DIAMOND HARBOUR RAILWAY

AND

DOCK COMPANY.*

THE above Company some years ago made a feeble attempt at existence, but not having attained even to the transition or chrysalis stage, died without a flutter, and was speedily forgotten by all but its disappointed projectors. Last year, when the mania was at the hottest, it was re-hatched and came out under the wing of some of the most influential gentlemen connected with the shipping from London to Calcutta, whose interests would be materially promoted by the success of this two-fold undertaking. How it is re

* Also known as the Calcutta and St. George's Point Railway and Dock Company. (1846).

garded in India may be gathered from what follows, taken from a recent Calcutta periodical.

"Diamond Harbour is a part of the river about half way between the sandheads or sea and Calcutta. Above it is the very dangerous shoal of the James and Mary, where many valuable ships have been injured and stranded. To enable the shipping to avoid this peril, and to stop short in a very dangerous river navigation, is the object of this company. It is only the larger ships and more valuable and less bulky cargoes, and those which take steam and go insured, which probably will use the railroad. They will effect a saving of about a half per cent. in the insurance, and perhaps one day's steaming; but this is doubtful; probably the cost of conveyance by railroad and the incidental charges of the merchant will exceed this saving. A railroad to Gravesend, without the advantage of any considerable number of passengers, and with the interest of the Catherine Dock and other docks opposed to it, would present to our English readers a fair comparison to the Diamond Harbour Railroad." "We should much distrust the scheme."*

Whatever the public utility, we might expect the most determined resistance from the merchants and

*Calcutta Review, for March last, p. 228. (1846).

They have numerous steam tugs on the Hooghly, from which they derive a handsome profit. (1846).

owners of house property in Calcutta, and other influential parties, to a project which would necessarily create a perfect revolution, subverting all existing arrangements; creating a new town with all its appendages, in a most unhealthy locality, putting the Government to an enormous expense for erecting new Custom-houses and other offices, without any corresponding advantage to the public service. This company therefore cannot expect much favour or support at the hands of the home and local authorities. Supplying one want, certainly in an improved manner, it would leave to others the labour of meeting a hundred inconveniences, resulting from so great an innovation and disturbance of the present distribution and investment of capital.

In the opinion of a practical Engineer, intimately acquainted with the locality, the making of docks at Diamond Harbour and keeping them in a state of efficiency is beyond the reach of art, and the railroad without the docks would be of little benefit to any one.

NORTHERN AND EASTERN RAILWAY.

A VERY brief notice will suffice for this impracticable project; we say impracticable advisedly, for we have what we esteem the highest authority for saying so, without reference to our own personal knowledge of the country. It is a good office line, that is, it looks well on the map to a person not acquainted with the country, and the nature of the rivers in its route. The Northern and Eastern proposes to start from a magnificent terminus in the city of palaces, and in the true spirit of direct communication, in spite of natural obstacles, which in these scientific days it very properly disregards, plunging into a net work of Nullahs (small rivers), skirting the banks of large streams, which overflow every year, it dashes boldly onwards to somewhere on the Ganges, it says Bogwangolah, but as this is a shifting village, changing its local habitation, if not its name, every year to the extent of some miles,

according to the caprice of the river, the upper terminus with its warehouses, &c., will no doubt have wheels, and be as migratory as Wombwell's Menagerie. They intend afterwards, we believe, making an extension to China, (tunnelling the IIimalayah) and other neighbouring and accessible countries, making Bogwangolah the great central terminus for railway communication in the East; and the Indian Direction is worthy of these majestic designs, for it rejoices in Princes and Rajahs.

The Calcutta Review after having given very cogent reasons for the controlling power of Indian Railway Companies being vested in a London Board of Directors, and the Calcutta or local management being merely their agents, and amenable to the authority of Home direction, from whom their power ought to emanate, regarding the direction of this line expresses itself as follows. "In one of the Companies* whose scheme is before us, there seems to be a departure from these principles. If we were asked our opinion beforehand, we should say that a pompous array of Presidents, VicePresidents, Chairmen, Princes, and Rajahs, would inspire our distrust, as utterly alien to the principle of responsible and economical management. In the Company to which we refer, the Calcutta Board is more numerous than the London; is evidently meant to have

The Northern and Eastern.

G