stevenson (Engineer London & North- Western Railway 
 Company). In material points these two witnesses answered each other. 
 For example, as regards the cost of dredging in the estuary, Mr. 
 Stevenson accepts the Promoters' prices, but increases the quantities ; 
 whereas Mr. Lyster accepts the Promoters' quantities but increases the 
 prices, &c.] 
 
 That is the sort of contradictory evidence brought against this scheme ; 
 whether commercial evidence, whether evidence upon estimates, or what- 
 ever it is, it always breaks down by being absolutely inconsistent with
 
 Chap. XIX.] Engineering Estimates of Cost of Works. 95 
 
 itself. All I can say is this — I do trust that against carefully cal- 
 culated estimates, by competent persons in consultation, and not only 
 competent persons, but the most competent persons in Great Britain, with 
 everything to lose by being wrong, and everything to gain by being upon 
 the safe side, you will not allow a certain amount of inconsequent and 
 inconsistent criticisms to weigh with you for a moment. And so I leave 
 the case of the estimate. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 THE ESTUARY CASE.— THE EFFECT OF FRETS ON THE BAR. 
 
 Now, your Grace, I come, and I come, I think, with full confidence, 
 which I trust is not misplaced, to the consideration of the estuary case, 
 and though it is the last, it has been to me the most careful piece of 
 labour that I have had to undertake in connection with this matter. Your 
 Grace, if a mere expression of alarm is to be enough to cause the rejection 
 of this scheme, I admit that my efi'orts are in vain — I might as well close 
 them. There is no use arguing with a startled horse, and if Liverpool is 
 afraid, and the fear of Liverpool is to be enough to upset all that we hope to 
 do in the Mersey, again, I say, I may give up further effort. * I might add, 
 however, that if an expression of fear had been considered enough a 
 generation ago to stop a great work, then the docks of Liverpool and 
 Birkenhead would never have been constructed, for, as was admitted by 
 the dock authorities themselves, there was just the same sort of expression 
 of apprehension upon the part of certain persons with regard to that great 
 work, of apprehensions which have not been verified, and which 
 were not sufficient to stop the scheme. As Mr. Eads, the gentleman 
 imported from the wilds of the Mississippi, said, I had plenty of 
 persons who told me that my training walls would create a 
 bar shortly outside their termination — he smiled and said : " Those 
 prophecies have not been made good." — Had apprehension, fear, or even the 
 affectation of fear been enough to stop Mr. Eads' work in the Mississipi, a 
 a very great work, according to the description given by Mr. Eads, would 
 never have been permitted. 
 
 Mr. Aspinall's position seems to me to be one which your lordships will 
 hardly sympathise with. In his opening speech he defined it very clearly 
 by asking a question upon page 117. You will find it in the Minutes of 
 Proceedings apart from the Minutes of Evidence — he says there, " Are we 
 bound to show more than that there is a risk and apprehension that harm 
 may happen to the river ? I apprehend that that is the outside of what 
 your lordships will require. I venture to submit that even that exceeds 
 what we are called upon to do. I venture to think that the whole burden 
 of proof is upon my learned friends in deaUng with a great port like
 
 96 The Estuary Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar. [Chap. XX. 
 
 Liverpool, upon which the whole of England and the whole of the world 
 is more or less commercially dependent, that they themselves, if they have 
 any opposition, are bound to prove, and the whole burden of proof would 
 be upon them to show there is no considerable risk." The first two 
 propositions laid down by Mr. Aspinall in the way of a question I do not 
 agree with. I think he is bound to show more than mere apprehension 
 or mere vague risk, and I certainly venture to think that a mere expression 
 of vague risk, and vaguer apprehension, certainly does not exceed what he 
 is bound to show ; but I do accept, in some measure, his last proposition, 
 that the burden of proof should be upon me to a certain extent, to show 
 that there is no considerable risk to the bar. But I think, on the other 
 hand, I am entitled to turn back the burden of proof, and to say, I come 
 here with a scheme which is prima facie beneficial both to the river and 
 to Manchester, and, indeed, it cannot be beneficial to Manchester without 
 being beneficial to the river, or harmful to the river without being 
 harmful to Manchester. I come with a scheme entirely beneficial to 
 both, and the burden of proof does lie upon the opponents to show by 
 facts and arguments that there is some tangible, substantial, and con- 
 siderable risk. Mr. Aspinall's definition of their duty, on the other hand, 
 would be very nearly to hmit it to a mere cry of alarm. Now I will say, if 
 he insists that the burden of proof lies upon me, that in an equal degree, 
 and indeed, in a stronger degree, the burden of proof lies upon him to show 
 by fact and by argument that there is a considerable risk. But the burden of 
 proof, I say, lies all the more upon them, and is all the more incumbent upon 
 them, because their fears, or aff'ectation of fears, whichever it may be, run 
 counter to all antecedent scientific theory, and counter also to all antecedent 
 scientific experience. Their fundamental principle I insist to be subversive of 
 all previous thought upon this undoubtedly important question. I have all 
 the more important items, I think, of engineering literature upon this subject 
 before me. Search the whole range of it, and I will undertake to say that you 
 cannot find a word suggesting the three points upon which the opponents 
 have elected to base their whole case for the estuary. First, that the 
 frets or changes of a shifting channel are advantageous to an estuary ; 
 secondly, that they increase the tidal capacity ; thirdly, that the con- 
 finement of a shifting channel within low training walls — mark, I say low 
 training walls — would injure the scouring power of the estuary and impair 
 its capacity for navigation, or injure the bar at its mouth. Those are the 
 three propositions I state, and I will re-state them for clearness sake, and 
 I say you will not find them within the whole range of engineering 
 literature — that frets or changes in a shifting channel are advantageousto an 
 estuary, one ; that they increase its tidal capacity, two ; that the confine- 
 ment of a shifting channel within low training walls injures the scouring 
 power of the estuary, and impairs its capacity for navigation, and injures the 
 bar at its mouth, three. On the contrary, the one motive, the essential 
 object of all such writers as those whose works I have before me, such as 
 Calver, Thomas Stevenson, the brother of Mr. David Stevenson, whom 
 unfortunately we could not see, Mr. Vernon Harcourt, Admiral Spratt, Mr. 
 Scott Russell, Admiral Evans, and the rest, all whose names and works have
 
 CiiAr. XX.] The Estuary Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar, 97" 
 
 been cited to you, their one motive, their one essential object, is tO' 
 destroy frets ; to put an end to them, and to the shifts and changes ; 
 that is their one essential object, and their one method is to train — no 
 exceptions are made. I have never read so much upon one- 
 subject since I left college as I have read upon this. I find 
 no exceptions ; no reservations — that is the one object, andi 
 that is the one method. I find no reservation such as Mr. Thomas 
 Stevenson in the box made the other day; first as to estuaries 
 in which there are bars, second as to wide estuaries : on the 
 contrary, that qualification made by Mr. Stevenson, for the first time 
 upon page 1148, is made expressly for this enquiry. It finds no place- 
 in any spoken or written expression of engineering thought. This is what 
 he says :he says, " If there is a bar, and if that bar is exposed to the 
 heavy sea, and lastly, if the river has a wide estuary, if there is a sufficient 
 area for holding a large amount of deposit." — What ? Not that you 
 ought not to have training walls even then, but you "ought to be cautious." 
 I look in vain through his brother's book, I look in vain through his 
 own, for the suggested direct or indirect confirmation of that qualifica- 
 tion of Mr. Thomas Stevenson. On the contrary, this qualification, made^ 
 as I say, for the first time, expressly for this enquiry, is made after Mr.. 
 Stevenson, upon a clever cross-examination by Mr. Michael, had agreed 
 up to the very hilt with the true theory, stating one after another 
 the benefits which arise from confining and training a channel,, 
 and doing it with low training walls. It is . quite curious. 
 On page 1157 Mr. Michael had cross-examined him, and pointed to his 
 brother's book and to an article in the " Encyclopaedia Britannica " 
 enunicating with great clearness, one after another, the beneficial eflects 
 of the works there described, and my learned friend said they might be 
 summarised as follows : " First to depress the level of the low-water 
 line. Secondly to increase the range of ti<de. Thirdly to accelerate the- 
 propagation of the tide through the channel of the river. Fourthly to 
 prolong the duration of the tide in the river. Fifthly to equalise the 
 velocity of the tidal currents removing rapids and bores. Sixthly to 
 add to the beneficial scouring power of the river. Seventhly to increase 
 the navigable depth " — one after another — are they really true, well 
 ascertained, and well agreed benefits, which accrue from the training of 
 the channel, and he accepts them all. ' Then you get this for the first time 
 in the history of engineering. You must be " cautious " how you do it if 
 you have a wide estuary, or an estuary which is terminated by a bar. 
 Where, I say again, in his own or in the books of others will he find such 
 a statement as that ? If it were existing, ought he not to have found it ? 
 Are estuaries usually narrow ? Are bars rare things ? Would the co- 
 existence of two such incidents be a factor of consideration, that is to 
 say, would the co-existence of a wide estuary and a bar be a factor of 
 consideration likely to escape the notice of such men as have thought 
 and written upon this subject ? Surely not. They knew of no such 
 qualification ; if they had known it they would have stated it, not only 
 so — if they had known it it would have excluded almost every instance
 
 98 The Estuary Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar. [Chap. XX. 
 
 of a tidal river, to which their works and the chapters in their works 
 deahng with tidal rivers and the improvement of them by low training 
 walls, the principle and method were alike applicable. For what estuary, 
 I may ask, is not wide, and what estuary, I might almost ask, has not got 
 a bar ? But the bars are common things, and the absence of bars, as I 
 can show by Mr. Stevenson's own book upon harbours, is the exception 
 — they result from the action of the sea, and the cross currents of the 
 sea at the mouth of the estuary, and are almost invariable unless the 
 estuary is of an enormous extent. Bars, therefore, are, instead of the 
 exception, the rule ; and therefore, for these gentlemen one and all 
 to have written on the treatment of estuaries and to have said, Our 
 object is to fix a channel, and the one method is to train it — for them to have 
 wi'itten in those general terms, having a reservation in their own minds as 
 to the exception of a wide estuary, and the exception of a bar, would 
 simply have been to have in their own minds a reservation which would 
 have covered all the ground they were travelling over. It would have 
 amounted to a general proposition in conflict with the very bases of all 
 theory and all practice. To make it worth anything it must be made 
 special to this case ; that is to say, it must be this wide estuary and 
 iliis bar which must differ in kind — not merely in degree but in 
 liind — -from all the other wide estuaries and from all other bars. In fact^ 
 you must have something which justifies Mr. Thomas Stevenson's original 
 acceptation of Mr. Leader Williams' principles and designs in laying 
 out this great work, which justifies his conditional approval of it by 
 saying that it depended upon the peculiar characteristics of the 
 Mersey. Where are the pecuhar characteristics of the Mersey making 
 it difi'er in kind not in degree, but in kind from all other broad estuaries 
 terminated by other bars ? Not one tittle of proof has ever been 
 advanced, nor indeed could any tittle of proof be advanced, for there is 
 no such thing. I fear to imitate Mr. Eacls when he wished to impress 
 upon your lordships with so much unction that there was not a grain 
 of sand in this vast estuary which was not amenable to natural laws. 
 Heaven forgive me for stating such a platitude, or affecting to instruct 
 your lordships upon such things as must be patent to any child of 
 five years old, but I must say as to there being no difierence in kind 
 in a wide estuary like the Mersey, that the laws of Nature are few 
 and simple, that she works in this direction and that direction 
 from a very few types. It is the unity of Nature, as many philosophers 
 have said, that makes her grandeur, and her operations, larger perhaps 
 in their exposition, are the same in kind on the Mersey as they are upon 
 the Tees, or the Tyne, or the Clyde. 
 
 That is our position, and it is impregnable ; the contrary is theirs, 
 and it is baseless. The Tees, the Tyne, the Kibble, the Mississippi, have 
 all bars, and they have all been trained, because they, like the Mersey, 
 are amenable to the great, few, simple, general laws that govern all 
 estuaries alike. The consensus hitherto of all engineers, of all com- 
 mercial communities, who have employed engineers, I was going to say 
 all sane men — but I forgot the attitude of the Mersey Board — is that to
 
 -Chap. XX.] The Estuavy Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar. 99 
 
 leave a tidal river in a sandy estuary untreated by the only known 
 method of treatment, training it, is pro tanto, to decline to utilise it, and 
 probably, though not certainly, to leave it to ultimate decay. But, at 
 least, it is pro tanto to decline to accept it for utilisation. Now, this con- 
 :sensus of all persons, either scientifically or commercially concerned 
 with estuaries, has only been broken in this one case by the act of the 
 Mersey Board. Secure in a monopoly, secure in the invincible attrac- 
 tions of Liverpool, as things are at present, for shipping, in consequence 
 of its contiguity to the great consuming and producing districts of this 
 country, the Mersey Board have been apathetic up to this time, and 
 have left their estuary untouched. Startled now by the awakening of 
 Manchester, they have become just ; so that their apath}^ so to speak, 
 and their jealousy, both appeal to you ; their apathy, if I may be excused 
 the metaphor, yawns, *' Leave the Mersey alone it will do for us ; " and 
 their jealousy almost screams ''For goodness sake do not let it be 
 improved so as to make it good enough for them." Yet they have had 
 •something like a warning. It is not disputed that within the memory of 
 man — and living men — there have been 17 feet of water over the bar 
 at low water ; there are only 9 feet now ; there have been only 7 feet. I 
 say that is a warning. In 20 years the cubical capacity of their estuary 
 has fallen 18,000,000 cubic yards. 
 
 Now seriously, in detail, I should like to examine their position. 
 At 1069 it is stated very succinctly by Captain Graham Hills — this is to 
 show you how it is stated. He is under examination .by my learned 
 friend, Mr. Bidder. In answer to question 15760 he states his position 
 very succinctly. I made him do it, because it is useful not only to have 
 your own text, but the text upon which your opponent preaches. " Do 
 you, from your observation and experience in the estuary, attach impor- 
 tance to that fluctuation of the channel and its shifting from side to 
 side ? — The fluctuation of the channel is the only thing which disturbs 
 the deposit which otherwise would become permanent." And then he 
 says, " I associate the recovery of the bar with the action of frets in 
 increasing tidal capacity." That is Captain Graham Hills' distinct 
 position. There are practically two statements in diff'erent terms, of 
 the same proposition, but the latter form is the most precise, that he 
 associates the recovery of the bar with the action of frets in increasing 
 tidal capacity, and that is the one we shall prefer to deal with, and in deal- 
 ing with one I shall deal with both. 
 
 Now, I have already said that that position is in glaring contradic- 
 tion to the whole literature of tidal waters, and it is interesting to make 
 up my mind as to who invented it, and I cannot help thinking it was the 
 ingenious gentleman from the banks of the Mississippi. I can fancy 
 the process. I can fancy his being called in this year after they failed 
 to persuade the House of Commons last year that there was anything in 
 the position they took up. I can fancy his going over that evidence 
 with them, and I can imagine him saying — and saying with some sense : 
 ^* You must lay hold, gentlemen, of the essential difference between what 
 is proposed by their scheme and what is going on now. You must
 
 100 The Estuary Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar. [Chai'.XX.. 
 
 defend frets ; the essence of their scheme is that they are going to stop 
 frets; frets are the essential feature of the present order of things. You 
 stick to the frets." 
 
