BOOKS.
FRANCIS'S HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH RAILWAY.* THElistory of railways has various branches, all interesting, and, considering the short time since the rail has practically come into use, rich in remarkable facts. There is the scientific portion, alike interesting for the length of time during which the prin- ciple was in use on a small scale, and the neglected proposi- tions for its extensive application, the objections, futile as it turned out, that were made by men of science to its practicability, and the engineering difficulties encountered and overcome. There are the finance and statistics of the subject, perhaps the most curious of the whole if the whole were fully put before the mind, in the total cost, the entire mileage, the actual material, earth as well as iron, stone, and timber, used or displaced, and the Parlia- mentary oppositions made to be bought up. The speculation, gambling, and swindling, are combined with the personal, and form the most titillating part of the whole story. Satire and fiction have been far outdone by the littleness in great people, the sordid baseness in nobility, the dishonesty and cozening in respectable men, and the avaricious madness and purposed fraud in vast masses of the people at large, which this branch of the subject would unfold, from the period when the landholder first made his position a plea for extortion, to the barefaced " swindles " of 1845, or the better veiled frauds of a later period.
Mr. Francis has undertaken to do a little with each of these branches,---and indeed with something more than these branches ; for he begins with the Roman roads, and rims through the middle and later ages, till he gets to the sera of stage-coaches with their ten miles an hour including stoppages. Any part of any subject which requires knowledge in the writer, or attention in the reader, Mr. Francis eschews ; confining himself chiefly to such bits of the his- tory as would tell in an article or a newspaper paragraph. The scientific questions at issue in any stage of the subject—the en- gineering skill, resources, and it may be said invention, displayed in overcoming difficulties rated a priori as impossibilities, and the gradual manner in which experience removed such supposed obstacles as curves and inclines—are not for Mr. Francis. He can tell a fact or two, and turn a period about such a matter as Chat Moss ; but his mind wants depth and the richness in acquirement neces- sary for this section of railway history. The story of the length of time that tramways had been in use for the conveyance of coals from the pit to the vessel—the various projects started by dif- ferent persons for applying railways to horse locomotion, and the number of tramways actually laid down for this purpose by act of Parliament, with the propositions made to establish railways upon the present, plan, are all very fairly displayed and clearly impressed upon the reader. The strongest point of Mr. Francis, however, is the more gossipy and anecdotical feature of the subject, —how this company had to "make arrangements" with senators to get its act ; notices of the lives of some leading men connected with railways ; the broad story of the Parliamentary and other efforts of the principal lines ; with accounts of the different bubbles and panics that have distinguished the railway -world, short as it has been in existence. In narrating these things, Mr. Francis does not aim at a complete history, and he could not have attained it had he tried. He picks out from statistics, history, report, or bio- graphy, just enough to answer his purpose of making a readable book : and in some of its stories approaching the scandalous, the narrative would have looked better -had he quoted lis authorities and mentioned names.
The mind of the gossipy raconteur remains with Mr. *Francis ; his manner is changed. The author has aimed at a high style of rhetoric applied to a theme for which rhetoric is ill adapted. He has chosen Macaulay's brilliant and balanced style for the story of the stock exchange and the " navvies" and has only managed the model without themerits. However artificial Macaulay's style may be, however much he may sacrifice truth to mode of statement, and however ill adapted his ornate composition may be to the sub- ject which it should present and not alter or overlay, still the workmanship is the best of its kind, and consistent with itself. Mr. Francis is not a master of diction. His phrases are full of sound, but his alliteration or antithesis is not always distin- guished by accurate meaning. Thus, he speaks of the editor 'of e _Banking Itragazine as being " too practical not to detect the ab- surdity which lurked in articles [that is, puffs] with more poetry than propriety,"—which is neither poetical norproper. The fate of merit and discovery in this world, -like the fate of goodness, is a puzzle to philosophy. Some men are like jackals —they discover, they pursue, they toil ; and, just as they have seemingly succeeded in running down the game, in comes the lion, and, without so much as thanking his provider, pounces upon the Whole. When men speak of the origin of railways, they always refer'to the Manchester and Liverpool ; yet that merely followed in the wake of the Stockton and Darlington, which in fact was opened before the Manchester got its -bah Mr. Francis, in his mingled re- flections and descriptions, somewhat adumbrates his meaning, but the following passage is curious for its facts.
