The Express.
London, England, 1859-10-20 00:00:00

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LONDON, THURSDAY, OCT. 10.

TUE gas consumers of London, as the facts we pro-
duced lad Friday show, are the victims of • confede-
racy. Like the Italians of the Centre, they lavaboes
undone by rent treaties and combinations opposed
to public pediey. As ling as the companies. being
ang{r-banded,and relying upon their own fair-dealing •
for support,were practically reepoasible,all went
If householden were dissatisfied, they could trans-
fee their cuatom to others, and the Itsowledge of this
feet kept the companies in a tolerably safe lies.
This security se longer exists. The powers, without
taking amount of the population, have met in Ne-
gress, have sashed sew distributions of torridly
sad sew allotments of the inhabitants at their plea
mire: seder them circumstances, with meted per- ,
masa* hawed epos them, the Londoners see ;
ally ow skanee Of living • quiet if.. Since the
epenals us se limier amenable to the old means of
selves, ft is well to ask whether something effectual
emit be done Mitigate their despotism, to define
tisk powers, substitute law he arbitrary force,
end. la • word, to obtain the advantages of • con-
altitudes. This is what the united Metropolitan
Delegates have undertaken to attempt. They seek
to obtain • cow general act to regulate the stingy
of pm to the metropolis. Armada on the altered pod-
nee in which the public has hese placed by the
ciesaliaation of the companies sad the cemation of
competition.
Foe the security of the CORIPORIWe interests the
•apply of pa should be made dependent only oa their
ability to pay for It; its quality should be genre&
teed ; its rice per foot restrained within dos
sad it should be sold by some wellommetaimed
mostraze. A general Metrepolitaa Gas Bill amid
provide for all these objects ; it would still be
a clumsy substitute for the natural regulation of
price by " the higgliag of the market ;" but it is the
beet that is left to us. It is sometimes said on be-
half of the Composes that, even alder a monopoly,
their interests and those of the consumers are oat,
moos the former mast always desire to sell as much gas
as posaible. But this I. sot correct. Their interest is
to make as much massy es pomade ea their invested
capital. Ids true that to do this they must dis-
poni of &certain quantity of their article per annum;
but in • large district, with increasing wants, it is
Tao possible to do this by choosing the most profit-
able customers, sad still treat the convenience of in-
dividuals with flagrant contempt. Dr. enALLIca,
is his evidence before the Select Committee of the
limes of Common lad year, stated that since the
districting system has been carried out in South-
wark, it is the cast et the Companies to settle
the most trivial dispels, which arise bottom them
and their customers by immediately cutting
off the gas. In mese to • suggestion of
Mr. BARROW, that be most be aware that
it could not be the interest of the Com-

paay to cut off the gas, and so deprive them-
selves of the profit on its sale, Dr. CHALLICII said,
" I will give you an illustration which is within my
" own knowledge, for I saw it. It was the ease at
" sae of my patients. I saw his place in darkness ;1
" I Inked him the reason, and he showed me the
" account for 11.175. 6d. which had been sent to him
" for gin. He had tendered 11. 161., which was
" the price of the quantity which the meter regis-
tered, according to figures which he showed me;
" and upon this dispute of Is. 6d. his pa was eat di
the next day, and the plus was in darkness whoa
I was in the house." No doubt there are Com-
panies which would not h►ve acted in this
illiberal Milner ; but tie fact shows that

a company in secure possession of a monopoly does
not always recognise the identity of its interests
with those of the consumer. The company which
thus acts knows very well that it does not rink •
customer, or maks any sacrifice. The oo•samer
cannot do without the article, and invariably mu,
renders at discretion, paying for the reconnection a
sum which more than C3mpeneates the Company for
the suspension for two or three days of its ordinary
profits. This arbitrary power of the Companies
should be restrained, as it might well be, by • clause
in a general act providing for a reference of disputes
to an impartial authority. Another practice, equally
arbitrary, that of requiring as •condition of the supply
of gas to an incoming occupier the payment of the
debt due from a former tenant to the Company, ought
to be suppressed by statute, se it is se far as regards
one Company, the Imperial, by the fifteenth section
of their act. The supply of the article having been
thus secured, its quality and the standard of its
measurement, upon which two points the relation of
the amount paid by the consumer to the quantity of
light he receives in return depends, are next to be
cared for. The illuminating power of gas is sear-
tainable by well-known processes. Most of
the Companies, if not all, employ inspectors,
to test and certify the quality of their gas. Them
officers are gentlemen of high, sometimes of eminent
attainments, and their eulogistic reports are no
dot.ht perfectly accurate as fax as the gas submitted
to their examination is concerned. Bu: the shot-
keeper, who finds that it is necessary to have ao per
cent. more gas to keep up the accustomed light,
without casting any reflection on those scientific
persons, conceives that the Company is not doing
him justice, and thinks, cot unnaturally, that a rood
test of gas should be conducted by parties indepen-
dent alike of the producer end the consumer, and the'
t should take place, not in the place where the gee ia
made bet in that where it is burnt. The illumi-
nating pewee of gas is fixed by Ism in most

provincial acts, as it is also in the Imperial Com.
psay's Act, and it should be provided ftt in a general
Metropolitan Bill. The question of meters naturally
belong,' to this. The law provides in the interest of
the public an inspector of weights and measures for
coal, corn, theme, tea, and other commodities sold by
quality ; but not for the inspection of the measure
et gee. There is no standard measure for a cubic
foot of gas; different meter makers use different
standards, and the Gas Companies' measures are not
all alike. On the plainest principles of business,
this anomaly ought to be extinguished.
Protection against exorbitant prices is more diffi-
cult to secure ; but it is attainable without injustice 11
to the Companies. The charges of a few Companies
are restrained by a maximum prim' inserted in their
Act of Parliament. This, with a limitation of divi-
dends to a certain per tentage, which should be
liberal, would meet the case ; but without some such
restriction the public would be left at the mercy of
the monopolist. Far this purpose the Com-
panies should be plated under the obligation
of publishing yearly ea account in abstract of
their receipts and expenditure, showing that
the amounts they have thought proper to divide
amongst their peoprietary, add to capital, or place
in a reserve fund, are not collectively greater than
the produce of a dividend of ten per cent. on their
capital. The amount of capital which owing to bad
management has been sank in some Metropolitan
Companies is so extravagant and enormous

that a limitation of dividend, unaccompanied
by • restriction on the price of the pa, would
prove • very unsatisfactory security to the con-
sumer. Nevertheless the capital invested in
metropolitan gee works pays nearly twice as
much per cent. as that inverted in the railways
of the Uaited Kingdom. The points we have

enumerated an those in which th; interested the
Landes gas consumer, no longer protected by the
mama laws of trade, bat exposed helplessly to the
monopolist, require protection. There is nothing

new in the climactic of the demands now mad;,
nothing which Parliament has not resognind as
just and necessary in similar cases. The gentlemen
who have undertaken to bring the case of the gas
esaanniers before Parliament have only to do jostles
to their emus by energy and prudence to command
• social and legislative success.

!be Court.

WINDSOR CABTLX, Ocr._l9.

The royal dime party, yesterday, included the
PAWNS Alice, Lady Caroline &Mylss, do Hos. his.
Bdddalpb Major 111Masams. sad Catimas Otey,
2E4 Balsam Granada, Otis.

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