 Captain GRAHAM HILLS : I did mention it last year most distinctly. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Captain Graham Hills has no right to take part in 
 these proceedings. You, Mr. Aspinall, have a perfect right. I am not 
 in the habit of relying on my own statements — perhaps I rely a little too- 
 much upon evidence. I say again, with perfect fearlessness, that not a 
 soul last year did so — not a soul last year said that frets recovered the 
 bar — not a soul last year said that the fluctuation of the channel was 
 the only thing disturbing the deposit which would otherwise become 
 permanent. Not a soul last year said that frets increase the tidal 
 capacity. The idea is reserved for this gentleman from the far west of 
 America. It is curious that no man last year in evidence, or previous to 
 last year, in literature, had ever said the same thing. But I go further ; I 
 say in spite of the interjection of Captain Graham Hills, which I trust he 
 will not repeat, I say, in spite of the fancied power of contradiction ex- 
 pressed by my learned friend, Mr. Aspinall, that that theory is absolutely 
 contradicted by Captain Graham Hills' own evidence last year. I say 
 again, that the statement that the fret does recover the bar, does increase 
 the tidal capacity, and that shifting is the only thing that prevents deposit 
 from becoming permanent and the estuary silting up, is refuted by his 
 own evidence of this year, and by that of other witnesses who fol- 
 lowed him. Now that is a tolerably strong position to take up, and I 
 will defend it. Now, as to his evidence of last year, it is not so pleasant 
 to make use of it, and to do so wears the aspect of a charge which I am 
 very far from desiring to make, believe me ; but it is necessary to insist upon 
 that, because it is necessary to insist upon the intellectual inconsistency 
 of the chief witness — which Captain Graham Hills undoubtedly has 
 been' — if his mind were one thing in 1883, and is another 
 thing in 1884, of what value arc the deductions of Captain 
 Graham Hills ? Of what value are the deductions of a mind 
 which is capable, within twelve months, of such violent oscillation — 
 how can you be persuaded to ruin a grand scheme like this upon 
 the suggestion that frets are essential to the bar, by a gentleman who 
 a year ago insisted — if he did insist — that they injured his bar '? 
 I read his evidence of 1883 to him a few weeks ago, and you 
 Avill find there all the extracts that I read to him on pages 1107 to 
 1110. The first question is No. 16290. He says: " The shoaling of 
 the Queen Channel Bar and the accumulation of the Shoal Lump in 
 Crosby Channel have taken place simultaneously with the disturbances 
 of the river deposits which have already been described." So far we 
 only get to the word " simultaneously." I agree you have not yet got 
 cause and efi'ect, but, as I pointed out to him, it is a very strong indica- 
 tion of cause and efi'ect that the two things should go on simultaneously.. 
 " The shoaling of the Queen Channel Bar and the accumulation of the 
 Shoal Lump in Crosby Channel have taken place simultaneously with 
 the disturbances of the river deposits already described. By such dis-
 
 .<]iiAp. XX.] The Estuary Case.— Effect of Frets on the Bar. 101 
 
 turbances the current of the tide is charged with silt, and with the 
 alternation of the flood and ebb the deposits of the outer bay and the 
 inner estuary interchange with each other, being displaced and re- 
 deposited under laws and conditions of infinite complexity. The con- 
 tinuous changes found in the condition of the navigable channels are 
 necessarily involved in such interchanges." All that looks uncommonly 
 like cause and effect, but I do not say that it is said so in statements ; 
 though if I had only that to rely upon I might confidently say that the 
 indication that cause and effect were in the mind of the man who penned 
 it, is almost irresistible. " You do not mean by that to suggest that the 
 shoaling up of the bar was caused by that fret or any other? — What I 
 meant is very plainly expressed. I do not think I did mean that, but I 
 was going to say it was some years since it was written" — so that he is not 
 very strong that he did not mean that — *' and I should like to know what 
 the context is, but what you have read clearly implies that certain disturb- 
 ances caused matter to be interchanged going out and coming in — that is 
 my opinion at the present moment that it is so." I say even that goes a 
 very long way in the contention, but I have got it far, far clearer than that. 
 " (Q.) In other words you say you do not mean to suggest that the shoal- 
 ing up of the bar so far as that passage went was caused by the fret. Now 
 let us see what you said last year. At page 819, Question 9786, you were 
 asked, ' Will you describe in your own way, if you please, the changes in 
 the depth of the bar at the different periods, and also ' " — mark what — - 
 *' * connect those changes and alterations with the condition of the river?'" 
 What is the meaning of connection, if it does not mean connection as cause 
 and effect? "'It was mentioned by Mr. Leader Williams under a 
 misapprehension that in 1872 there was more water on the bar than there 
 is at present, and that he considered that at the present time the water was 
 less ; the converse is the case.' " He puts Mr. Leader Williams right, and 
 is anxious to do it. " ' 1872 was the time when we had the least water 
 within my experience of 27 j'^ears. The water at that time was seven feet 
 on the bar, and that shoaling of the water there was coincident with a very 
 large change which took place in the upper part of the river during a 
 period of two years and a quarter when I watched the effects of it.' " 
 Does not " coincident " mean cause and effect ? But I have got him far 
 •clearer further on. " ' A fret came down the river and 5,800,000 cubic 
 yards of soil were removed from this spot.' " What can he mean, if he 
 is talking of shoaling of the bar as being coincident with the operation 
 going on in the upper estuary, and further says it was bringing 5,800,000 
 cubic yards from the spot in which it took place ? Would not anybody 
 have supposed — as we supposed in 1883 — that a portion of that 
 6,800,000 cubic yards, or all of it, was put upon the bar? Then he 
 describes it. He says, " ' The channel as it came across cut in as much 
 .as 35 feet below the level of the top of the bank displacing in that way 
 large quantities of material which being so disturbed were carried down the 
 river and deposited elsewhere.' " As we should say, I cannot say exactly 
 where. I do not pledge myself and point on to the bar. " 'But the coincidence 
 was that with that change there the bar shoaled up from 11 to 7 feet.' "
 
 102 The Estuary Case — Effect of Frets on the Bar. [Chap. XX» 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : That is the question ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : It is the question ; and although I ask him the 
 question, the question being, " Was not that your evidence last year," 
 and though he says " Yes " to the question, take the evidence of last 
 year out of the question, it is his assertion in 1883. Then he is asked 
 '* Yes or no distinctly do you mean to say that you did not intend to 
 suggest by that answer to that question that the shoaling of the bar was. 
 caused by the fret ? " He is quite positive, for he answers, " I not only 
 did not intend but did not suggest it." He did not want to leave the 
 question open. We cannot get inside a man's mind at present, though 
 I will see whether I cannot get into his in the long run. But whether 
 he did not suggest it in the sense that any sane man who listened to him 
 would not think it was what he meant was another matter. Then I said, 
 *' Now Ave will go on, that is your answer at present, it is your answer 
 still. The next question is this ' What inference do you draw, or can you 
 draw any inference from that ? — The inference from that is simply this 
 that there is an intimate relation between the upper river and the outer 
 estuary and between the changes which occur in the upper river and in 
 the outer estuary.' " Now, pause upon these words. What was the- 
 change that occurred in the upper river ? The change was a shifting of 
 the channel and a bringing down of 5,800,000 cubic yards of stuff. 
 What was the change in the outer river ? The change in the outer river 
 was the shoaling of the bar from 11 feet to 7 feet ; if those two changes 
 in the upper and outer river were, according to him, in intimate relation 
 what could those intimate relations be but cause and effect ? But 
 that is not all. Then he says, " I did not say the one is the cause of the 
 other nor did I intend to say so. You have put another question to me 
 now upon the following questions and I want to answer that question 
 and what I have stated there is what I believe at the present time — that, 
 there is an intimate relation between the inner and the outer estuaries 
 and that you cannot make a change in the one without its affecting tho 
 other." True, you could not in fact, according to him, in 1883, send 
 down 5,800,000 cubic yards from the upper estuary, but what you made 
 a change in the bar ; and what was the change in the bar ? Shoaling. 
 But that is not all. I go further on. I put to him a remark of the 
 Chairman in 1883, which is embodied in Question 16295. The Chairman 
 then interposes, and says, " I understand you to say that the shoahng of 
 the bar followed upon a fret in the upper reaches of the river." Now 
 I admit that the Chairman in the House of Commons used the phrase- 
 "that followed upon," and "followed upon" may be interpreted to 
 mean " came afterwards." But you and I know well that when we talk of 
 so and so and so following on so and so, we mean not following only in 
 the matter of time, but in the matter of causation. His answer is,, 
 " Yes," Then he said, " I should say that that answer was 
 not correct at the moment, because I had already said it was 
 coincident." I then discuss the meaning of "followed;" followed 
 upon what? But I need not go into that. But further 
 on he is asked, " The fret is the turning over of a large
 
 Chap. XX.] The Estuary Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar. 103 
 
 quantity of material over more than one-third of the width of the estu- 
 ary ? — Yes. (Q.) Then how can the fret itself be the cause of itself? — 
 The turning over of the quantity of matter was the cause of the fret. (Q.) 
 It is the fret. I am still unconvinced, I am sorry to say, as to what you said 
 last year. Now turn to page 849 of the evidence of last year, Question 
 10010 : * How do you show the Committee that the maintenance of the 
 estuary in its present condition is kept by these * shifting channels ?' " 
 — Now mark this: "In that particular case the maintenance of the 
 estuary in its present condition is kept by these channels ?— In that par- 
 ticular case the maintenance of the estuary in its present position has 
 enabled the bar to free itself of the encumbrance " — that is shoahng from 
 11 to 7 feet — "which was caused by that change in the upper river." 
 That is the first time we get the word "caused." We have had "coincident" 
 " followed upon " and " intimate relation," and now for the first time, aS 
 clear as words can put it, we get the fact that the encumbrance on the bar 
 was caused by the change in the upper river, and the change in the 
 upper river was the great fret which rolled down 5,800,000 yards. What 
 can he say ? " The fret in the upper river was a part of the change I 
 referred to." But I have not done with him yet. Turn to the following 
 page, 1109, " I will now read at page 857 Question and Answer 10107 
 ' That is what you have told me " (says Mr. Michael) " in other words 
 you say the beneficial action which took place was attributable to so 
 many millions of silt that was brought down in the fret, and. that led to a 
 diminution of water over the bar." Mr. Michael had the pleasure of 
 cross-examining Captain Graham Hills in the House of Commons last 
 year. " I say " (said he) " the great stir which occurred in the bed of 
 the river and which occurred at a given period had at first the effect of 
 causing the shoaling up upon the bar." Now I think there is one neat 
 little bit more. 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : You ought to read it — you stopped without 
 reading the answer, and you were asked at that time to finish it. Read 
 the next. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : You are quite right, I ought to have read it parti- 
 cularly because I want it— it follows on. Mr. Aspinall's criticism is 
 right, and the same criticism was made against me when I examined 
 Captain Graham Hills. I have only to read the complete answer to 
 that question and the next one, " I say the great stir which occurred in 
 the bed of the river and which occurred at a given period had at first 
 the eff'ect of causing the shoaling up upon the bar, and eventually the 
 effect of increasing the tidal capacity of the river at the point from 
 which that large quantity of matter was removed. Those are two things 
 quite distinct, and first the great stir which is identical with the fret ? — 
 No, there is a great deal more than the fret. (Q.) But it involves the 
 fret ? — Yes," and so on. Mr. Aspinall is quite right, and I want it, but 
 not for the purpose Mr. Aspinall imagines. Here you have got two 
 distinct declarations, one without qualification that the fret and change 
 in the upper river caused an encumbrance upon the bar, and secondly, 
 the admission that the great stir which was the great fret, had the effect,
 
 104 The Estuary Case. — Effect of Frets on the Bar. [Chap. xx. 
 
 first of raising and shoaling up upon the bar ; and afterwards what does 
 he say? He does not say the fret eventually increased the general 
 capacity of the river, but only that it increased the tidal capacity of the 
 river at the point from which the large quantity of matter was removed 
 — that is perfectly obvious. Then I say, but it involves the fret ? — 
 Yes — you are dwelling now upon what has been called the great fret. 
 If you look at that report of mine of 1871 yoii will see that there I 
 speak of two frets then in progress. (Q.) Excuse me for saying that I 
 was not examining you then, but Mr. Michael ; what Mr. Michael says is 
 this ; he does not use the word " great " though you do ; he says : " In 
 -other words you say the beneficial action which took place was attribu- 
 table to so many millions of silt that was brought down in the fret, and 
 that led to a diminution of water over the bar ? — I say the great stir 
 which occurred in the bed of the river. That involved the fret ? — 
 Yes, or a part of it. (Q.) And which occurred at a given period had 
 .at first the effect of causing the shoaling up on a bar? — Yes. (Q.) 
 Then it did cause the shoaling up upon the bar ? — Yes." There is an 
 :admission this year that it did. That is not quite all — upon page 1110 
 he says in answer to 1G314 : " I have no doubt in my own mind that the 
 reason why the bar shoaled at that particular time was that there was a 
 large movement outward of sand and other matter from the bed of the 
 river. That was your answer there ? — You put it as a question to me. 
 I have no objection to your making the statement as it stands. There 
 was a large movement out of the bed of the river." Good heavens, that 
 is again his evidence last year : "I have no doubt in my own mind that 
 the reason why the bar shoaled at that particular time was that there was 
 .a large movement outward of sand and other matter from the bed of the 
 river," Now that movement of sand from the bed of the river is the 
 result of fret and therefore the fret, which was the cause of that, was the 
 .sole cause of the shoaling up the bar. Expound as he likes, struggle as he 
 may, you are perfectly able to judge, did he or did he not say last year 
 that frets caused the shoaling up of the bar ? If he did, he has made a 
 very sudden change of mind now. I do not want to pun upon him, but 
 he has created a great mental fret this year himself — there cannot be a 
 doubt about it. 
 
 Now I would say, are you going to stop a scheme of this magni- 
 tude and promise upon hypotheses either originating in, or adopted 
 by, a mind that can so oscillate as Captain Graham Hills' can ? I do 
 not rely only on that — let us see this year whether or not he can 
 support his own new theory himself, or whether it is supported for him 
 by the others who come and help to support it. Now the theory I 
 •cannot too oftgn repeat is first that frets recover the bar — re-cover 
 the bar must mean not simply to undo some damage that they have 
 done themselves, but if the bar gets shoaled up from some cause or 
 •other, they put it right ; secondly, to increase the tidal capacity — and 
 here let me notice that in the remainder of his answer which my learned 
 friend, Mr. Aspinall, quite properly made me read, because there is no 
 doubt, even if it is apparently irrelevant to one's own mind, one has no
 
 CiiAP. XX.] The Estuary Case.— Effect of Frets on the Bar. 105 
 
 right to read a part of an answer — he has not said that the fret increases 
 the total tidal capacity of the river, but only that it increased it at that 
 one particular point, which is a truism. If I take a certain amount of 
 sovereigns out of my own pocket and transfer them to the pocket of my 
 son, it is obvious that I have increased the monetary capacity of my 
 pocket, though I have taken the sovereigns out, and I have diminished the 
 monetary capacity of his, though I have put some sovereigns in. As to 
 the capacity of the bar, cause or not cause, the great fret was one which 
 he thought so remarkable that he thought it worthy of special mention, 
 that he says upon page 1110, Question 1G813 : "It was a fret so re- 
 markable that I thought it worthy of special observation at the time." 
 That he had said last year, and he repeats it this year. Now, would 
 you kindly notice, your Grace, we are upon the question of whether a 
 fret can recover the bar, and whether this fret is a specimen of the re- 
 covery of a bar, and it is a good specimen, because it is a remarkable 
 fret — it was going on during the period during which the bar increased 
 .and shoaled up. I must ask you to turn to page 1106, where he tells 
 me when the fret began, as he subsequently tells me when the fret 
 «ended. I asked him — "When should you think it began? — I cannot 
 make a guess ; somewhere between 1861 and 1869 ; looking at the pro- 
 gress afterwards, I should think it must have begun about the middle 
 ■of the interval, but it is a mere guess." I do not want to pin him to 
 .a year or two, but in all human probability it was in 1865, and I am 
 ready to take it as 1865. But even if it began in 1861 it would do. I 
 want to call your attention to the fact that from 1861 downwards for a con- 
 siderable period, down to 1872 or 1873, the bar constantly deteriorated. 
 If you turn to page 1083 you will find that the fret terminated in 1873 
 — it is in answer to Question 15909. At 15908 Captain Hills is asked : 
 *' When was the fret ? — The first we knew of it, the first measurement we 
 ,got of it was in 1869." And he subsequently says it probably began in 
 
 1865. " Was the effect of it prolonged through several years ? — Yes it 
 went on to 1873." I say that the very period during which this 
 fret was going on was the period during which the bar shoaled up. Now, 
 if I show you that from his own figures and his own statements, surely 
 I show you that so far from the fret recovering the bar, if there is any 
 inference at all, it is that the fret damages the bar, damages it seriously. 
 Will your Grace turn for this purpose to page 1116. On page 1116, 
 ]in answer to Question 16386, he gives his own minimum depths— the 
 worst depths on the bar. He will not let me take Admiral Evans's best 
 depths, he says you ought not to do that, you ought to take the worst 
 
 -depths. That is true ; as I said upon a previous occasion, the efiiciency of a 
 company of infantry is the efiiciency of the worst man in it ; the efiiciency 
 of the bar may be taken to be that of the worst spot in it, so to speak. He 
 
 .gives his own depths. In 1865 the worst depth is 10 feet, the same for 
 
 1866, 1867, and 1868 ; in 1869, when you see the fret had been in opera- 
 tion four or five years, according to him it has gone down to 8. It goes up 
 .a little in 1871 ; in 1872 it fell to 8, and in 1873 to 7, when the opera- 
 tion of the fret was completed — so that during that period, even begin-
 
 106 The Estuary Case, -Effect of Frets on the Bar, [Chap. XX» 
 
 ning with 1865, or I do not care if I begin with 1861, the bar silted up 
 during this very Hvely fret no less than 3 feet. Those are his own areas- 
 of the bar, and tell the same tale. Upon page 1084 he gives the sec- 
 tional areas of the bar. If you recollect, that was the occasion upon?, 
 which he produced a variety of cross sections, and that is the point at 
 which he gives his complete evidence upon the subject. He gives us 
 the areas upon those cross sections from 1868 down to 1883, and I will 
 ask you to notice this : — Those sections are 624 for 1868 ; 580 for 1869 ;, 
 544 for 1870 ; 691 for 1871 ; 518 for 1872 ; and 560 for 1873, so that, 
 having been as high as 624 in 1868, with one or two intermediate- 
 changes, the whole condition of the bar down to 1873 was far worse with 
 the exception of one year, 1871, which must have been from some extra- 
 neous and peculiar cause, as it differs from all the others ; but, with that 
 exception, the condition of the bar during the whole of the periods whicb 
 he gives, and during which that fret had been going on, was bad com-^ 
 pared to what it is in the period from 1877 to 1883, when it has risen 
 from 610 in 1874, 560 in 1873, up to 1,000 in 1883. You see it was 
 bad all the time the fret was going on, and it improved and improved 
 most materially during the last five or six years, which are admitted upon 
 all hands to be a period of comparative quiescence when the main channel, 
 has not materially altered. 
 