" The great importance of the Liverpool and -Manchester line has east a shadow on that of the Stockton and Darlington; the former is ever looked to as the great starting-point of the modern rail, and practically this is true. hi itthe public was appealed to, and responded ; it-was 'a public 'trial, a • A History of the English Railway; its Social Relations and Revelations. R120-11,15. 13y John Francis, Author ef "" The Bisturrefthe'EaZhel 'Enfield." he. Published by Longman and Co. public announcement to the people that a new power was to be exerted far their benefit. It WWI made with public money; it was opposed and sup- ported by public men - it-was to all intents and purposes the first public line. When the latter was projected, the proposal was limited to the con- veyance of coal and other mineral products : its cost and capital did not ex- ceed 250,0001., although its extent 'was forty miles. But looked at in a higher point of view, it 88811III03341 different appearance : it was'the first line which tested the great continued power of the locomotive ; it was the first railway which witnessed the public delta of the great mind which projected it ; it was the first railway which really showed how much between two towns, the personal intercourse of which was trifling, facile and cheap com- munication would increase that intercourse. Its act of incorporation was obtained in 1821, it was opened in 1826. its promoters had only antioipated the carriage of 10,000 tons per annum; they had not thought of passengers; and the locomotive appeared incapable of acquiring the regularity require by such traffic. They began their work, therefore, with animal power. Prior to the formation of this railroad, there had been a coach traffic of four- teen or-fifteen persons weekly; the rail increased it to five or six hundred. Foeh carriage was drawn by one horse, bearing in ordinary cases six pas- sengers inside and from fifteen to twenty outside; `in fact,' says one writer, they do not seem to be at all partioalar, for m cases of urgenoy they are seen crowding the coach on the .top, sides, or in any other part where they can get a footing; and they are frequently so numerous that when they descend from-the coach and begin to separate it looks like the dismissal of a small congregation! The general speed with one horse was ten miles an hour. Another advantage conferred on the neighbourhood was in the unjust fact that the Stockton and Darlington Railway were assessed in the amount of their net income, and paid in some parishes half the entire rates. In addition to the social advantages which accrued from inereased communica- tion—and who shall doubt the fireside union, the social pleasure, and the domestic happiness it conferred ?—was the development of commerce, and the increased importance of the various places through which it passed. A new trade in lime arose ; the carriage in lead was enormously reduced in cost; the price of coals fell from 18s. to 8s. 6d. ; the landholders received large sums for gravel, timber, and stone, taken from their estates. An ob- scure fishing village was changed into a considerable seaport town. The Stockton and Darlington Railway turned the shopkeeper into a merchant, erected an exchange, gave bread to hundreds, and conferred happiness on thousands."
In marry oases Mr. Francis is turgidly. eomplimentary. Among others, Mr. Hudson comes in for his panegyric : if we believe Mr. Francis, there never was such a victim to circumstances as the Napoleon of the North. The panegyric, however, not only proves too much, but seems to know too much for-an unbiased critic. Who would have supposed that the present age had got hold of -a Maecenas and a Man of MASS both in one, and that one the oi- devant Mayor of York? yet so it is—at least Mr. Francis says so. "The mental and moral nature of Mr. Hudson, as proved by deeds whidly never meant to be known, cannot be specified, is as necessary to a conception of his character, as a record of his public acts is necessary to his career. He did great good by stealth ; he availed himself of his riches to assist the needy ; he has helped scores of persona through improvident or unfortunate under- takings; he has made loans to many without the slightest prospect of rey- ment. The widow—it is a bold assertion—never appealed in vain ; and the orphan rarely left him unrelieved. To literary men he was peculiarly and especially kind. The poor clergyman—and, to our shame, there are too many such—found in a fast fiend; poor artists—and they form toe numerous a class—were never forgotten. With a well.founded case ef dis- trees the most thorough stranger was rarely, if ever, denied. Much of his munificence, like that of an Abraham Goldsmid, was spontaneous. Many a one has been benefited who never knew from whom the favour came. Many an embarrassed family has been relieved who never saw the almsgiver. He has made speculations in grain, and told his agent to give the profit away, if profit there were ; he has bought shares, and directed his broker to hand the gain to others, if gain accrued ; he has maintained in credit many who must otherwise have beenruined. Where a ten, or twenty, er even a fifty-pound note would relieve the affliction 'of individuals or soothe the distress of fami- lies, it was unhesitatingly given. Of such the cases are legion. Nor was an application always necessary. Without an appeal, but from natural good feel- mg, he has directed paymonts to be made to many. whom he thought required it-; he has purchased res in the market and given them to those whom In thought were deserving. Of the laboring comminsity he was the sincere friend., and instanees are not wanting of some who, now holding an elevated position, owe it entirely to Mr. Hudson. Those around him partook of his kindness. It needed no intereesaion of others, and no interferenee of their own, to pro- cure a pecuniary advantage. It is a pleasure to record that bis houeehold servants were not forgotten in the allocation of Lis benefits. "Nor was it in money matters only that his disposition was shown. 11 he were offended, he always tried to forget it If any one transgressed, he was always willing to forgive. His chief failing, and it is a remarkable thing to -assert of such Amen, is the leniency of his disposition."
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