CHAP. IX.] OPPOSITION AT MANCHESTER. 259 erty, who offered a vigorous and protracted resistance to the survey in all its stages. The duke's farmers obstinately refused permission to enter upon their fields, although Stephenson offered to pay for any damage that might be done. Mr. Bradshaw positively refused his sanction in any case; and being a strict preserver of game, with a large staff of keepers in his pay, he declared that he would order them to shoot or apprehend any persons attempting a survey over his property. But one moonlight night a survey was effected by the following ruse. Some men, under the orders of the surveying party, were set to fire off guns in a particular quarter, on which all the gamekeepers on the watch made off in that direction, and they were drawn away to such a distance in pursuit of the supposed poachers as to enable a rapid survey to be made during their absence. Describing before Parliament the difficulties which he encountered in making the survey, Stephenson said: "I was threatened to be ducked in the pond if I proceeded, and, of course, we had a great deal of the survey to take by stealth, at the time when the people were at dinner. We could not get it done by night; indeed, we were watched day and night, and guns were discharged over the grounds belonging to Captain Bradshaw to prevent us. I can state farther that I was myself twice turned off Mr. Bradshaw's grounds by his men, and they said if I did not go instantly they would take me up and carry me off to Worsley." The same kind of opposition had to be encountered all along the line of the intended railway. Mr. Clay, one of the company's. solicitors, wrote to Mr. Sandars from the Bridgewater Arms, Prescott, on the 31st of December, that the landlords, occupiers, trustees of turnpike roads, proprietors of bleach-works, carriers and carters, and even the coal-owners, were dead against the railroad. "In a word," said he, "the country is up in arms against us." There were only three considerable land-owners who remained doubtful; and "if these be against us," said Mr. Clay, “then the whole of the great proprietors along the whole line are dissentient, excepting only Mr. Trafford." The cottagers and small proprietors were equally hostile. "The trouble we have with them," wrote Mr. Clay, "is beyond belief; and those patches of gardens at the end of Manchester bordering on the Irwell, and the tenants of Hulme Hall, who, 260 OPPOSITION OF THE CANAL COMPANIES. [PART. II. though insignificant, must be seen, give us infinite trouble, all of which, as I have reason to believe, is by no means accidental." There was also the opposition of the great Bradshaw, the duke's agent. "I wrote you this morning," said Mr. Clay, in a wrathful letter of the same date, "since which we have been into Bradshaw's warehouse, now called the Knot Mill, and, after traversing two of the rooms, we got very civilly turned out, which, under all the circumstances, I thought very lucky, and more than we deserved. However, we have seen more than half of his d―d cottagers." There were also the canal companies, who made common cause, formed a common purse, and determined to wage war to the knife against all railways. The following circular, issued by the Liverpool Railroad Company, with the name of Mr. Lawrence, the chairman, attached, will serve to show the resolute spirit in which the canal proprietors were preparing to resist the bill: "SIR,-The Leeds and Liverpool, the Birmingham, the Grand Trunk, and other canal companies having issued circulars, calling upon 'every canal and navigation company in the kingdom' to oppose in limine and by a united effort the establishment of railroads wherever contemplated, I have most earnestly to solicit your active exertions on behalf of the Liverpool and Manchester Railroad Company, to counteract the avowed purpose of the canal proprietors, by exposing the misrepresentations of interested parties, by conciliating good will, and especially by making known, as far as you have opportunity, not only the general superiority of railroads over other modes of conveyance, but, in our peculiar case, the absolute necessity of a new and additional line of communication, in order to effect with economy and dispatch the transport of merchandise between this port and Manchester. Such was the state of affairs and such the threatenings of war on both sides immediately previous to the Parliamentary session of 1825. When it became known that the promoters of the undertaking were determined-imperfect though the plans were believed to be, from the obstructions thrown in the way of the surveying parties to proceed with the bill in the next session of Parliament, the canal companies appealed to the public through the press. CHAP. IX.] THE PRESS AND THE RAILWAY. 261 Pamphlets were published and newspapers hired to revile the railway. It was declared that its formation would prevent the cows grazing and hens laying, while the horses passing along the road would be driven distracted. The poisoned air from the locomotives would kill the birds that flew over them, and render the preservation of pheasants and foxes no longer possible. Householders adjoining the projected line were told that their houses would be burnt up by the fire thrown from the engine chimneys, while the air around would be polluted by clouds of smoke. There would no longer be any use for horses; and if railways extended, the species would become extinguished, and oats and hay be rendered unsalable commodities. Traveling by rail would be highly dangerous, and country inns would be ruined. Boilers would burst and blow passengers to atoms. But there was always this consolation to wind up with-that the weight of the locomotive would completely prevent its moving, and that railways, even if made, could never be worked by steampower. Although the press generally spoke of the Liverpool and Manchester project as a mere speculation-as only one of the many bubble schemes of the period*-there were other writers who entertained different views, and boldly