 Now I say that here are the figures given by a gentleman who says 
 frets re-cover the bar, and the figures show that so far from the fret 
 re-covering the bar, the coincidence of the fret is the coincidence of the 
 shoaling up of the bar, and the shoaling up of the bar in depth, and the- 
 diminution of the bar in sectional area, and, on the other hand, that the- 
 period which is noted for its quiescence and for its tolerable freedom 
 from fret, is coincident with the very important rise of the sectional area, 
 of the bar, and I may add improvements in its depth, because since 1873 
 it has gone up from seven feet to nine feet. So far, then, as that coin- 
 cidence goes, so far as any proof adduced by him goes, that frets 
 recover the bar, they are turned without the slightest efibrt of ingenuity 
 by his own way of dealing with them into an indication, if it is an 
 indication, that the operation of frets, so far from being beneficial, is 
 baneful to bars. 
 
 But we need not confine ourselves to one fret. Look at what I 
 have called from time to time Admiral Spratt's skein of serpents, in other- 
 words the bundle of channels between Garston and Runcorn, any time 
 between 1825 and 1882. See if your lordships can pick them out of the 
 changes of the channel during the period from 1861 to 1863 — how 
 many frets that have caused those changes of channel must there have^ 
 been in that interval ? The frets having been so plentiful during the 
 interval of these years what were changes in the bar ? Turn to page 115 — 
 you see you have had two channels to deal with in that interval, the 
 Victoria Channel and the Queen's Channel. Owing to the changes at 
 the mouth of the Mersey from whatever cause arising, at one time- 
 the Victoria Channel has been the main channel, at other times the 
 Queen's Channel has been the main channel. Captain Grraham Hills had
 
 Chap. XX.] The Estuary Case.— Effect of Frets on the Bar. lOT 
 
 something to say about the Victoria Channel not being usable in the 
 dark. But that has nothing to do with the point we are upon now. The 
 depths are the thing. I am now taking the epoch of frets as shown by 
 the charts of Admiral Spratt, between 1861 and 1873 ; here are the frets 
 — what were the changes upon the bar during that era or epoch, which- 
 ever I ought to call it. The Victoria Channel had in 1861, 17 feet; 
 in 1862, 17 feet; in 1863, 16 feet; in 1864, 15 feet ; in 1865, 15 feet 
 — slowly diminishing up to 1865 — the epoch at which, when put to 
 it. Captain Graham Hills thinks he may put the commencement of 
 the great fret — the following year after the commencement, what 
 is the drop? From 15 feet to 12 feet, slowly diminishing up to 
 1865, rapidly after the first year in which he thinks the great fret began.. 
 From that time the Queen's Channel becomes the channel and the best 
 available channel ; and what are the depths of the Queen's Channel ? I 
 have given you, with the exception of one year, his own depths as taken 
 in 1868, but he goes on in 1867, when the Queen's Channel takes up the 
 wondrous tale : 1867, 10 feet ; in 1869, 8 feet ; in 1870, 8 feet ; in 1871,. 
 9 feet ; in 1872, 8 feet ; and in 1873, 7 feet — and there is one last depth,, 
 which I gave awhile ago. What happened between 1873 and 1878 we da 
 not know, but we do know that from that time onward the main channel 
 has been fairly stationary. I do not say the river has not wandered, and 
 that there have not been certain local frets and changes, and certain dis- 
 placements of the stuff in the estuary, but the epoch has mainly been, so* 
 far as the channel is concerned, an epoch of stationarinesa;, if I may coin. 
 a word, and the bar has gone down again. It is now (upon page 1117), 
 according to himself, from 9 feet minimum to 11 feet maximum, in 1871,. 
 but I am content with the 9 feet minimum, showing, therefore, an. 
 improvement of two feet. 
 
 Now, that is all the evidence you have of the effect of frets upon the- 
 bar, if any, of which I must say personally I avow a prudent dis-- 
 belief. What does it show, if anything, to sum it up once more ? It 
 shows that an epoch of great activity in the matter of frets was coinci- 
 dent with an epoch of considerable decrease upon the part of the bar.. 
 It shows that an epoch of comparative quietness upon the part of the 
 river was coincident with an epoch of partial recovery of the bar. It. 
 shows that Captain Graham Hills, in associating frets and the bar at all 
 as matters of intimate relation, in 1883 might have been right, when he 
 said they cause the shoaling up of the bar ; in 1884, when he says they 
 cure it, he must be wrong. 
 
 CHAPTEK XXI. 
 
 THE ESTUARY CASE. THE EFFECT OF FRETS IN INCREASING 
 OR DECREASING TIDAL CAPACITY. 
 
 Now, let us test his theory by the view which I suppose I may call 
 its corollary ; namely, that frets increase tidal capacity. I agree that if 
 they do not increase tidal capacity they could not aflect the bar. I will
 
 108 The Estuary Case. [Chap. XXL 
 
 admit that. It is perfectly obvious that if a change involving a large 
 displacement of sand and a huge body of sand, wherever it took place, 
 were accompanied by a force sufficient to sweep the sand at once out to 
 sea, then of course there would be an increase of the general total 
 capacity of the estuary, there cannot be a doubt about it; in that case 
 the operation would be equivalent or analogous, whichever term you 
 prefer, to the making of my channel — the contents of which I do 
 take up and carry out and transport to sea ; if the fret which changed 
 the channel could do what I do, have force enough to take 
 the stuff out to sea, then no doubt there would be an increase 
 in tidal capacity ; then the result of the fret would not be transposition, 
 which everybody, himself included, up to this year called it, but 
 transportation, but that condition is wanting, and no one sees this 
 more clearly than Captain Graham Hills. Up to this year he had 
 never claimed for frets that they increased the tidal capacity. Up to 
 this time he, like everybody else, has described their results as trans- 
 position, as interchange. Let us take his report of 1871, which I quote 
 to him on page 1113, where you see distinctly he points to the result of 
 the fret as interchange. It is in answer to 16357. The subject of the 
 report is Pluckington Bank. He says, *' The causes of such changes are 
 often remote in time and are due to operations originated in distant 
 parts of the river bed not difficult to be traced in broad outline." The 
 causes which changed Pluckington Bank. That would be transposition. 
 If the change in the upper river caused change in Pluckington Bank, it 
 would mean obviously that it brought down the silt which increased it. 
 It continues : " As regards the present time it will be seen on reference 
 to my report of 1873 on the general survey of the river made in 1871 
 and continued as regards certain changes then in progress in the 
 upper estuary to September, 1873, that a description is there given of an 
 operation observed in progress during 2 J years when a bank containing 
 5,800,000 cubic yards was displaced from the neighbourhood of Stanlow 
 Point and Ellesmere Port whereby the main ebb stream was diverted 
 from its previous course and directed towards the banks which then 
 bounded the west side of the narrow Garston channel. Thus directed it 
 gradually swept away those banks including the Devil's Bank creating a 
 broad deep channel along the Garston shore past Dingle point " (doing 
 what?) " filling up with deposit the middle part of the river where for 
 several years previously the channel which carried the principal of the 
 ■ ebb stream of the upper river had existed." 
 
 Now look at his report of 1873, where he constantly talks of inter- 
 ' change as being the result of these changes in the condition of the 
 upper channel. I have here the manuscript of his report of 1873 : 
 "In the second compartment," he says, "12 sections appear increased 
 .and 10 decreased nearly making a balance. This compartment com- 
 prises Pluckington Bank. A series of annual surveys submitted to the 
 Board for several years past has indicated that the great changes 
 annually noticed in the surface of this bank are caused by equal inter- 
 ^changes of deposit, and by the view now given of the whole width and
 
 Chap. XXI.] The Effect of Frets on Tidal Capacity. 10&^ 
 
 length of this compartment, it is shown that here the capacity of the 
 tideway is practically the same as it was 10 years before." Then he- 
 says : " The third compartment comprising the great expanse from 
 i) ingle Point compares unfavourably with its previous condition, as the 
 majority of its sections stand on the side of decrease. The proportion 
 of the decrease, as illustrated in Diagram A, does not appear considerable, 
 but in the sections the mass of deposit transposed is in many cases shown 
 to be very great. The nature of these transpositions is exemplified by 
 two cases occurring at the time of the survey, and which still con- 
 tinue in progress," and so on. Then again: "In July, 1871, when 
 the work of the river survey reached the same locality, the fret had reached 
 the brown line, implying a transposition of deposit " (not carrying the 
 stuff down to the sea and increasing the tidal capacity, but an increase), 
 " in 15 months sufficient to cover nearly 700 acres a yard deep. Follow- 
 ing the progress of the fret up to the latest record in September, 1873, 
 it lad reached the red line implying " "What? "a further trans- 
 position of deposit in 2J years sufficient to cover nearly 1,200 acres." 
 " The increased capacity of the tideway in the two upper com- 
 partments of the estuary implies a removal of deposit from these 
 localities, and thus indicates a probable cause of some part of the decreased 
 capacity of the 3rd compartment ; the erosion of the clay cliffs within its 
 boundary adds another." Then he says : " The statement before given 
 with regard to the frets near Hale and Halewood Shores and the 
 particulars noted of the Stanlow and Ellesmere fret illustrg,te " (What ? 
 Not an increase of tidal capacity or transportation of this stuff to the sea, 
 but) ** a condition of perpetual interchange of deposits which always 
 exist in the bed of the estuary. The figures before quoted show the pro- 
 gross of such interchange at the place last named during intervals of 14 
 and 26 months respectively ; if spread equally over the whole period from 
 May, 1870, to September, 1873, they indicate an annual transfer equivalent 
 to 670 acres one yard deep from the locality." Mr. Lj^ster showed 
 tliose sections showing the transposition of the stufi" from the 
 upper estuary, and the consequent increase of Pluckington Bank to 
 3^our lordships, in a very frank manner. All I say is, no one has more 
 clearly held and shown and expressed in official writing the precon- 
 ceived notion of the result of frets, namely, transposition, and not 
 transportation, than has Captain Graham Hills himself. Others have 
 said the same. I see that Admiral Spratt, in his report of 1878, refers 
 to it as if it was a foregone conclusion that that was the sort of thing. 
 He is talking of Pluckington Bank, and how it has fluctuated — he says 
 that the height above low water remains as it was, but the other part 
 had grown very much, and " The underwater contours of 10 and 20 
 feet depth have been projected into the deeper water in proportion 
 similar to the extension of the dry area* Further observation shows 
 that this extension of shoal water is due to the transposition of Devil's 
 Bank, which has moved bodily to the northward, tailing out in a long 
 narrow strip connecting itself with the southern margin of Pluckington 
 Bank, and that this transposition of deposit is compensated by the
 
 110 The Estuary Case, [Chap. XXI. 
 
 deep water which now occupies the former site of Devil's Bank and by 
 the scouring away of the shoal margin beyond low water on the Cheshire 
 shore." 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : You challenged me to show you what he said 
 last year about this, and he does give a strong answer in his evidence 
 last year at page 889, Question 9928. On being asked by my learned 
 friend, Mr. Rodwell : *' He says in paragraph 57, ' It does not seem 
 likely 'that access to the port of Liverpool will ever be seriously impeded 
 while the present existing volume of back water is preserved.' Now 
 will you take that as your text, and tell us how that warning on that 
 statement of his applies to this case ? — The warning applies in this sense, 
 that the accretions which, as I have stated already, will certainly occur 
 will affect every part of the river below them. As the tidal water is 
 excluded little by little or more from one point to another, there will be 
 a corresponding decrease in the tidal water coming into the Mersey. 
 That decrease will decrease the velocity both of the flood and ebb. Of 
 course a decrease of velocity suffers silt to subside which hitherto has 
 been carried through. And so in that way there is no part of the 
 river or the sea channel that will not be affected by loss of tidal water. 
 Lookinty forward I consider that the river and the bay will be affected 
 in somewhat two different ways. The river will be rapidly silted up, the 
 bay will have the sandbanks beaten in by the heavy seas into the exist- 
 incy channel, so that the sea channels will suffer more by the action of 
 the sea than by the silt brought down into them ; but either way the 
 Tesult will be the same, the sea channels will suffer and the navigation of 
 the port will suffer. (Q.) Those will be the gradual and sure conse- 
 quences you think ? — I am sure of it." 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Now, Mr. Aspinall, for the first time in my experi- 
 ence, is sinning somewhat in the same way as my learned friend, Mr. 
 Potter, sinned this morning. If he could have shown you a distinct 
 declaration last year that Captain Graham Hills said frets increased the 
 general tidal capacity of the river, I, having shown from his evidence 
 that he has not said so, and on the contrary that in his report of the 
 previous year, and in his evidence so far as it went last year, he has 
 spoken of transposition always and not of transportation, he would 
 have been justified ; but nothing justifies him in simply sticking in a lot 
 of evidence to the effect that he thinks the diminution of tidal water in 
 the estuary will injure the bar. I dare say it will. 'I never said the 
 diminution of the tidal water would not injure the bar, nor have I 
 said that Captain Graham Hills ever said the contrary — and it is 
 not quite fair to interrupt me in my speech, which must necessarily 
 be loner, and must be consecutive, by perfectly irrelevant interruptions 
 of that kind. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : I must say I do not consider it an irrelevant 
 interruption. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : There is no assertion there that a fret increases the 
 .tidal capacity. Now let me go on. I say not only does Captain Graham 
 Hills say that, but I say also that Admiral Spratt does in the report which
 
 CiiAP. XXL] The Effect of Frets on Tidal Capacity, 111 
 
 I read, and so says Mr. David Stevensen, at page 185 of his book on Canal 
 and River Engineering : " This tendency to deviate from channel to channel 
 Is common to all rivers that are left undirected to work their way through a 
 tract of sand, and is utterly destructive to navigation. Continued during 
 iiood and ebb tide it sets loose a large amount of floating sand, which is 
 daily drifted to and fro and deposited in some new situation. A channel 
 which is thus constantly shifting its course never remains sufficiently 
 long in one position to form for itself a properly defined bed, but is, in 
 fact, always in a transition state, the sand which is worn from the concave 
 side where there is the greatest scour being thrown," " carried " not 
 *' thrown " out to sea, but " being thrown to the convex side of the 
 ^stream while some portion of the floating materials carried to and fro 
 during this process of perpetual change is often deposited and forms 
 shoals in the middle of the fairway. A river left in this state of nature 
 cannot possibly attain the maximum depth due to the natural scour of 
 the tidal currents as their power is expended in abrading and removing 
 the sandbanks " (Do note that the tidal currents do abrade the sand- 
 banks.) " through which the stream flows and not as it ought to be in 
 deepening and scouring its bed. In such cases what is wanted is to secure 
 :a permanent channel by guiding the first of the flood and the last 
 of the ebb tide by means of walls so that the strength of the 
 currents may constantly operate on the same line of channel. In 
 this way it is obvious that not only will the advantage 
 of a permanent navigable track be obtained, but the constant action of 
 the currents of flood and ebb tide flowing in the same channel will 
 secure a much greater permanent depth than they could possibly do if 
 j)ermitted to wander at random through the estuary sometimes operating 
 in the same channel and at other times directly opposed to each other 
 .and these results can best be attained by training walls." Therefore, 
 Mr. David Stevenson says that what occurs is that the sand is deposited 
 in some new situation, and thrown by the fret from the concave side 
 from which it is worn, to the convex side of the river, showing that 
 there was nothing in Mr. Stevenson's mind at all when he penned that 
 which contains the common sense of the thing, nothing in his mind like 
 what is in Captain Graham Hills' mind this year, namely, that the fret 
 instead of depositing stufi" in some other situation, carries it out to sea 
 without doing which it could not increase the tidal capacity. So says 
 Captain Calver : "A fresh water stream I believe is powerless 
 to maintain a sea outlet." It is a fresh water stream, as 
 Captain Graham Hills said to you, which causes these 
 frets. These frets, he says, take place at low water when the fresh 
 water stream is acting, and it is that which gets turned and cuts through 
 the sandbanks, and saws across from side to side. In fact, upon this 
 point, there was a general consensus until Captain Graham Hills said 
 that this year as to frets increasing the tidal capacity and it 
 has never been said in this shape by anyone except himself. 
 I felt certain when I heard him say that that some time or other a con- 
 tradiction to it would come either from himself or somebody, and I
 
