between that station and every other with
which it has had dealings during the week,
both inward and outward. These abstracts
are checked at the clearing-house, the
outward of one station against the inward of
another: discrepancy sheets being issued to
the stations for explanation, whenever any
difference arises. At the end of the month,
division sheets, showing the month's total,
and each company's proportion, between
every station and every other between which
traffic has run, are sent by the clearing-house,
together with a general balance-sheet,
to each company, showing how much the said
company is debtor or creditor to clearing-house.
These sheets are examined at the
audit offices, and any inaccuracies that may
be discovered, are corrected in a subsequent
month. The same rule as regards division
applies also to through passenger traffic.
But, in several cases, where the traffic is of
importance, and competition between opposing
lines would be hurtful to both sides, a
compromise is effected, and the whole of the
traffic, by each route, between the points in
question, is massed together by clearing-house,
and divided between the competing
parties in certain agreed proportions, without
reference to the mileage labour performed by
each.

Of such a nature is the Octuple agreement,
which affects a large proportion of the
through Scotch traffic. Such also is the
Ten Towns' Agreement, which affects several
of the principal towns in Yorkshire and the
Midland Counties. Were it not for such a
protective policy, the competition between
rival lines would reach a point, pleasant,
indeed, to the public in general, who have a
fondness for low fares, but ruinous to
shareholders and detrimental to the welfare of the
lines concerned.

We cannot conclude our notice of railway
machinery better than by devoting a few
words to the means in operation here and
there for polishing and brightening it up at
the conclusion of its daily labours, when it
might otherwise lie by and rust. At
Worcester, the other day, Mr. Sheriff, the general
manager, presided at the inaugural ceremony
for opening a literary institution and schools,
for the benefit of the officials at that station,
and their children. There is a flourishing
institution at Crewe, in connection with the
railway there; there is another at Derby; and
there are various others scattered up and down
the country: still they are not nearly so numerous
as they might be, if the persons, for whose
benefit they are formed, would but heartily
co-operate, and seek that assistance which
both directors and heads of departments are,
as a rule, quite willing to render, if the
matter be only set about in a proper way.
We have a literary institute on the P. and B.
line, but it is not in a very flourishing
condition. However, any one who had an
intimate acquaintance with the railways twelve
years ago, will acknowledge that the
intellectual progress made in the interval is far
greater than might have been reasonably
anticipated.

     HOW THE OLD LOVE FARED.
                           i.

ONE morning the sun shone gloriously
from his blue home in the skies athwart a
few pale yellow clouds. Then its rays fell
disheartened and cold on some two or three
hundred yards of murky atmosphere,
beneath which lay a "rising town."

The streets were something narrow, and
the houses were curiously jammed, and had
a permanently blackened look; but what
they lacked in size or beauty, they compensated
for in number. Seafaring men stood
talking in groups at the corners of the
crossings. Every pair of trousers in the
place was more or less daubed with tar;
and some of those who wore them were fine
stalwart specimens of the Saxon race, with
bullet head, bull-dog neck, handsome
sunburnt face, and crisp flat yellow curls. Small
boys of five years old wore their fathers'
sou'-westers. One jostled another as he
passed along the street; another young 'un
was climbing up a coast-wall, in a sort of
fly fashion, inserting his toes in invisible
chinks, and holding on by projections not to
be discerned by ordinary eyes. He fell more
than once, and from a fair height too; but
rose nothing daunted, and doggedly
recommenced the ascent. They all wore a reckless,
self-reliant air, and were, I suppose, of the
proper stock to make British sailors. Even
the less respectable of the women who were
wrangling among the men, differed strangely
from the faded worn-out objects who are
daily placed before the magistrate in our
London police courts. Their laughter was
loud, their voices deep, their limbs massive.
Very virile indeed they looked, and were.
Further on to the right, some stupendous
works were in course of construction. Thews
and sinews were to be seen there, such as
only England produces, toiling doggedly and
perpetually. Steam-engines of various forms
and uses were toiling also .after their fashion
—here to pump water in, and there to pump
water out. Besides these, there were some
hundreds of big horses dragging enormous
loads, calmly, as if they were quite used
to the engines, and cared less than nothing
about their noise. They were of the sort
of animals foreigners are so much smitten
with when they see them in the dray-carts
in London, very carefully tended; many of
them were gaily ornamented with ribbons,
plaiting of hair, brass settings, and the like,
according to the taste and ability of the man
who looked after each particular horse. The
works themselves were well worth an exami-
nation. The workers were pushing out groins
and breastings which must have astonished
the sea as they gradually forced it out of its