66 The prosperous were well supplied with carriages, waggons, trucks, and all that comes within the meaning of railway stock," the poor companies had as little as they could help, and made up for the deficiency by unacknowledged borrowings; so that, altogether, the interests which should, for mutual and public good, work most harmoniously, clashed in a manner that could be pleasing only to the lawyers of the disputing companies. The solution of the litigious maze was found in a plan derived from that of the city clearing house, which was carried into effect under the auspices of Mr. Glyn and Mr. Hudson. On the 2nd of January, 1842, the system of the Railway Clearing House came into operation on the railways extending from London to Darlington in one direction, and from Manchester to Hull in another. It was adopted, at subsequent periods, by the companies whose railways extended from Darlington to Carlisle, Sunderland, Hartlepool, and Scarborough; and from Birmingham to Gloucester, Birkenhead, Liverpool, Fleet · wood, Lancaster and Manchester. And in a few months it will be in force in all the railways included in the area defined by a line passing from London through Gloucester, Liverpool, Fleetwood and Glasgow to Edinburgh; and returning by Berwick, Newcastle, Scarborough, Hull, Yarmouth and Cambridge, to the metropolis; or, in other words, in all the narrow gauge railways in Great Britain lying north of the Thames, with the exception of the few short lines which are beyond the limits of the area just described. The main principles of the system thus widely diffused, are first, that passengers shall be booked through at all principal stations, and conveyed to their destination without change of carriage; that the horses and cattle shall likewise be sent through without change of conveyance, and that goods shall, in the same way, be carried through without being either shifted or re-assorted. Secondly, the companies respectively shall pay a fixed rate per mile, for such carriages and waggons not their own property, as they may use; and a further sum per day by way of fine or demurrage for detention, if kept beyond a prescribed length of time; and lastly, that no direct settlement shall take place between the companies in respect to any traffic, the accounts of which have not passed through the railway clearing house. In order to work out the clearing principle, there are sent daily from each of the clearing house stations (including all the principal booking stations of every line, forming a part of the railway union), 1st. A return of the passengers booked through. 2nd. A return of the horses, private carriages, and cattle booked through. 3rd. A return of the parcels booked through. 4th. A return of all the carriages, waggons, &c., which have arrived or been discharged either loaded or empty. From these returns the accounts of what is due to and owing by each company is made out at the clearing house, and after being examined and approved by each company, the final settlement of the accounts is effected by the railway clearing, paying, or receiving the balances, as the case may be, through the hands of the bankers, who act as agents to the several companies. In this way all the transactions of one company, with all other com panies, amounting frequently to many thousand pounds a week, are cleared weekly by a sum seldom exceeding a few hundred pounds. The means which the clearing house possesses for having each vehicle reported from the moment it leaves the parent line until it returns to it, and the plan adopted of charging mileage for stock used, and demurrage for stock detained, have put an end to the practice before referred to, of borrowing from neighbours to supply an improper deficiency in carrying vehicles. From these returns, for the year 1845, we find that 517,888 passengers were each conveyed through an average distance of 146 miles-the average length of the lines travelled over being forty-one miles, so that each passenger travelled over four railways on an average, and must have passed three junctions or points of conveyance -to accommodate these passengers, 59,765 railway carriages and 5,813 trucks, carrying private carriages, were sent through. There were also sent through in the same year, 7,573 horse boxes, 2,607 post offices, and 180,606 goods waggons, besides waggons conveying minerals, of which no record is kept at the clearing house. There are other circumstances connected with the clearing house, which render it a most valuable institution. The control is vested in a committee, composed of all companies who form part of the union. Their meetings tend to produce harmony and also uniformity in their respective arrangements, and to impose a check on the disposition to introduce diversities of system, which, for some motive or other, railway managers have so often evinced.* Mr. Morison's pamphlet on Gauge Evidence. Vide also the work, by Mr. Samuel Sidney, on the same subject. PRICE OF LABOUR AND MATERIALS IN INDIA. Average amount of Wages and Prices of materials on the spot. Cost of excavating to an average depth of twenty Ditto 90 Chunar stone (Calcutta price) each eighteen inches square and two inches thick, per score Tiles, eighteen inches, per hundred Teak, in plank six inches thick (Calcutta price) per ton Piles per hundred (pan or roof) Cost of conveying materials by land, per ton, per mile Ditto by water, exclusive of loss of interest and insurance 2 10 09000000 5 10 0 15 0 0 0 0 3 0014 |