 112 The Estuary Case. [Chap. xxi. 
 
 was not disappointed ; mind, I am upon this dictum that frets increase- 
 tidal capacity. My hopes began to be realised in page 1073 for decry- 
 ing my channel, Question 17796 : "May I say before passing to that 
 subject that even the infinitesimal portion that would be partially filled 
 cannot afi'ect the bar because the velocity of the stream and the time of 
 the tide does not admit of the stream from the excavation they propose 
 meeting the bar at all so that it would be dispersed somewhere in the 
 river or over the banks without reaching the bar at all;" that is tho 
 stream from the excavation which is up in the river where these frets^ 
 took place. That is what he said distinctly. Now, thought I to myself, 
 if the water cannot get down from that part of the river which is repre- 
 sented in my channel, how' could matters in suspension in the water 
 from that part of the river ever have got down to the bar, or have been 
 carried beyond it ? Now at page 1085 you will see that distinct state- 
 ment that his fret took place exactly at the time when it is low water in 
 the channel. It is in answer to Question 15934 : " A great part of tht^ 
 estuary is dry, in fact at that time comes into operation the fret, the channel 
 is then restricted to the narrow run through the bank. The velocity of 
 the stream has increased in proportion as its width is limited , and it picks. 
 up the silt which grows from a proportion of 1*7 grains to a gallon at two 
 o'clock to 52 grains in the latter part of the time." Now, there you see 
 that is exactly the point — take what rapidit}^ you please of the current — it 
 has got between 20 and 30 miles to run, and long before any water in that 
 channel can get to the bar, according to his own showing, it would have 
 met the incoming tide, so that all that is carried with it will be brought 
 back again, and what is true of the water in my channel is perfectly true 
 with the matter in suspension in the water in the natural low-water 
 channel — namely, that there is not time, ranging from the moment at- 
 whicli the frets begin to work — viz., at low water, when nearly all the 
 tidal water has run off, there is not time for anything, whether watei' 
 or matter, in suspension in the water to reach the bar. There is no doubt 
 about that. But that is not all If you turn to Page 1141, you will 
 find he clenches the matter. I kneAV exactly what I was about, and I 
 wanted to get at the truth of this, as to whether anything that was done 
 by the river in that condition, when it was at or near low water, could 
 possibly afi'ect the bar — that is to say, whether it would be possible for- 
 the water from the middle of the estuary at that time of the tide to get 
 down to the bar, and so bring the matter in suspension either to the bar 
 or send it away to sea. And what is his answer at the bottom of page 
 1140 — at Question 16631 he is asked: "Would you just tell me this- 
 what to begin with is the velocity of the water in the present low-water 
 channel say within one or two hours of the ebb of low water ? — Within 
 two hours of the ebb it will be about its greatest velocity probably about 
 four knots an hour." How many miles is four knots ? About five miles.. 
 It is 23 miles to the bar at least from the point he suggested — at five miles 
 an hour it would have taken four hours to get down to the bar, but we know 
 that the tide begins to flow at the bar long before the ebb has ceased in 
 the upper estuary, therefore it has only two hours of its own ebb to do*
 
 Chap. XXI.] The Effect of Frets on Tidal Capacity, 113 
 
 the distance, which it would take it four hours to do according to hia own 
 showing, and yet that two hours is not all open to it, because before the 
 two hours are over it will begin to meet the flood tide coming from the 
 bar. And mind you, that is only to be the velocity of the second hour 
 before ebb. Then he is asked : " About how long will it continue ? — 
 From the time that it gets to its greatest it will gradually diminish," so 
 that it will not have the advantage of going at four knots an hour. 
 " What would it be at one hour from low water ? — Probably half that 
 velocity. (Q.) Dwindling to nothing at the extreme end ? — Yes the 
 greatest velocity is soon after the banks uncover and the water is all 
 confined to the narrow channels." Then, but not till then, did I feel 
 safe in asking him the clenching question, '* What is the latest period 
 after high water in the centre of the estuary at which any water turned 
 . from the centre of the estuary would reach the bar?" He says most 
 distinctly : "It could not reach it from the beginning of the tide till 
 the end," if the water cannot, how can the matter borne in suspension 
 reach it ? Then he made the suggestion of transposition as being 
 the real result of frets against transportation. I have referred to what 
 Captain Hills said in his report of 1878, and those sections of Plucking- 
 ton Bank under water put in by Mr. Lyster, showing a large increase in 
 consequence of the deposit brought down the river — they abundantly 
 show that. But I would venture to say this : if frets do not cause trans- 
 portation, in other words, if they do not get rid of the materials they set 
 loose before those materials get down to the bar, and without those 
 materials getting at least as far as the bar you cannot have an increase 
 of tidal capacity, what has become of the old channels ? How are they 
 filled up ? No one says, they were of less capacity than the ones that 
 had superseded them, they are filled up, and therefore the opening of 
 the new one which is the consequence of the fret or the method of the 
 fret must mean the transposal of its contents to some receptacle ready to 
 receive them, and what is the receptacle ? Why the old channels 
 themselves physically where the stuff goes, though not necessarily in the 
 first instance, it may be at either end of this red hollow,, 
 but eventually it finds its way into the bed of the old 
 channel which is filled up with the contents of the new. And, moreover, 
 this is a most remarkable thing. If frets increase the tidal capacity, how 
 is it that the cubical capacity of the estuary has decreased since 1861 no 
 less than 17,000,000 cubic yards. I do not know whether you have this 
 document, which is the report of the marine surveyor made in the year 
 1881. If your lordships turn to page 5 of it you see that the tidal 
 capacity of the estuary dropped from 1861 to 1881 from 979,000,000 to 
 962,000,000. Now, if frets, which had been enormously prevalent 
 between 1861 and 1881, are to increase the tidal capacity, they ought to 
 have increased it in that 20 years ; but instead of that there has been a 
 decrease. Now, look at this between 1861 and 1871 ; there was a still 
 larger decrease than the total decrease of the two decennial periods. 
 That is, there has been a recovery in the second ; the total decrease from 
 1861 to 1871 is 24,000,000. Now he might tell me that the frets going 
 
 H
 
 114 The Estuary Case, [Chap. xxi. 
 
 on between 1871 and 1881 raised the tidal capacity from 954,000,000 to 
 962,000,000, if it had not been that I had the tidal capacity in 1861 ; 
 but if he tells me that the fret between 1871 and 1881 increased the 
 tidal capacity from 954,000,000 to 962,000,000, I ask how is it that the 
 frets between 1861 and 1871 allowed the tidal capacity to fall from 
 979,000,000 to 954,000,000. What is the net result, so to speak, of 20 
 years of fretting ? The frets have filled up the old channels instead of 
 taking the contents of the new channels out to sea, and further they have 
 allowed other sources, that is either in the sea, or the clifi's of which we 
 have heard a great deal, or the upland water bringing down more silt, to 
 encroach upon the cubical capacity to the tune of 17,000,000 cubic yards. 
 That is the net result of 20 years of fretting ; so far from the cubical 
 capacity being greater it is less by 17,000,000. That sums up as 
 clearly as it can be summed up the claim of frets as increasers of cubical 
 capacity. 
 
 Now there must be some other cause obviously at work to cause this 
 decrease of the tidal capacity, and the only other cause at work is the 
 tidal water operated upon by various causes ; and so far as the decrease 
 may be caused by anything from above in the shape of erosion of cli£fs, 
 we shall partially stop it, so far as it is caused, — no doubt it is caused 
 very largely, as Mr. Barry and others tell you, by the silt and deposit 
 which are brought down from the upper reaches of the Mersey and the 
 inland reaches. We shall stop that altogether. But how Captain Hills, 
 with his own surveys before him, could have held otherwise than this is, 
 I confess, to me a puzzle. Just analyse a little further these figures, to 
 which I have called your attention in the report of 1881, and while you 
 do that, think of the skein of serpents in the meantime. Now you have 
 got a decrease of 17,000,000 cubic yards during the two decennial 
 periods with frets and changes of channel all the time as that 
 skein of serpents shows ; you have got that as a fact. Now you have 
 got a decrease in one decade of 25,000,000 cubic yards, and there is 
 no evidence whatever of any paucity of frets ; in fact, at page 1112, 
 Captain Hills admitted that there were plenty of frets. At Question 
 16346 he is asked : " There had been frets of one sort or another between 
 1871 and 1881. There were plenty of frets between 1861 and 1871 ?— No 
 doubt there were." Then if frets increase the cubical capacity, how do you 
 account for the loss of 25,000,000 cubic yards when they w^e so plentiful ? 
 — In the next decade you had an increase of 8,000,000 cubic yards, but not 
 the slightest evidence of any increase in the frequency of frets. On the con- 
 trary, a great portion of the first decade was occupied by the great fret. All 
 these two years of the great fret were in the first decade, and the greater 
 portion of the last decade on the contrary is known to have been a period 
 of comparative quiescence. On the balance of the two decades, there- 
 fore, though you had a great rise the period which was the more 
 quiescent of the two is the one during which the estuary partially 
 recovered." And this is a further thing to be noted, and it is very 
 curious that if he contends he could claim the recovery between 1871 and 
 1881 as due to the increased tidal capacity of any portion of the estuary 
 
 I
 
 Chap. XXI.] The Effect of Frets on Tidal Capacity. 1 1 5 
 
 as opposed to the tidal capacity of the whole — it is a funny thing that 
 the increase of that tidal capacity is in part 3, which is the part we deal 
 with where our channel is, and where the gain is from 565 to 581, 
 and it is exactly in that part of the estuary where he says our increasing 
 above low-water mark of that part of the estuary by 14,000,000 cubic 
 yards will do no good, because no water in that part of the estuary can 
 by any one tide reach the bar, and yet if increase of tidal capacity 
 has gone on during that period, the increase of that tidal capacity was 
 actually in that particular bed of the estuary. In fact, the increase is, 
 from 1865 to 1881, about the same as ours, which is to do no good at all. 
 Now surely this ought to have convinced him that frets do not increase 
 tidal capacity. But, finally, it is a very odd thing, if you will look once 
 more with me at those figures, that Part 1, from the Rock Lighthouse to 
 Seacombe, showed an increase between 1861 and 1871 ; not a very large 
 one, but about 1,500,000 ; it showed an increase at the time when the 
 total capacity of the estuary went down to 24,000,000. That is a very 
 curious thing, and that is the part which is so essential to 
 Liverpool. So that, actually, the lower bit from the Rock 
 Lighthouse to Seacombe increased appreciably, as did also Part 2, 
 because Part 2 went up between 1879 and 1880. It increased 
 appreciably during a period when the total cubical capacity of 
 ihe estuary had sunk so vastly. Further, this is .also funny — 
 that though there is, in Part 1, when the estuary recovers, a slight 
 increase —from 144 to 145 — it is very little, because it is nearly 145 in 
 1871, a slight increase when the cubical capacity had increased, Part 2, 
 which is the bit from Seacombe to the Narrows, including the docks in 
 Pluckington Bank, went back about 8,000,000. Now all that is 
 very funny ; but you see it shows that there is an absolute inconsequence 
 between the increase of the tidal capacity and the increase of 
 any particular part, because when there was a large decrease of 
 capacity up goes Part 1 and up goes Part 2, and when there is a decrease 
 of capacity on the whole, down goes Part 2. All this goes to show that 
 some agent distinct from frets is an all-powerful agent — that is, streams, 
 tidal current, silt and inland waters. 
 
 Now to this Captain Hills, in spite of my laborious cross-examina- 
 tion, will attach no importance ; but fortunately others do, and notably 
 Admiral Spratt, whose report of 1882 I will call attention to upon that 
 point. This is what he says, referring to the cause of the various 
 changes occurring in the navigating channel. After stating certain pal- 
 pable causes to which Captain Hills attaches a good deal of importance, 
 he thinks he has overlooked the all-important consequences for the less 
 important ones, which are more visible, and says this : *' I am however 
 induced to believe that the tidal action is frequently the more powerful 
 and rapid agent of change when it is combined with a heavy gale from 
 the westward on the top of high- water spring tides, for then the action of 
 the surf, combined with the flowing tide sweeping as a torrent over the 
 surface of the banks, must carry forward with it a considerable amount 
 of the surface sand under every such condition, partially filling some
 
 116 The Estuary Case, [Chap. XXL. 
 
 pcM'tions of the pre-existing channels and tending to level the whole." I 
 confront Captain Graham Hills with this, and all he can say is, as h& 
 does at page 1103, that he does not agree with it. Sir John Coode^ 
 whose opinion is quoted at page 1596, is of the same opinion. He says 
 this in answer to Question 17308 : " That a gale of wind of 24 hours; 
 would bring about a far greater change in the condition of sandbanks 
 and foreshores than ordinary weather of 24 months. It should therefore 
 be always borne in mind that as a rule it was to the currents generated 
 by wave actions and not to currents generated by the tide that those 
 great changes were due. Do you agree with that or not ? — That, I think, 
 related to the question of harbours --) far as I recollect the discussion.. 
 (Q.) And estuaries ? — Yes, but I do uot think what Sir John Coode was 
 referring to was that. (Q.) Sandbn^ks and foreshores — do you agree 
 with those two sentences or not ? li-e Chairman: The inconvenience 
 of putting questions in this manner is this if you refer to the bottom of 
 page 44 you will see there that it says : * Bringing together as it did 
 in a condensed form all the salient facts with regard to a series of 
 harbours.' " Mr. Nash goes on to deal with this part upon this paper,, 
 and I read the part about the Mersey estvi,. i-y. Mr. Thos. Stevenson says at 
 page 1168 that he admits the action of the winds and waves, and says 
 that sands are thereby broken up and redeposited. He is asked at 
 Question 17960 : "Take this case of water agitated by high wind and 
 passing over the surface of the sand entirely exterior to the channels what 
 is the effect of the incoming and ebbing tides upon the surface of the sand ? 
 — The action of waves has a direct tendency to keep down the level of these 
 sands ; no doubt it is an agent for preserving the level of these sands." 
 Mr. Stevenson, on harbours, on page 229 says, " The permanent accu- 
 mulation to which we have referred will be greatest where there are- 
 projections of the land to atford shelter ; but if waves get access 
 from the ocean, or if the estuary be in itself wide enough to admit of the 
 generation of waves a foot or two in height, the deposit will be to a large' 
 extent broken up and removed during high winds." Surely that is 
 conclusive. And see what the engineer, Mr. Francis Stevenson, who- 
 was called for the London and North- Western Railway Company, 
 says, at page 1779, in answer to Question 23170 ; he says, " In a 
 great storm of wind or heavy sea such as I have seen in the river^ 
 great volumes of sand will be scooped off the tops of these sand banks ,„ 
 and they will go clean over your training walls and take the train- 
 ing walls with them and put them into your channel." Yet these- 
 are the winds and waves which, according to Captain Graham Hills^ 
 will do nothing whatever in stopping the permanent accumulation and 
 consolidated form of the sand banks, all of which seem to silt up to high 
 water mark. Then Mr. Barry had said, upon page 1200, that the sands are 
 swept about with great ease by the tide. He is asked at Question 17370, 
 *' Is the velocity of the tide also very great ? — The velocity of the tide- 
 is very high indeed ; the result is that the sand is swept about with great 
 ease by the tide, and the whole of the water is charged with sand to a 
 very remarkable extent." But if I wanted any independent proof out-
 
 CriAP, XXL] The Effect of Frets on Tidal Capacity. 117 
 
 ;side these witnesses of the force of the action of the tidal water on the 
 sands, and the action of the tidal water upon the clay cliifs as proof 
 positive of what its action must l.e upon sandbanks — I can quote Mr. 
 Lyster on page 1284 upon his own report on the action of tidal waters 
 upon the clay, and I have quoted to you Admiral Fitzroy's report, Captain 
 Graham Hills' report, and Admiral Spratt's report of 1879. I do not 
 think there was any question between Mr. Lyster and myself upon such 
 :a question of fact as that ; in fact, I am bound to say that Mr. Lyster's 
 evidence, though I do not agree with the bias with which it was tinged, 
 is given fairly and honourably all the way through ; and he never 
 affected to dispute the fact of this effect upon the clay cliflfs. On the 
 • contrary, he pointed out to me with great frankness how far these clay 
 cliffs were acted upon by the tidal water, and did not confine his remarks 
 merely to the point at which the fresh river water comes close up to 
 the banks, but brought his pointer down to the eastern or southern part 
 ^of the coast where it is all coloured green, and where nothing but the 
 tidal water can reach the cliffs. 
 
