United Kingdom. Some charge for their services
nearly twice as much as others. The Great
Eastern charges more than twice as much as the
Caledonian for carrying a first-class passenger
a hundred miles. Of forty-two of our companies,
the fares now range from a halfpenny to
three-pence-halfpenny a mile for first-class travellers;
from a halfpenny to twopence for second class; and
for third class from a farthing to three-halfpence.
An excursion train on the Great Western to
Plymouth, takes passengers at the rate of fifty
pence the hundred miles; on the South Eastern
to Ramsgate, the charge for the same service is
twenty pence the hundred miles. The prime
cost, direct and indirect, of carrying a first-class
passenger a hundred miles being only sixpence,
fares are charged which compel trains to run
with an average of only a tenth of the number of
passengers they are capable of carrying, and
with a third or a quarter of the loads that could
be taken with no appreciable addition of expense.
The dearest line to travel on, Carmarthen and
Cardigan, charges four hundred and fifty per cent
more than the North and South Western, the
line with lowest fares. And it is a notable fact
that this line with lowest fares pays a dividend
of six per cent to its shareholders, while the
North London, also a line of cheap fares—
three-farthings a mile for first class, and less than a
halfpenny for second although it was ten times
as expensive to construct as an ordinary line,
enjoys also the rare distinction of paying a
dividend of six per cent.

Let us see what happens when railways contest
with each other for possession of some
line of traffic. At the time of the Manchester
Art Exhibition, a contest between the London
and North-Western and Great Northern
Companies enabled Londoners to go to Manchester
and back for seven-and-sixpence for first class,
and for second class five shillings. The whole
expense of each train so run was fifty guineas,
and the average receipts from each were one
hundred and seventy-four pounds. The contest
lasted during the summer months, to the very
great advantage of the public; and a half per
cent was all the fall in the railway dividend.

The quarrel in the years 'fifty-two and 'fifty-three,
between the South-Eastern and Great Western,
for the London and Reading traffic,
lasted about a year and a half. To a distance of
sixty-seven miles and back again, passengers
were conveyed during all that time for three
shillings first class, and two shillings second
class. On other parts of their lines, those com-
panies were charging ten times as much: yet,
where the fares were lowest, there was an
average profit of two hundred and fifty per cent
upon the cost of running every train. Again,
ten years ago, the Edinburgh and Glasgow and
the Caledonian lines quarrelled and took
passengers by all trains from Edinburgh to Glasgow,
forty-six miles, for fares of one shilling, nine-
pence, and sixpence, being one-eighth of the
former charges. The Caledonian paid only a
half per cent less dividend; yet here was not
only a reduction of fares to one-eighth, but also
a division of the traffic between two contending
lines. Under the present system of fares, an
ordinary passenger train may be compared to a
four-horse coach carrying one passenger upon
each journey.

On the Bombay and Baroda Railway, where
the gradients are very favourable, and a single
engine can draw heavy weights, the average rate
of fares for all classes is two shillings the hun-
dred miles, or one-sixth of the average rate in
England. In Belgium, when the railway system
of that country was planned, the government
undertook that it should be managed exclusively
for the public convenience, as neither a burden
nor a source of revenue, and the fares were
fixed at less than a penny a mile for first-class
passengers. The Belgian Minister of Finance,
M. Rogier, resisted the adoption of the English
system; for, he said, "whoever holds the railways,
holds a monopoly, and that should only be
allowed to exist in the possession of the State,
subject to the responsible advisers of the Crown."

On our railways, as they are, there are made
in a year about two hundred and ten million of
journeys, the payment for which is about fifteen
millions sterling. For conveyance of goods we
pay to the railways about seventeen millions
sterling, at rates varying from twelve and
sixpence the hundred miles for a ton of stone
or manure, to thirty-seven and sixpence for
the same conveyance of a ton of cotton goods.
For a hundred tons of coal or coke, the
average rate of charge is over a pound a
mile. The cost price of that service is only
one-and-fourpence; and, as the price of coal
at the pit mouth is about a fourth of what
we pay in London, if railways were managed
with an eye to public benefit, even with three
hundred per cent profit on the railway carriage,
coal could be sold in London at ten
shillings a ton. The Midland Company stated
in evidence on this subject, that after they
had brought coal from Derbyshire and
Nottinghamshire at a charge of six shillings a too, a
toll of two shillings a ton was levied on it by
another company for crossing over the lines to
Kensington Basin. A Committee of the Society
of Arts on the Small Parcels Post, found that
a parcel sent from Land's End to John o' Groat's
must be transferred through nineteen separate
conveying interests, from each of which inquiry
must be made in event of delay or loss. Sometimes,
a company forming a link in such a chain
of conveyance, in feud with a neighbour or for
other causes, checks general transit by a prohibitive
charge. Feuds there may well be, for these
companies are heavily taxed by conflicting interests.
Four lines were, at the outset, proposed
from London to Brighton, and the parliamentary
expenses of their contest for one year amounted
to a hundred thousand pounds. "There were
about twenty counsel engaged, headed by six
king's serjeants and king's counsel; there was a
regiment of twenty eminent solicitors, flanked
by a whole brigade of parliamentary agents, and
a whole army of surveyors and engineers, whose
chief business appeared to be to contradict each