and ably announced them. Among the most sagacious newspaper articles of the day, calling attention to the application of the locomotive engine to the purposes of rapid steam-traveling on railroads, was a series which appeared in 1824, in the "Scotsman" newspaper, then edited by Mr. Charles Maclaren. In those publications the wonderful powers of the locomotive were logically demonstrated, and the writer, arguing from the experiments on friction made more than half a century before by Vince and Coulomb, which scientific men seemed to have altogether lost sight of, clearly showed that, by the use of steam-power on railroads, the cheaper as well as more rapid transit of persons and merchandise might be confidently anticipated. "Many years ago I met in a public library with a bulky volume, consisting of the prospectuses of various projects bound up together, and labeled, 'Some of the Bubbles of 1825.' Among the projects thus described was one that has since been productive of the greatest and most rapid advance in the social condition of mankind effected since the first dawn of civilization: it was the plan of the company for constructing a railway between Liverpool and Manchester."-W. B. Hodge, in "Journal of the Institute of Actuaries," No. 40, July, 1860. 262 SIR JOHN BARROW'S IDEAS. [PART II. Not many years passed before the anticipations of the writer, sanguine and speculative though they were at that time regarded, were amply realized. Even Mr. Nicholas Wood, in 1825, speaking of the powers of the locomotive, and referring doubtless to the speculations of the "Scotsman" as well as of his equally sanguine friend Stephenson, observed: "It is far from my wish to promulgate to the world that the ridiculous expectations, or rather professions, of the enthusiastic speculist will be realized, and that we shall see engines traveling at the rate of twelve, sixteen, eighteen, or twenty miles an hour. Nothing could do more harm toward their general adoption and improvement than the promulgation of such nonsense. Among the papers left by Mr. Sandars we find a letter addressed to him by Sir John Barrow, of the Admiralty, as to the proper method of conducting the case in Parliament, which pretty accurately represents the state of public opinion as to the practicability of locomotive traveling on railroads at the time at which it was written, the 10th of January, 1825. Sir John. strongly urged Mr. Sandars to keep the locomotive altogether in the background; to rely upon the proved inability of the canals and common roads to accommodate the existing traffic; and to be satisfied with proving the absolute necessity of a new line of conveyance; above all, he recommended him not even to hint at the intention of carrying passengers. "You will at once," said he, " raise a host of enemies in the proprietors of coaches, post-chaises, innkeepers, etc., whose interests will be attacked, and who, I have no doubt, will be strongly sup ported, and for what? Some thousands of passengers, you say— but a few hundreds I should say-in the year." He accordingly urged that passengers as well as speed should be kept entirely out of the act; but, if the latter were insisted on, then he recommended that it should be kept as low as possiblesay at five miles an hour! Indeed, when George Stephenson, at the interviews with counsel held previous to the Liverpool and Manchester Bill going into Committee of the House of Commons, confidently stated his expectation of being able to run his locomotive at the rate of twenty miles an hour, Mr. William Brougham, who was retained by *"Wood on Railroads," ed. 1825, p. 290. CHAP. IX.] PUBLIC OPINION AGAINST RAILWAYS. 263 the promoters to conduct their case, frankly told him that if he did not moderate his views, and bring his engine within a reasonable speed, he would "inévitably damn the whole thing, and be himself regarded as a maniac fit only for Bedlam." The idea thrown out by Stephenson of traveling at a fate of speed double that of the fastest mail-coach appeared at the time so preposterous that he was unable to find any engineer who would risk his reputation in supporting such "absurd views." Speaking of his isolation at the time, he subsequently observed at a public meeting of railway men in Manchester: "He remembered the time when he had very few supporters in bringing out the railway system-when he sought England over for an engineer to support him in his evidence before Parliament, and could find only one man, James Walker, but was afraid to call that gentleman, because he knew nothing about railways. He had then no one to tell his tale to but Mr. Sandars, of Liverpool, who did listen to him, and kept his spirits up; and his schemes had at length been carried out only by dint of sheer perseverance." George Stephenson's idea was at that time regarded as but the dream of a chimerical projector. It stood before the public friendless, struggling hard to gain a footing, scarcely daring to lift itself into notice for fear of ridicule. The civil engineers generally rejected the notion of a Locomotive Railway; and when no leading man of the day could be found to stand forward in support of the Killingworth mechanic, its chances of success must indeed have been pronounced but small. When such was the hostility of the civil engineers, no wonder the Reviewers were puzzled. The "Quarterly," in an able article in support of the projected Liverpool and Manchester Railway, while admitting its absolute necessity, and insisting that there was no choice left but a railroad, on which the journey between Liverpool and Manchester, whether performed by horses or engines, would always be accomplished "within the day," nevertheless scouted the idea of traveling at a greater speed than eight or nine miles an hour. Adverting to a project for forming a railway to Woolwich, by which passengers were to be drawn by locomotive engines moving with twice the velocity of ordinary coaches, the reviewer observed: "What can be more palpably absurd and ridiculous than the prospect held out of locomotives |