 Now, note what the effect of the tidal water upon the clay cliffs is at 
 high water, when the velocity is practically nil ; yet the mere lapping of the 
 surf can erode and carry the clay cliff's down into the estuary ; how 
 much greater must be the action of the tidal water upon the sand- 
 banks, a more easily stirred material to begin with, affected too 
 when the water is at a lower level, and operated upon when the tidal 
 water is of far greater velocity. Captain Hills sacys everything is 
 covered for two hours on high tide, that is at page 1099. The 
 velocity when the banks are covered is two miles an hour ; that is 
 abundant to stir the sand. The velocity he earlier gave me at three, 
 four, and five miles an hour, that is on page 1100. At that time, when 
 the velocity is what he has given it, though the sandbanks are not all 
 covered, vast tracts of sand may be operated upon ; it is obvious, there- 
 fore, that the tidal water in ordinary weather must be very powerful in 
 .shaving and toppling over and cutting through and upsetting banks, and 
 changing their formation. Captain Hills says the flood tide runs at 3^ 
 miles an hour at Hale Head. See what his description is at page llOl". 
 The stream of tidal water running hither and thither amongst the sand- 
 hills according to the different configuration of them, rapidly or slowly, 
 according to the level. He is asked at Question 16179 : *' I suppose the 
 velocity at which the streams are described as coming in all directions 
 
 over the sandhills would be greater even than at the first ? At 
 
 different parts the rate would be diflerent. I mentioned a case 
 where, when I was steaming in my boat and could fairly hold my 
 own within a few minutes, the tide was sending me in an oppo- 
 site direction. (Q.) You have given the velocity when first the 
 banks are covered at two miles an hour ; now, you have spoken of what 
 was previously the case, namely, what occurs while the incomin<' water 
 is in process of covering the sandhills, how it starts in this direction and 
 in that direction. That would be, I suppose, at a greater velocity than 
 .two miles per hour? — No ; as it covers the sandbank it is veiy uncertain
 
 118 The Estuary Case, [Chap. xXL 
 
 if the water happens to make a rush over the higher part of the bank 
 and fill a hollow it comes with considerable velocity ; as soon as the 
 hollow is filled the velocity is gone." Then I said at Question 16185 : 
 " Must not that very fact be the cause of a number of little streamlets, 
 running hither and thither among the banks ? — Yes, running hither and 
 thither. (Q.) They run at a considerable velocity ? — Some do." That 
 all shows that you have got operating on the sandbanks in accordance 
 with the views held by all these gentlemen, whose works and evidence 
 I have quoted, tidal water even in ordinary weather acting in all kinds 
 of directions and with all kinds of forces. Then you must remember,, 
 also, that the tide falls seven feet at Garston, and eight feet at Runcorn 
 in two hours, and more than 13 feet in two hours and forty minutes, and 
 he says that at that time more than one-fourth of 710,000,000 cubic 
 yards, which he gives as the tidal contents of the estuary, has fallen in 
 that time, and he says at the end of the two hours and forty 
 minutes a much larger proportion of water in that portion 
 of the estuary has run off. Then I say that water running 
 off at that point it is perfectly obvious it is running off the sand- 
 banks at a pace quite sufficient to stir them about and alter their con- 
 figuration in a very sensible degree. But here we are talking of still 
 water. Still pledged to his theory of frets being the only means by 
 which the deposits are prevented becoming permanent, and when I con- 
 front him with Admiral Spratt he says he does not agree with him. He 
 will not pledge himself that the velocity required to move sand is the 
 velocity which is given in Mr. Stevenson's book, although the latter has 
 to discredit his own work by throwing dirt upon the table of velocities 
 published in his book, notwithstanding he knows and says that he was 
 responsible for them, and says they were intended to guide professional 
 men. But this erosion of the clay cliffs is undisputed. Now, that silt 
 which so erodes the cliffs of the estuary, and must have been working 
 hke a saw or a rasp sideways, is toppled overhead, and as it swept 
 onwards up these sandbanks along the sands comes over the top like a 
 huge river far above our training walls. What is the common sense of 
 the matter ? Is it what Captain Graham Hills, who denies this, says, 
 or what all these other gentlemen say ? I say that the conclusion is 
 inevitable — namely, that the existence of frets has never caused increase 
 of the cubical capacity or the preservation of it, and I say that the 
 stoppage of frets will not be followed by an increase m the 
 general bulk or height of the sandbanks, that the main agent of redis- 
 tribution will always remain that which it has been up to this time, tidal 
 action daily renewed at all heights and all places, and intensified every 
 now and then — and very beneficially intensified by gales. Upon this 
 theory, therefore, of the usefulness of frets in increasing the tidal capa- 
 city and breaking up and redistributing the sandbanks, the main case 
 of the opponents is built up, your Grace; and with the destruction of 
 it, which I flatter myself I have completely accomplished, their case 
 fails.
 
 CiiAP. XXII.] The Estuary Case, — Accretion. 119 
 
 CHAPTEK XXII. 
 THE ESTUARY CASE— ACCRETION. 
 
 Now, my lords, as to the question of accretion ; there are two factors 
 here : what is there to accrete, and what will be the cause of accretion ? 
 On the first question, what are the materials that accrete ? A good deal 
 hangs there. Now, to understand that, we must realize something of the 
 geology of the estuary. What is it Admiral Spratt says in his Report of 
 1880, pages 5 and 6. He speaks of a broad depression, and he says 
 this must have been the " old channel of the Mersey when the land 
 stood at a higher level, but which is now filled up everywhere with the 
 sand and debris to the level of low water and in parts even much above 
 that level, which the present condition of the tides and freshets fail to re- 
 move." That is obviously so. The land stood once at a much higher level, 
 and it has since been filled up. Whence ? Obviously by deposit brought 
 down the river, and when once the basin has been filled up to the low 
 water level and above it the regime, as we understand the regime of the 
 river, begins ; deposits are still brought down the river partly by silt in 
 the upland reaches, and partly by erosion of the cliff, but the main stock 
 of sand and silt of the river has reached the level at which the flood and 
 the ebb tide begin to act and react upon it, the flood tide disturbs and 
 throws up a certain amount, and the ebb tide throws down a certain 
 amount, and the reciprocal forces of the tides in the mams are kept fairly 
 even. That Mr. Lysler admits at page 1274, Question 18212 — he says 
 that the quantity of incoming and outgoing silt is a fixed amount, and 
 that " certain conditions of weather storms and gales of wind add tre- 
 mendously to the amount of silt. (Q.) And certain other gales take it 
 out again ? — Yes. (Q.) There is a fixed stock of silt ? — Yes, I suppose 
 there is, varying according to the condition of the weather." Now, upon 
 page 1281, Mr. Lyster thought he had misunderstood me, and he said : 
 *'I should like to explain that as I fear I may have misunderstood 
 you. What I meant by my answer and what I understood by your 
 question was distinctly the amount of silt that was contained in the 
 tide that went up the river between the rock and the opposite 
 shore of the channel of the river — you asked me if it was a constant 
 quantity and I said probably taking one tide with another and all the 
 natural circumstances that surround the growth of silt storms and so 
 on that I thought over a certain number of years the amount of silt 
 probably in the water of the tide would be pretty constant." (That is 
 what I did mean, but he thought I meant something else.) " But I did 
 not mean by that for an instant to say that there is no more silt but 
 what is held in suspension in those tides — there is sufiicient silt in the 
 Bay of Liverpool to go on depositing over the whole upper estuary so 
 as to fill it up. I was afraid that I had misunderstood your question 
 when you asked me about the constant supply of silt, but I may 
 illustrate it in this way. Assuming a spring tide and 710,000,000 cubic
 
 120 The Estuary Case.— Accretion. [Chap. XXII. 
 
 yards of water entering the river with the amount of silt in mechanical 
 suspension due to that quantity of water — if by magic when all that 
 water was in the river the whole of that silt would be suddenly dropped 
 into the river and the sea water was to retire in a perfectly pure and 
 siltless state — I do not for an instant wish it to be supposed that 
 because it has deposited that amount of silt the next tide will not take 
 in an equivalent of silt also." I never supposed he did mean it 
 for a moment. All I saj^ is that when once the regime of the river, as 
 we understand, and as Admiral Spratt says, is once gone then in a 
 general way the inflow and outflow of matters in suspension are the same, 
 and the reciprocal forces of the tide are kept fairly even. It is true the 
 ebb tide contains the proportion of 33 to 29 of the quantity of stuff" in 
 suspension as contrasted with the flood ; but that diff'erence arises, as 
 Mr. Barry pointed out upon page 1200, from detritus brought down 
 from the upland water and from tlie cliff's. Well, even with this balance 
 •on the ebb tide as against the flood tide, the floods in the river and in 
 the general cycle of unknown circumstances and conditions enable the 
 river to get rid of that balance. Now just see what we do. The river 
 now has to contend with 29 of silt coming in, and 33 being brought 
 down, we shall trap, and for ever deal with, the greater amount by far 
 of the amount brought down from the inland sources — our canal and 
 our channel would be for this a vast filtering or deposit bed of 30 miles 
 long, along the whole length deposit will take place (and I am speaking 
 BOW of silt coming down from the upland waters of the Mersey and 
 Irwell) which we shall have to take away, with this, — which 
 is a very vast amount— of course formerly the estuary had 
 to deal, our canal and the channel to this extent will be a kind 
 •of chapel of ease to the estuary, and we shall be constantly dredg- 
 ing this and carrying it away ; and that answers the dilemma which was 
 put by a noble lord two or three weeks ago, when he said some will come 
 up and less will go down ; what becomes of the balance ? The answer 
 is, It is trapped in our canal and channel of 30 miles long ; it is dredged 
 and carried away to sea. I therefore say that the first results of our 
 stereotyping the channel, walling the channel, making our canal, aid 
 maintaining all the depths when once made, both the channel and canal 
 would not be accretion, but the removal to a very sensible extent of the 
 materials for accretion — the total of the river water togetlier, that is the 
 total water coming in and out, the river water coming down, both 
 charged in their own degree and in their own kind with silt, will, 
 together, have less to deal with by all that we trap. The strain, therefore, 
 upon the suspensory power of the ebb tide will be relaxed, and the 
 silt resources of the flood tide diminished, that is to say, by all the 
 amount we so trap and dredge away the flood tide will have less 
 to bring in, and the ebb tide less to carry away. And more than 
 that, all that sand, which, according to the evidence of Mr. Stevenson, 
 the engineer, is to be brought by storms, toppling over from the 
 top of the sandbanks into our channel, which is brought from the middle 
 bed of the estuary, that we shall trap, dredge, and carry away. Therefore,
 
 Chap, XXII.] The Estuary Case. — Accretion, 121 
 
 we start with an increase of tidal capacity of 1-1,000,000 cubic yards, and 
 we shall constantly produce a recurrence of diminution of the stuff inter- 
 fering with the growth of the tidal capacity by the constant dredging of 
 our canal and channel for a distance of 30 miles ; and, being supplied from 
 three or four sources from a stock which would otherwise be an increase 
 •of the stock of deposit and silt, sand and clay in the estuary itself. That, 
 I think, must be tolerably obvious. That is our first result. A positive 
 ;.and a substantial benefit — that is a diminution in the materials of accre- 
 tion. But the training walls, they say, are to cause accretion themselves. 
 That is a deceptive term. If it means the sort of accretion which 
 goes on wherever Nature changes the channel for herself, it is true. 
 I have no doubt, though it will be a slow process, that the old 
 'Channel will silt up ; but, if it means that we shall add to 
 the total amount of deposit in the estuary, it is untrue ; we 
 must diminish it, if we do anything, for the reasons I have just given 
 — no silt will henceforth go into the estuary unless it can travel over 
 the whole 30 miles without becoming deposited ; and a great quantity 
 'of eroded clay will be stopped, because there will be no erosion by the 
 .river itself where it touches. Where the deep channel has hitherto 
 .been under the cliff at Dungeon Point, and the bend at the top ; and 
 thirdly, a great quantity of sand which only used to be tossed about 
 the estuary will be tossed into my channel and be taken out. Therefore, 
 if they say I shall accrete by adding to the total amount, not only shall 
 I not add to the total amount, but perpetually diminish the total amount. 
 But if they mean that there will be an accretion behind my walls where 
 they are above the level of the sandbanks, I admit it at once, and that 
 will be analogous to the accretion that goes on where Nature is chang- 
 iag the channel. But to say that I shall add to the total amount is non- 
 .sense. You may as well say a miser adds to the amount of bullion 
 in the country by putting sovereigns in his strong box I shall do 
 more than the miser, because he has never been accused of destroying 
 his sovereigns, but I shall take the sand and silt that come into my 
 channel and take them away, and the water which comes from the com- 
 mon stock. But leaving them out of the question and saving a certain 
 .amount of the sand being transposed by gales and the cliffs eroded by 
 gales, I want to know how do I permit or encourage the sea to hurl in 
 one extra bucket of sand — what can my training walls have to do 
 with the sand coming in upon the flood tide ? It is obvious they can- 
 not. On the other hand, how do my training walls prevent the ebb tide 
 ■carrjdng down anything that it would be disposed to carry down ? Will 
 the flood tide ever know that my low training walls are where they are 
 going to be as it sweeps some 20 feet above them, and will the ebb tide 
 .be in the least degree more sensitive ? Certainly not. Where we cross 
 ;the bed of the existing channel we shall leave the tidal water to fill up 
 the bed of the existing channel, as the tidal waters fill it up now, 
 when Nature has left it a disused channel, gradually, b}'' shoving off and 
 stumbling about the cubical contents of the higher banks into it. This 
 will be very gradual, no doubt. Mr. Fowler told you that so gradual has
 
 122 The Estuary Case, — Accretion. [Chap. xxil» 
 
 it been upon the Tees, that even the old disused channel of the Tees has 
 hardly yet silted up in all these years. The process will be slower than 
 the old natural process for this reason : that where Nature unassisted had. 
 got the channel to change, changed it — she had got at her disposal for fill- 
 ing it up all the contents that she was tossing out of the new channel.. 
 Nature now will not have the contents of the new channel to dispose of ; 
 we shall take those away to sea once and for all ; therefore the process 
 will be slow. The old channels, too, are the only spots at which we are 
 seriously above the level of the sand, even there we are below the level 
 of the neighbouring sandbanks — by that I mean that supposing you take 
 any point where we cross the old channel you may see there the walls are 
 15 or 16 feet above the bed of that old channel — as a matter of fact you 
 will see sandbanks in the neighbourhood as high and higher than our walls, 
 so that we are only above any unusual depression of the sandbanks even 
 at points like that. 
 
 Lord NOKTON : Do you argue that the effect of the channel will 
 be perpetually to reduce the cubical contents of the estuary — no accretion 
 but constant removal ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : No accretion but constant removal — by cubical 
 contents of the estuary, I do not mean the cubical capacity of the 
 estuary. 
 
 Lord NORTON : It will be pei-petually doing it ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER: Yes, for this reason— that every ton of sand borne 
 by a gale of wind swept across the estuary and tumbled into my channel, 
 I shall dredge away and carry it all out to sea for the purpose of 
 maintaining my channel, as the regime of the river now involves only a 
 certain amount of sand and silt to deal with, except that brought down 
 from the upland reaches, or that which is caused by the erosion of the 
 cliffs, and as I shall stop the one altogether, the general stock of silt and 
 sand together to be dealt with by the estuary, or the flood, or ebb, will 
 be smaller than it is at present ; and even that small amount I shall 
 dredge away, and eventually get rid of altogether finding its way into my 
 channel. 
 
