A great deal of suffering and hardship is bound to
be caused among small Irish investors, annuitants, societies and charities with a little capital by the failure of the Free State Railways to pay any dividend on their ordinary stock. The interest on the guaranteed prefer- ence stock is only paid by drawing on the compensation fund provided by the home Government after the War to settle claims arising from control during the War. There are so many familiar points in the dreary story that it forms a serious warning for us here. There was the pre-War security of these investments, the compulsory amalgamation on similar lines to the amal- gamations of the English and Scottish railways ; there was the huge increase of wages in a " sheltered " industry and the same objections to reducing them ; there is the same demand for reduced fares and freight charges ; the same competition with growing road transport and the same general decrease of business.
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