 Lord NORTON : So that the estuary will be perpetually deepening ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : The estuary will be perpetually improved. 
 
 Lord NORTON : Deepening ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Deepening means improved ; it seems to me 
 demonstration ; I can see no answer to it. We do liot interfere with 
 the sweep longitudinally of the tidal area up or down the estuary, as you 
 see the sandbanks will be far above the level of our training walls, 
 supposing in gales, and by the transverse action of the wind and wave, 
 any amount of sand is tambled sideways into the channel, I shall take 
 that away for my own sake, and every ton that is taken to sea is a ton 
 taken out of the general fixed stock of silt and sand in the estuary. For 
 that reason alone, unless I increase it in some other way, there must be 
 constantly a recurring benefit to some degree or other caused to the 
 estuary by my works ; then there is a constant benefit now by the abso- 
 lute withdrawal of the silt coming down from the Upper Mersey into the
 
 Chap. XXII.] The Estuary Case. — Accretion. 123- 
 
 channel, and which I shall take out in some way, by the prevention of 
 the erosion of the cliffs by the withdrawal of the fresh water channel 
 from the sides of the cliffs where we impinge upon them now. Supposing 
 my channel were in the middle of one of these distorted sections ; sup- 
 posing any of that alpine ridge tumbles into my channel, I dredge it out 
 and take it away, and there is so much less of the alpine ridge left, and 
 it will go on from year to year and cycle to cycle. I was just about to 
 say that where I was in any degree seriously above the level of the 
 sandbanks, it was where I crossed the old channel — behind my walls no 
 doubt there will be accretion, and indeed the old channel will be filled up 
 exactly in the same way as Nature fills it up now, only it would fill more 
 gradually. Their model is very misleading, because it shows a great red 
 ridge above the sand all the way along, which is not the fact. Mr. 
 Harcourt was perfectly fair to us ; he said on page 1186, " Your walls are 
 only slightly above the sand banks on the whole " — that is in answer to 
 Question 17207. Mr. Vernon Harcourt was right when he gave that 
 evidence, but since then they have been cut down several feet, so there- 
 fore his answer would be modified in our favour. My challenge to the 
 opponents to disprove the fact, that except where we cross the old 
 channels we were only a mile and six furlongs above the levels of the 
 sandbank, which is given at page 1140, comparatively early in these 
 proceedings, has never been taken up. Now just see what that one mile 
 and six furlongs is. What is it ? The little narrow strip or ridge across 
 the longitudinal section of that estuary which might be represented by 
 the width of the narrow part of the wand if you laid* it across the 
 channel. There is a little bit across the estuary where it might accrete. 
 Supposing my walls accreted outwards, as they have done upon the Lune, 
 how much would it represent ? But the accretion can only come by 
 transposition from some other part of the estuary of the stuff needed to 
 form the accretion. In fact, it will be a cliff going in to fill up a valley. 
 Mr. Vernon Harcourt was useful to me in his book on tidal rivers ; he 
 tells me this on page 236 : " This may be sometimes accomplished by 
 low training banks which, whilst directing and concentrating the latter 
 half of the ebb, do not materially impede the admission of the flood tide 
 of the estuary. Where the estuary is very wide and irregular and the 
 main river channel through it is very tortuous and shifting, high embank- 
 ments may be formed on each side widening out towards the sea, and the 
 land behind them reclaimed," so that in very wide estuaries there would 
 always be high training walls, and he says that low training walls do not 
 materially afiect the passage of a flood tide. Moreover, this little dis- 
 tance of 1 mile and 6 furlongs, at which we are above the level of the 
 sandbanks, is only gained, as Mr. Lyster said at page 1279, by counting 
 a very excessive height down to an inch. I said to him : " You under- 
 stand what I mean if I say I have counted every inch ? — Upon a scale 
 of that kind 40 feet to the inch it would be impossible to get so low as 
 an inch." When I tell you that our walls are above the level of the 
 sandbanks you must remember that in some places it is so trivial that 
 you would not know it. What sort of accretion could be caused by walls
 
 124 The Estuary Case, — Accretion, [Chap. XXII. 
 
 like that ? "Wherever any Httle accretion, which I admit to the full, 
 ensues behind a piece of upstanding wall, it would be sand or silt bor- 
 rowed from some neighbouring sand hillock. That is perfectly obvious, and 
 through the whole of the literature upon the subject I can find no hint 
 -ever given that under any circumstances low training walls caused dan- 
 gerous accretion. Every writer or thinker upon the subject has gone 
 upon the opposite assumption till the evidence given in this case. Mr. 
 Barry is particularly clear in our favour. At page 1207, Question 
 17470, he is asked : " Let me see if I understand the way you put it. I 
 understand you to say that in your opinion low training walls being 
 constructed as proposed by Mr. Leader Williams will lead to sandbanks 
 being formed up to the level of those low training walls ? — No, I did not 
 say that I said where they are above the present level of the sand, accre- 
 tions will take place behind them, but where they are below of course it 
 will not." Kecollect that the evidence of Captain Hills is to the effect 
 that our training walls are going to cause the whole of the estuary to 
 silt up to high water. Mr. Barry, recollect, contradicts that. 
 
 That being the opinion of Mr. Barry, a very first-class engineer, we 
 are told upon the other hand by some of those gentlemen, notably 
 Captain Graham Hills, that our walls will cause accretion up to high- 
 water mark. Consider the height above the walls to which this brings 
 -accretion. Mr. Thomas Stevenson, the river engineer's evidence, which 
 is given on page 1153, is all given upon the assumption that we are going 
 to raise our walls. He says in answer to Question 16794 : " You must 
 raise your wall to keep the sand out," and then he is asked, "You must 
 keep your wall perpetually above the sand? — Yes." The answer is, 
 We will not ; we cannot by the frame of our Bill. We shall dredge 
 instead, and the very toppling over which Mr. Stevenson suggests, as 
 the other Mr. Stevenson did, shows how the tidal water acts upon the 
 sands and throws them about. What else will make the sand topple 
 over into the channel except the transverse action of the tidal water 
 agitated by wind and wave ? Mr. Lyster, I believe, though not 
 unnaturally, did not think the toppling over would be anything but 
 trifling. However, it is obvious common sense that it is so, and that 
 disposes at once, if Mr. Barry is to be trusted, of any notion that there 
 will be any accretion at all caused by our training walls where they are 
 below the level of the sandbanks than where they aj-e above the level 
 •of the sandbanks. The only accretion that can be caused is the accre- 
 tion achieved by the toppling of the sands from the high level to the 
 .little places behind the walls. 
 
 Where, I want to know, is there the slightest evidence that the 
 low training walls have ever brought about accretion ? There is 
 nothing whatever about the subject, that is to say, the training 
 walls which are below the level of the sandbanks. On the Dee, 
 or the Lune, or the Tyne, a perfectly different method has been 
 pursued. When I cross-examined Captain Hills upon the subject 
 ■of the accretion behind the training walls, I suggested what is the ditfer- 
 •ence between my method and that of the Dee, the Lune, and the Seine.
 
 CiiAi-.xxlL] The Estuary Case,— Accretion, 125^ 
 
 He does not think there was much of a difference, but on page 1139, 
 much to my astonishment, he admitted point blank that the only river 
 that referred to the case before you was the Tees. It is in answer to 
 Question 16613. I was referring him to other rivers, and he said he 
 was referring to the Seine more particularly. He is asked at Question 
 16609, "This is quite another thing? — They had either to submit to 
 the shore slipping over the walls where the accretion stopped or raise 
 the walls. (Q.) But the Seine has got high walls has it not now ? — The 
 greater part of it or a great part of it. (Q.) Is there any river you 
 have mentioned which has not got high walls ? — I have not mentioned 
 any river in particular. (Q.) I thought you had mentioned a great 
 many? — I referred to certain rivers which your side mentioned. (Q.) 
 That is mentioning them ? — I have given the Tees which is the only one 
 which appHes to the case before the Committee." Can you have any- 
 thing more positive than that ? I say there has been no accretion upon 
 the Tees. Mr. Fowler's evidence was very precise. " The Tees is the 
 only river that applies to the case before the Committee." There has 
 been no accretion upon the Tees. What could be more precise than Mr.. 
 Fowler's evidence upon that point ? 
 
 Then you will not forget the double set of training walls upon the 
 Tees — the high ones being the outside of the estuary and the lower 
 ones running through the middle — the high ones are for the purpose of 
 embanking land and filling it up, and it is now filled up with the accu- 
 mulations of various works, but the low training walls to gui^e the channel 
 are the walls which are in point in our case, and with respect to 
 which we say there has been no such accretion. Mr. Fowler denies 
 over and over again that there has been any accretion, and he 
 says at page 662, I have made a careful examination, and at 
 Question 9870 he is asked, "What has been the result of your examina- 
 tion ? — The result of the examination was to find the sandbanks lower 
 at the reclamation training walls than they were in 1853. There is very 
 little difference in the middle in the seal sand there and no difference 
 upon the other side — the result is that the cross sections are rather 
 deeper than they were. There is no difficulty in proving what the sands 
 were because the Admiralty surveyed the Tees in 1853, and they 
 took soundings throughout the whole estuary from high water to 
 high water, and those soundings are marked in figures upon the plan, 
 the original of which is at the' Admiralty, and a copy of which was given 
 to the Tees Conservancy Commissioners, and they paid the cost of 
 making a manuscript copy of it so that the state of the estuary at the 
 present time, and the state of the estuary in 1853 can be found exactly." 
 Then he says that he has made a survey upon the question before. Then 
 he is asked at Question 9869 : "Have you made a survey both of the 
 foreshore and of the estuary during the last few months ? — I have been 
 over the whole estuary." He says distinctly there has been no accre- 
 tion whatever. Now the only contradiction of Mr. Fowler is the impres- 
 sion which Captain Hills says he got from a casual eye glance. He says : 
 " I went down. I took no surveys, but I saw the place and I saw a place-
 
 126 The Estuary Case, — Accretion, [Chap.xXII. 
 
 ivhere there was accretioni There may have been some little transposi- 
 tion of stuff from one point to the other fretting is thrown in occasion- 
 ally. It may be it was a lump of fretting which he saw. but Mr. Fowler 
 examined the green growth which deceived Sir Frederick Bramwell 
 last year." At Question 9871 he was asked : " At any time during the 
 whole of this period of time 30 years has there been to your knowledge 
 any period in which the estuary has sustained damage either from 
 accretion or transposition ? — No. In 1829 or 1830 Captain Hewett 
 made a survey of the Tees and there were differences between Captain 
 Calvert's survey in the higher parts and the survey of the higher parts 
 of the estuary by Captain Hewett. The south side of the estuary is not 
 movable, it is soft mud with marine vegetation." No doubt that is what 
 Sir Frederick Bramwell saw both last year and this, but they knew their 
 case last year about the Tees. Captain Graham Hills must have known 
 that he thought the Tees one of the rivers in point, but no fresh evidence 
 is offered to you except the casual glance of Captain Graham Hills and 
 Sir Frederick Bramwell's casual glance, which he took in both years. 
 No fresh evidence is offered as to the accretion. No local men are brought 
 to say we know that there has been accretion, or who have taken surveys, 
 and we know there is no evidence whatever suggested. Yet surely some 
 might have been deduced. I say, therefore, that the evidence is perfectly 
 strong given by Mr. Fowler, who is the very best person to know about 
 the Tees, and who has had it in charge for half a generation. There is no 
 contradictory evidence that there has been no accretion caused by training 
 walls upon the Tees. 
 
 Captain Graham Hills sums up his evidence upon this point at page 
 1074, in answer to Question 15816. He says : " I venture to put it as 
 strongly as I can to their lordships that there is no instance anywhere of 
 an estuary trained through walls like that without the training being fol- 
 lowed by silting." Then follows my cross-examination, and I challenged 
 him to give me an instance of low walls forming an accretion. Then 
 he immediately put the Seine upon me, and I pointed out an essential 
 difference. I asked him whether there his instances are not instances of 
 high training walls, and then he says, at the close of all, that the Tees 
 is the only river in point, and there has been no accretion in the Tees, 
 neither has there on the Clyde, as the Rivers Pollution Report shows you. 
 But before I leave that point I should just like to show you one or two 
 things which were stated in Mr. David Stevenson's book, which bear 
 upon this point, as to whether such walls as these will cause accretion. 
 He says, speaking of the Dee, first : "It will at once be seen that the 
 works constructed in the process of land making as carried out on 
 the Dee were totally different from the low water training walls which 
 I have described. The system pursued is in fact in direct opposition to the 
 principles of river engineering which have been laid down, and the result 
 as has been seen has not been favourable to navigation at all events in 
 the case of the Dee." Then he says further on — " The change pro- 
 duced on the relative levels of the low water and the banks by the 
 depression of the low water line described at page 250 have sometimes
 
 €iiAP. XXII.] The Estuary Case, — Accretion, 127 
 
 led to considerable misapprehension. This lowering of the surface of 
 the water when the river is confined by walls in the lower part of an 
 estuary invariably conveys the impression that a great rise has taken 
 place in the level of the adjoining sandbanks, and it has consequently 
 been thought that the erection of river walls is inconsistent with the 
 principle of non-exclusion of tide water which I have been advocating. 
 But leaving out of view for the present the enormous gain to the navi- 
 gation by the increased scour due to the enlargement of the channel 
 as explained at page 224 it can be shown that even the increase of the 
 sandbanks may be greatly misunderstood and exaggerated." Then he 
 says this, which is very strong, giving a number of illustrations 
 — he says : " From all these considerations I infer that the 
 efi'ect of river walls upon an estuary is mainly to prevent the con- 
 stant disturbance of the materials of which the banks are composed, 
 but not necessarily to occasion additional accumulations," and then he 
 goes on to say that people had made a mistake about the Lune, but that 
 I do not care about. Then he says this, speaking of the increasing scour : 
 ■** Such a result may indeed be expected for it is difficult to conceive 
 in what way parallel walls formed in an estuary can operate either in 
 bringing down additional alluvial matters from the river above or in 
 l)ringing up additional detritus from without the bar. Holding these 
 views and supported by the actual observations made in the case of the 
 Lune I therefore conclude that the tendency of works executed in accord- 
 ance with the principles laid down is not necessarily to produce additional 
 accumulation of matter, but simply to alter the disposition of the existing 
 materials of which the bed of the estuary was originally composed." That 
 is what I have been struggling for all along. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN: Those are Mr. Stevenson's general views, not 
 applied to a particular case. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Certainly not, but my view of the present case is 
 based upon the antecedent assumption that nothing has been shown to 
 lake the Mersey out of the general law. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : I understand your point. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : What was the use of citing a number of inapposite 
 rivers. Take the Dee. The purpose of the Dee was not to avoid reclamation 
 — they began with transverse groynes, many in number, the ordinary 
 result of accretion, of course, took place behind those such as one may 
 see at groynes anywhere along the south coast ; then they put longitu- 
 dinal ties and cross walls or high cross walls. Now take the Seine which 
 leads me to one of the last points. If you look at the Seine there are 
 •enormous tracks of the inner estuary cut off in loops by training walls. 
 Take the first, the largest brown patches ; you see the training wall begins 
 over the " H " in Havre where the accretion was, and touches the green 
 on the other side ; in other words a large loop of the estuary was cut off 
 by the training wall and formed a bed for silting, and not only cut off by 
 a training wall, but by a liigh training wall, and there was an enormous 
 loss. You did not see also there that the action of the ebb tide was altogether 
 Mopped, because one of the training walls goes up to the point over the
 
 128 The Estuary Case, — Accretion, [Chap. xxii.. 
 
 word " tideway" at the north side ; so that the action of the ebb tide was 
 lost there, and the action of both tides was lost to a large extent. You. 
 see also where the cross walls are on the Seine above Berville. The accu- 
 mulations there which are so much loss to the estuary must not be con-^ 
 fused or confounded with any apparent accumulations lower down. 
 You recollect the training wall will always be standing up above the 
 level ; they were raised at once above the level and raised from time to- 
 time in lieu of dredging ; that is the main distinction. There is an. 
 essential difference in our method and extent. The Seine has a 
 drainage area of 30,000 square miles ; the Mersey has only a drainage- 
 area of 1,700 miles. See what happened : There was an enormous 
 amount of space over which the water used to expatiate ; it was intended 
 by an enormous scour to clear the reaches below Rouen, and set up a 
 scour by the river itself. They never dredged the river below Rouen where 
 they confined it within training walls. They never took the stuff out ; 
 they left the river to take the stuff out, and the consequence was as no- 
 dredging was done, that instead of excavating a trained channel and. 
 carrying its contents to deep water, they let the river Seine scour itself, and. 
 the consequence was transportation of this sand to the lower reaches of the 
 river ; it caused great accumulations, and has been causing them up to* 
 this time in the lower reaches of the river ; but once done that is over. 
 In fact, making an artificial channel in the Seine was exactly what was 
 not done ; it was a huge artificial fret, it was a channel scooped out hy 
 the river itself assisted by these two training walls for about 90 miles — tO" 
 such an extent was this scooping carried on by the river itself, that ships 
 which draw 20 feet of water can now go up to Rouen, where before that- 
 took place only ships drawing seven feet of water could go up. Con- 
 ceive what a transposition of stuff there must have been there making all 
 that difference in the navigable capacity of the river. Of course you 
 mast expect enormous accretions lower down ; you will not find those- 
 accretions with us, because we carry them down to the sea. Captain Hills^ 
 evidence is clear that there they depend upon the scour. He says that 
 on page 1078. But as it is the main entrance from the sea the naviga- 
 tion up to Rouen is untouched by any accretion, as Captain Graham 
 Hills admits at page 1124. It is not that it is the approaches to Havre 
 which may have been damaged, but the main entrance from the sea up 
 the river is untouched, and unharmed, according to the evidence which 
 we have got. Therefore, the result upon the Seine* that the main sea. 
 entrance is untouched gives you a not untoward indication about the 
 Mersey ; but a good indication, namely, that it may be done without 
 harming the sea approaches. The truth is that if the approaches to 
 Havre were threatened, which we deny, it would not be to the point. 
 Havre does not represent Liverpool in its position on the Seine. The 
 approaches to Havre do not represent Liverpool bar, nor do they repre- 
 sent the channel up the Mersey to Liverpool. Havre is round a corner ;, 
 it is, so to speak, out of the great fairway of the Seine ; Havre is much 
 more like what Formby would be upon that map ; it is Formby 
 not Liverpool — it is recessed out in the sandbanks near the " M " \m
 
 CiiAP. XXII.] The Estuary Case, — Accretion. 129 
 
 Manchester ; that is the position of Havre. In scouring itself out, and 
 being tra^ined, but not dredged, the Seine has sent down, it is possible, 
 large quantities of detritus to Formby, so to speak. There is an 
 enormous quantity of freshwater comes down the Seine, and, no doubt, its 
 power of propulsion is extremely great ; but it has not done anything with 
 the detritus and sand, we shall do because we take it out of our bed and 
 dispose of it ourselves. Moreover, the training walls on the Seine end 
 where the river is very wide. Captain Graham Hills admitted the width 
 of the estuary across there as 8 kilometres, five English miles. If 
 you look at No. 28, which is in the appendix to M. Vauthier's 
 Keport, you will see the channel keeps varying very much in the same 
 ■way as the channel of the Mersey varied during that period repre- 
 sented by what I have so often called Admiral Spratt's skein of serpents, 
 what you have had going on between the termination of the training walls 
 and Havre is exactly what you have had going on up to this time in the 
 Tipper reaches of the Mersey, namely, constant fluctuations of the channel 
 frets and therefore tranpositions ; therefore I am not in the least degree 
 surprised to find Captain Graham Hills saying, if you look you see the 
 deep water channel has varied further to the east or west, or north or 
 south, and the people of Havre are afraid that their approaches are 
 being damaged. If it were so, the approaches to Havre, if they were 
 damaged, would not be damaged by the training walls that have been 
 put into the river, for the improvement of the navigation up to Rouen, 
 but by the vagaries which the river still indulges in in consequence of 
 having the power of indulging in the vagaries now over an estuary five 
 miles in width. M. Vauthier's undisputed figures show that the forces of 
 the second moietie have increased upon the whole from 126,000,000 in 
 1853, to 192,000,000 in 1875. The training walls may have really 
 improved in the main, the river by the scour, and the concentration of the 
 channel, but the variations of the channel below the training walls having 
 gone on in the same sort of way that they have gone on hitherto in the 
 Mersey, may have caused transpositions, though not accumulations, 
 which may have caused the fears of M. Vauthier and the people 
 •of Havre. But nothing of that kind will go on with us, because 
 at Liverpool there is nothing of the sort; the channel does not vary 
 below Liverpool now in the same sort of way that the channel varies 
 below Berville, and our training walls cannot make it vary. Our train- 
 ing walls will intensify the present efi'ects, keeping it straight. If the 
 present conditions of the river and the Birkenhead narrows and Liver- 
 pool Docks are sufficient to keep a good fine deeij-water channel from 
 Liverpool out to the bar, we say that the prolongation up the river will 
 have the same class of cause as the narrows and dock walls and quays 
 •of Birkenhead and Liverpool ; therefore we shall have a prolongation of 
 the same effect as we have a prolongation of the same class of cause. It 
 is not true to say that the works in the Seine were stopped because they 
 were dangerous to Havre, that is not stopped in the sense of being half 
 done as the Mersey Commissioners may stop my works if they 
 are proved to be injurious. Havre got frightened in 1864, and they pro- 
 I
 
 1 30 The Estuary Case, — Accretion. [Chap. XXII. 
 
 tested against them, but they were completed down to Berville. Discussions 
 have been going on as to whether there shall be further prolongation, and 
 at present the decision seems to be to go no further than Berville, but 
 they were not stopped in their original intention in 1864. M. Vauthier's 
 exhaustive work upon the subject is in my favour — you will find a 
 resume of it upon pages 1133 and 1134. I will not read it all to you, 
 because it is very long, and you have it in your mind ; but he winds 
 up with the declaration that funds will never have been more worthily 
 expended, or in a manner more largely remunerative, than upon the pro- 
 posed works in the Seine. He was writing in 1881, and to show that he 
 does not merely refer to events before 1875, I notice on page 1132 he 
 refers to the memoir of 1878, in answer to Question 16572, and most 
 distinctly we read what he had said only a year or two ago, showing that 
 he had not changed his mind since he wrote his pamphlet in 1881. It is 
 no use calling that gentleman a partisan ; Captain Graham Hills intro- 
 duces him. He had a funny notion that he was entitled to read a little 
 bit of his report — his opinion is before you — and it is an opinion of great 
 weight, and we know the deductions it contains which are eminently 
 favourable to the works in the Seine. 
 
 But now I want to ask this question : If M. Vauthier is wrong, if he 
 is a partisan of Havre, if in spite of being a great engineer with a great 
 reputation to maintain, he not allowed his partisan feelings to warp 
 him ; if the works in the Seine are really a gigantic error, and a warn- 
 ing, why has no competent French engineer been called to say so ? 
 Last year we were threatened with a great French engineer, as we were 
 this year — he never came ; this year the same thing is done — this year 
 a sort of apology is given, the condition is appended to the threat, 
 " If the Government will let him come he will be produced " — that 
 condition is obviously ridiculous. Are there no great engineers in 
 France who are not Government engineers ? Are there no great 
 engineers in France untrammelled by Government fetters? If not 
 our opponents knew that last year perfectly well, and as they knew last 
 year they could not call him last year ; they knew still better this year 
 they could not call him this year, but we actually could have introduced 
 them to an eminent French engineer, not subject to official fetters, we 
 could have pointed him out by name, we could have told them he was a 
 M. de Coene, well known as a public man in France. > If they had any 
 difficulty in finding him, we could have told them that they need not look 
 further than behind Mr. Aspinall's chair in this room. We could have told 
 them that for several days we saw the gentleman occupying that enviable 
 position, and we could have said his then place of residence was the Charing 
 Cross Hotel ; and if you ask who was paying his hotel bill, there would have 
 been no very great difficulty in discovering ; and we are now 
 able to tell you that one of our principal witnesses, Mr. Marshall 
 Stevens, had the pleasure of travelling with him back to France ; 
 but he was not called. Now, I say, as far as my memory goes, 
 we heard nothing about official trammels last year, and it is ridiculous to 
 say that it would not have been easy to have called a French engineer
 
 Chap. XXII.] The Estiiary Case, — Accretion. 131 
 
 this year. Nobody who knows the Seine is called — nobody who could 
 speak at once with authority, and with a sense of responsibility, is put 
 into the box to tell the story of the Seine. In the meantime I have been 
 presented with M. Vauthier. I did not present him myself. He, with the 
 interests of Rouen at heart, no doubt, but with the facts of Havre fully 
 before him, with vast knowledge to apply, and with a great reputation to 
 maintain, declares, on a review of the whole subject, that funds can 
 never be more worthily expended by France, nor in a manner more 
 largely remunerative. 
 
 I have before me now one of the reports presented to the English Parlia- 
 ment — H.M. Consular Report of 1884, which treats of Havre, Rouen, and 
 the Seine, which says the docks at Havre are being largely increased because 
 longer vessels, which means larger, are using them, and there is not a 
 hint throughout, though the commerce of Havre is said to be increasing, 
 that there is any complication in the nature of decreased approaches to 
 Havre, or anything of the kind, or damage from the works in the Seine. 
 
 With regard to the Ribble and the Lune less has been said and less 
 need be said. In the first place the silt m the Lune is stated by Mr. 
 Stevenson to be 70 to 30 upon the Mersey, and they have done no 
 dredging, just as they did not do any upon the Seine, or need do none ; 
 but the total amount of accretion up to 1851 was three millions at the 
 time when the accretion and scour had balanced, and since then the total 
 is five millions, showing a balance of accretion of two milHons in 30 years — 
 this has taken place in 30 years, whereas he told us there was no scour since 
 1851, though he did up to 1851, and for all I know the scour and accre- 
 tion may balance now. These works are in a comparatively undredged 
 river where the bank has burst, and the river fretted, a rubbishing work 
 altogether, where the training wall — which, like those in the Seine, 
 stops the action of the ebb tide — was only two miles long, and cost 
 £7,000. Of course if they first leave the channel to scour itself, and 
 then to keep itself clean, with the river carrying down silt more than 
 twice as much as the silt in the Mersey, such a river as that will do their 
 business for them, especially if, in consequence of a breakdown of the 
 works, they let the river wander as it used to wander before. 
 
 As to the Ribble, Mr. Stevenson says there has been a certain 
 amount of accretion — he let us know none of the circumstances. We 
 know that reclamation was always contemplated in the Ribble. We 
 know how strong clauses were inserted in the Act of Parliament, as to the 
 disposal of the reclaimed lands, but with regard to the Ribble he let this 
 important fact drop out. On page 1159, and, I believe, that is the 
 last bit of evidence I shall ask you to look at, at 16894 he is asked : 
 "There is some other unknown factor which influences the bar ? — Cer- 
 tainly a storm of wind influences the bar and causes grave variations. 
 (Q.) We are perfectly clear upon this matter, but if you materially 
 diminish the quantity of water which passes over the bar and its velocity 
 you will injure it ? — Yes. (Q.) There is a large quantity of silt which has 
 to be carried out of the estuary ? — Yes. (Q.) If that is not carried out 
 there will be an elevation of the banks ? — Yes. (Q.) I understand there
 
 132 The Estuary Case. — Accretion. [Chap. xxii. 
 
 is in all your works which are scheduled here and others of which you 
 have given us a list the beneficial action which resulted from the works 
 which you have constructed ? — Invariably and where there was a bar 
 generally speaking the bar was improved but only temporarily. (Q.) In 
 any of your works have you injured the bar ? — I really can hardly answer 
 the question. I can tell you that in the case of the Ribble the result of 
 our works was to improve the bar, but it has fallen off since ; I do not say 
 from what cause whether it is accretion or not, but it has gone back 
 to what it was before ;" he winds up by saying at page 1160, in answer 
 to the two Questions 16910 and 16911 : " None of the works that I have 
 carried out there or elsewhere," he says "they range over three or four 
 whether there has been accretion or not have ever injured the bar."" 
 That is at page 1160. The truth is, that when our channel is once made- 
 the estuary will have very little to do, and we shall stop up a heap of silt 
 coming down from places above Throstle Nest. We shall stop up all the- 
 silt arising by erosion between Manchester and Runcorn, that is» erosion 
 on the banks of the canal itself. We shall, to a considerable extent, 
 stop the erosion on the cliffs on the estuary, by withdrawing the channel 
 from fretting other places. We may do something by pitching the 
 river banks, as the Ellesmere Port people have done, and as Liver- 
 pool ought to have done long ago, and by fulfilling the earliest 
 wishes that Admiral Spratt expressed over and over again, in his reports 
 about the erosion of the clifi"s, and we shall prevent the channel itself at 
 any state of flood or ebb rubbing down its own sandy side and contributing 
 to damage on the bar. Now, as it is, the flood tide water of the estuary 
 which is charged with sand and silt, with heavy and light matter, of 
 course drops the heavy matter first, so that, as what Mr. Lyster dredged 
 out of the docks is principally light flocculent matter, the contribution of 
 the flood tide to the upper reaches must be principally this Hght flocculent 
 stufl" — a very slight motion keeps such stufi" in suspension, though it 
 falls in the Liverpool Dock where there is absolute quiescence, and as 
 it is the rule with Mr. Lyster that more of the light matter falls at high 
 water at Liverpool, though it is sand, it will fall at high water with us.. 
 I pass that by. But with the contribution of the heavier matter we 
 deal, and the light flocculent matter is at first raised above the river from 
 various multitudinous sources, most of which we shall most distinctly cut 
 ofi". What will be the extent of the change that we shall work in the 
 purity of the water in respect of the amount of matter in suspension is- 
 uncertain. Mr. Stevenson, upon page 306 of his book, says, *' When a 
 river channel has been thus fixed and confined by walls, I have ascertained 
 by repeated observations that the tidal water covers up the channel in a 
 comparatively pure state, instead of being loaded with particles abraded 
 from the sandbanks and marshes. It has also been found that the: 
 process of deposit at the sides of an estuary so improved goes on very 
 slowly after it has reached a certain stage, for the material deposited 
 on the upper parts of the banks are, as afterwards more particularly 
 described, exceedingly fine, and are carried only by the highest tides 
 which seldom reach those elevated portions of the shores." Mr^
 
 CiiAP.XXll.] The Estuary Case,— Accretion. 133'. 
 
 Fowler, at pages 686 and 687, says he notices the same fact upon the 
 Tees. Here, upon totally different grounds, we have the strongest 
 reasons to suppose that so far from causing accretion, we shall 
 sensibly cut ofl' the materials for accretion, and shall benefit the tidal 
 capacity in two or three other ways — we shall increase the height of 
 the tide. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE ESTUARY.— GENERAL CONCLUSIONS. 
 
 Mr. Leader Williams says the training of the channels will' 
 increase the height of the tide at Runcorn — that is upon pages 524 and 
 525. Mr. Abernethy supports him upon page 624, and so far as I 
 know, that important fact is not cross-examined to. We shall 
 increase the tidal capacity by lowering the low-water line, which is 
 a converse operation, and increase the range of the tide in the opposite 
 direction — lower the low water and raise the high water — more will 
 run out and more will come in. Mr. Leader Williams puts the increase^ 
 I believe, at spring tide at 8,500,000 cubic yards. Mr. Fowder says, at 
 page 672, a greater amount of tidal water will be brought in through 
 lowering the low-water line. Mr. iViessent expresses the same fact by 
 that diagram of the wedge of water. Mr. Brunlees says both the 
 volume and velocity of the ebb will be largely increased. Mr. Giles 
 confirms all this, and estimates the addition at 2J per cent, of all the 
 tide flowing above Garston, and Mr. Stevenson admits it upon page 
 1157, Question 16854. There he held that the beneficial effects of 
 the works would be first to depress the level of the low-water line, 
 which is a matter of great importance, and secondly to increase the 
 range of tide, and to this you must add the 1,500,000 cubic yards, for 
 which the tidal part of our canal up to Latchford will be a new re- 
 ceptacle which is shown upon the top. Captain Graham Hills, on the 
 whole, puts our increase as 14,000,000 cubic yards, and in putting it at 
 that point does not take in any cubical contents of the channel below low 
 water, yet that 14,000,000 is to do no good, though 5,800,000 cubic yards 
 of the fret did so much good. Those advantages are stated by Mr. Stevenson 
 to be very great, on pages 224 and 225 of his book, and no doubt they 
 are : " The lowering of the low, water line and consequent flattening of 
 the slope or inclination acts beneficially both on the tidal j^^'opagatioji and 
 the scour. As regards tidal phenomena, it will be found that in all rivers 
 whose beds and low water lines have been altered the rate of tidal propa- 
 gation has been increased and the duration of the tide in the river has
 
 134 The Estuary. — General Conclusions. [Chap, xxill.. 
 
 been prolonged to the benefit of navigation, as will be explained hereafter 
 when we treat of rivers that have been improved. It will also be found 
 that the scouring power has in some cases been enormously increased, and 
 made to act in the most beneficial way for the channel, a result which in 
 river engineering can hardly be over estimated. In order to illustrate 
 this it is only necessary to point out that the mere cubic contents dredged 
 from a ford or shoal form no measure of the gain of tidal water due to the 
 operation." So that the 14,00i>,000 cubic yards that we shall add will 
 form no measure of the benefit we shall confer. Now contrast our 
 giving the 14,000,000 cubic yards with the loss of the 17,000,000 cubic 
 yards of tidal capacity during the last 20 years. 
 
 Now, a subsidiary point is the termination of our training walls, and a 
 question was asked of Mr. Vernon Harcoart by a noble lord, as to what 
 he had to say upon that subject. Upon that subject Mr. Eads' evidence 
 is very instructive. Mr. Eads said, I terminated my training walls 
 upon the Mississippi at a certain point. There were croakers there who- 
 told me as sure as fate that the end of my training walls, the moment 
 the velocity ceased, up would start a bar — he says, so far from that, 
 those prognostications have been absolutely unrealised, and sailors tell 
 me you can feel the force of the current of my training walls 25 mileS 
 out to sea. What I want to show is this — there will be no adverse con- 
 sequence from my training walls stopping where we do between the end 
 of my training walls and the narrows — if Mr. Eads' training walls were 
 sufficiently powerful to shoot the stufi" right out straight to sea, and had 
 the effect of being felt for 25 miles away, the force of the tidal water 
 coming down my training walls is sufiicient to keep the thing going 
 until you get it taken up by the narrows in Liverpool ; and then, when 
 you cannot get it taken up by the narrows in Liverpool — all that is- 
 beyond the narrows in Liverpool has the same causes to act upon it, 
 and the same class of consequence to be followed by that action 
 after our channel is made, except that our channel will be a plus 
 to the effect of the narrows in Liverpool. Mr. Vernon Har- 
 court limited his objection to our training walls that we did not 
 take them far enough, but he forgot that the narrows take us up far 
 out towards the bar. It is not as if we were training the river for 
 the first time only to a certain point ; we are training it beyond the point 
 to which now it is in one sense trained — trained, partly by nature, which 
 has created the narrows, partly by Birkenhead and Liverpool and the many 
 dock walls, so that there is a tail to the head of the existing training. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN: Mr. Eads says: " If the proposed works of the 
 canal company were carried out in the estuary very serious and injurious 
 results would follow them, both as respects the entrance over the bar at 
 the Queen's Channel and as respects the entrance to the Liverpool Docks 
 and the docks at Ellesmere Port and Garston." 
 
 Mr. PEMBEE, : That is what Mr. Eads was brought to say. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Your argument was this, that because he gave his 
 opinion of what happened with his bar in the Mississippi, I thought you 
 gave it as a parallel case to the case here.
 
 Chap. XXIIL] The Estitary. — General Conclusions. 135 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Mr. Eads makes the statement in examinatlon-in- 
 •chief. That is what he is brought here to say, and he may think so, but 
 -when I cross-examined him I did not expect to cover the whole case 
 -with him. I get a certain fact, that whereas before he trained his works 
 -the pilots said they could only detect the Mississippi water two miles from 
 the mouth, they say they can detect it 25 miles now out at sea. Now I say 
 this, that if the action of the Mersey stream under its present circumstances, 
 narrowed as it is partly by the Liverpool Dock Works and the Birkenhead 
 Works and the Narrows, is sufficient to keep the bar down where it is ; 
 my training walls placed within it, artifically or naturally narrowing, 
 as the case may be, can only act as an additional factor in the same 
 direction, and will do something of the sort which Mr. Eads' training 
 walls did on the Mississippi. I do not expect to get rid of Mr. Eads' 
 opinion. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : Where is his answer ? 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : At page 917. He said croakers told him that the 
 Tesult of his training walls would be to create a bar, and he said they 
 had not. On the contrary, says he, as a matter of fact, the Mississippi 
 ^ater used to be detected only two miles from the shore, now it can be 
 detected 25 miles out at sea. 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : This was a change from one channel of the Missis- 
 sippi to another. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : Nobody said it was not? — The question is this — was 
 it trained or not, and was the effect after it was trained to ^oot the Missis- 
 sippi water with greater force out to sea or not. The answer is. It did. 
 At page 931 he is asked : " Before we leave the Mississippi works I would 
 ask this. You said that the opposers of your plan declared that a bar 
 would form below your jetties ? — Yes, beyond them. (Q.) That has not 
 occurred ? — No, not to any appreciable extent. (Q.) And therefore their 
 prophecy that you would have to extend your jetties indefinitely has not 
 been fulfilled ? — That is true." I call Mr. Eads to contradict Mr. Har- 
 court. Now conceive an enormous volume of water that is thus, by our 
 channel, intensifying the velocity of the tidal action in quantity and quality 
 coming, but in reserve of what Liverpool and Birkenhead and the Narrows 
 -do now — conceive an enormous volume of water thus directed upon the 
 bar 710,000,000 cubic yards in addition to our 14,000,000. If bars are 
 ever kept open by water from tidal estuaries, then there is no force com- 
 parable to that amount of water brought to bear upon any bar at the end of 
 any other estuary in Great Britain. The Tees is kept open with 
 20,000,000 cubic yards. The Tjne is kept open with 25,000,000. 
 The Liverpool bar is a small affair. Captain Grraham Hills gave a 
 description of it ; he said : The 9 feet depth is only 100 yards through, 
 and within a quarter of a mile each way, going to and from Liverpool, 
 there is 20 feet of water. You will find the reference to that at page 1063. 
 From that point inland, he says, you get deep water up to Liverpool — 
 there is no doubt of that. Is it not a crying shame that with so small 
 an obstacle to get rid of, the large Atlantic steamers, close to the port, 
 .should have to wait about outside upon a lee shore, as Mr. Hornby says
 
 '136 The Estuary. — General Conclusions. [Chap. XXIII. 
 
 they have to do ? If the Mississipi and the Danube bars have been 
 removed ; if the minor mineral ports upon the Tyne and the Tees can 
 get rid of their bars, ought not Lancashire to be ashamed of the Mersey 
 as it exists now ? The Mersey with 40 times the import and 
 export trade of these minor ports put together, when you find that 
 £200,000,000 is the money value of the foreign trade of Liverpool, and 
 d617,000,000 is the money value of the Tyne ports ! And let me remind 
 you that this is only taking credit for Liverpool, and leaving out Garston 
 and Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Widnes, and Warrington. With such a 
 trade as that to conduct, and to preserve, ought not the people connected 
 with the Mersey to be ashamed of the condition in which the Mersey is 
 left when they see what these minor ports on the Tees and Tyne have 
 done ? Is the Mersey to be the only unimproved and unregenerated river ? 
 Is there any special circumstance in the nature of the Mersey, which has 
 been shown to you, which can warrant an affirmative answer to that 
 question ? Is it to be left unregenerated and unimproved, and possibly 
 to ultimate decay ? It is not for want of exhortation that the Mersey 
 Dock and Harbour Board do nothing. Mr. Rennie and Admiral Spratt 
 have both reported, as you heard, upon the work of improvement 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : Mr. Rennie has never done anything. You asked 
 the question whether Mr. Rennie had reported, and several days after- 
 wards I told you that we had found a letter sent by Mr. Rennie to the 
 Dock Board, asking for employment, in which he made some suggestions. 
 
 Mr, PEMBER : If you do not like the term " report," I will not use it. 
 Why I used the term " report " was because I find in this paper 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL ; It is not on the notes ; it is not in evidence. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : It is produced. 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : No, it is not produced ; I said that as you asked for 
 it I would give it to you privately. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : For what purpose ? 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : It is not evidence before the Committee. 
 
 The CHAIRMAN: What does it come to? You say Mr. Rennie 
 reported, and Mr. Aspinall says he did not report. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : What is the difference between sending a thing called a 
 report and reporting to the Dock Board ? 
 
 Mr. ASPINALL : It is not on the notes. It was given to the other 
 side in the way I have described, and it is now in their possession, 
 because Mr. Leader Williams asked personally and privately, as a favour, 
 to have it left with him. 
 
 Mr. PEMBER : An official letter was sent to the solicitor of the Dock 
 Board calling upon him to produce the report. If this is given to me, for 
 what other purpose can it be than to use it ; but, however, I will leave it. 
 Admiral Spratt urged the work of improvement, and said most distinctly it 
 would be an economical work, and it ought to be carried out. 
 
 In conclusion, I would ask your Grace is it not obvious that when 
 a vast new interest springs up at Manchester, such as will be created by 
 the existence of this canal and channel, that the initial step in the com- 
 plete regeneration of the Mersey will have been taken ? We shall not 

 
 'Chap. XXIII.] The Estuary. — General Conclusions, 137 
 
 injure the bar, tliat we know perfectly well ; but do you suppose that 
 we shall not take an interest in the bar, and that we shall not be anxious 
 to improve the bar apart from any question of having injured it ? When 
 Lancashire has spent £7,000,000, as I hope she will be permitted to do, 
 in perfecting Manchester as a port, she will want to make it as perfect 
 in every respect in its seaward approaches as well as in everything else. 
 Our opponents may call us, if they like, adventurers and enthusiasts, 
 though, I think, I have proved that we are neither one nor the other ; 
 b>ut with regard to this question of the bar, the only hypothesis worth 
 •contemplation is the canal made, the millions spent, and the proprietors 
 of the completed undertaking the representatives, to a very large extent, 
 of the fortunes of Lancashire. 
 
 Now in pledging such a company as it will then be, and in pledging 
 ;such a company as I ask you to incorporate, to co-operate in main- 
 taining and improving the bar, as I do most solemnly — I pledge, 
 not the provisional committee that asks for the Bill, powerful and 
 influential and wealthy as that provisional committee may be, but I 
 jDledge the vast corporation or the trust into which it will go. I pledge the 
 Lancashire that will be behind it, with its industries, its wealth, its bold 
 find intelligent sense of self-interest. Let this canal once be made, and 
 the new life once kindled in the mills, the foundries, and the workshops 
 of Lancashire, and we will soon stop all maunderings over the bar ; there 
 ;shall be no bar left to maunder over. Do you suppose that Lancashire 
 cannot do what has been done by Newcastle and Middlesb'oro'. If Liver- 
 pool wants, as is suggested by Admiral Spratt, piers perdu, or breakwaters, 
 or what not, we will co-operate with her, we will act with her. Perhaps, 
 if the need arises, and she. proves sluggish, we will force her hand and 
 make her act with us. We make no secret of it, none at all. Our 
 present works will enable us to use to the full the river as it is ; but we 
 want the river better than it is, and we will shrink from no develop- 
 ment of the capacity of the river, and acknowledge no finality. 
 The Mersey Conservators know this well, we have told them 
 so. They know it well, and we are desirous that your Grace 
 should know it too. An attempt has been made to say that the 
 work will be expensive beyond measure, and I am not enabled 
 now, I suppose, to quote this report or statement of Mr. Rennie 
 upon the subject ; but inasmuch as Captain Graham Hills cited it, 
 a-nd said that Mr. Rennie had stated that the work would cost five 
 millions, I am entitled to say, too, that I have read it through, and 
 the only item of expense that I can find is £156,000, and Admiral Spratt 
 supports Mr. Rennie by saying that what he wants done to improve the 
 bar would be an economical structure. Now, I say w^e shall consider that 
 ;any sort of structure, even if it costs a good deal more than Mr. Rennie 
 suggests, which really makes the entrance to the Mersey an admirable 
 entrance, economical, unless it costs a fabulous sum. We are willing to 
 <50-operate — not we, as you treat us now ; but we as we shall be when 
 this canal is brought into existence — a powerful corporation. We pledge 
 ourselves now to co-operate in anything that may be required for the 
 
 K
 
 138 The Estuary. — General Conclusions. [Chap, xxili. 
 
 improvement of the Liverpool bar ; and if there be the slightest pre- 
 tence for saying that any works of ours have deteriorated the 
 bar, or have prevented its improvement, we will frankly and fairly 
 let it come for argument before any Parliamentary. Committee sitting 
 upon a Bill for granting powers to carry out such a measure, and if it 
 is proved that we ought to give more than Liverpool in proportion 
 to the traffic we carry, or in consequence of the effect of our works, 
 let Parliament say that we shall pay in that proportion. The Mersey Con- 
 servators know this well ; and do you imagine that the Mersey Conser- 
 vators, as has been hinted, are either reckless in this matter or 
 that they are ill advised. They are neither one nor the other. Admiral 
 Spratt is an eminent man in his profession, and an accomplished man of 
 science, and he has had this scheme before him now for more than two 
 years, and for more than one year the Conservators have had the further 
 advice of Sir John Coode, who is facile princeps in this branch of 
 marine engineering. Do you suppose that a word has been uttered 
 in evidence this year or last year of which the Mersey Conservators 
 or Sir John Coode or Admiral Spratt has not known ? They have the 
 right to be here opposing this scheme, if it is a rash and evil one, and 
 they are not here. The Conservators of the Mersey have a right to 
 know what is going to be done in the Mersey under the Act which I 
 read to you. They are not here and they were not here last jear, 
 though they have carefully studied our plans. They have looked at all 
 the circumstances, they had considered all the contmgencies, and they 
 deliberately and elaborately arrange matters with ourselves. What does 
 their absence show ? What does their agreement with us show ? They 
 show satisfaction and confidence. Against that satisfaction and confidence, 
 which surely I venture to say might be supposed to sway you, what is 
 there to sway you ? Which will you have, that or the unreasonable fears, 
 not unalloyed with commercial jealousy, of Liverpool ? Will you have 
 the novel and paradoxical theories I have endeavoured to dissect, or 
 will you take old established theories which for the moment they attempt 
 to supplant ? Will you take the inconsistent and fantastic objections 
 of the opponents, or take the judicial acquiescence of such a body as 
 the Mersey Conservators acting under the dispassionate and unbiassed 
 counsels of two such men as Admiral Spratt and Sir John Coode ? 
 
 Surely! surely! my lords, I am entitled to be somewhat confident 
 in this matter. Upon the whole surely it is a crisis in which the issue 
 ought not to be seriously in doubt. Great necessities are proved, and 
 great destinies are shown to be imperilled, and greater elements than 
 my poor powers of exposition have been able to explain to you are at 
 stake in the commercial interests of England. The contest is one of 
 resolution against timorousness, of energy against apathy, of progress 
 against inevitable retrogression. Your lordships will not be slow to see 
 this ; and I leave with all confidence the determination in your hands. 
 
 My lords, thus comes to a close for the present, at all events, the 
 severest piece of professional labour that I have ever undertaken. I am 
 almost ready to hope that I shall never have so heavy a one again.
 
 €iiAP. XXIII.] The Estuary. — General Conclusions, 139 
 
 Perhaps you will think that some part of the labour I have gone through 
 is self imposed, but I was anxious, so far as my poor powers allowed me, 
 to do justice to this vast case. I wanted to be able to say, if I may 
 venture to repeat an old story, what Hyperides, the Athenian advocate, 
 said to the Athenian judges when he drew aside the veil of Pliryne : 
 *' At least I have shown you what you are asked to destroy." 
 
 The Committee here adjourned to deliberate, and on returnim/ made the 
 folio wincj announceme^it : 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : In a matter of such importance it requires con- 
 siderable time to look over the evidence and speeches ; therefore we 
 shall not come to a decision to-night, but meet to-morrow morning, at 
 11 o'clock, when we shall discuss the matter amongst ourselves and give 
 •our decision when we have come to a conclusion. 
 
 (^Adjourned to to-morroiv, at 11 o'clock.) 
 
 DECISION OF THE COMMITTEE. 
 
 WEDNESDAY, THE 23ud MAY, 1884 
 (BEING THE 41st SITTING- OF THE COMMITTEE). 
 
 The CHAIRMAN : The Committee are of opinion that it is expedient 
 to proceed with the Bill, subject to the insertion of a clause ofiered by 
 Mr. Pember, prohibiting the commencement of the works until live 
 millions of money has been subscribed or issued. 
 
 riUNTED AT THE GUAKDIAN OFFICE, WAKRINGTON.
 
 
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