The Sun.
London, England, 1862-09-13 00:00:00

THE RAIL WAY,

An average day's work of the railways of the
United Kingdom in 1861 was, to carry 500,000 pas-
sengers, 258,000 tons of minerals and merchandise,
35,000 live stock, 1,100 dogs, and 740 horses. The
precise number of the travellers of the year can-
not be stated, because there is no record of the
journeys of season ticket-holders ; but it must
have been more than six times the number of the
population of the United Kingdom. The trains,
passenger and goods trains added together, tra-
velled 2,897,748 miles more than in 1861 than in
1860, which is equivalent to going round the world
116 times more last year than in the year before.
3,881,990 trains ran in the course of the year ; that
is to say, upwards of 10,600 a day, or more in a day
than seven times the number of minutes in the day.
If the trains had been equally distributed, running
night and day without ceasing, they would have
travelled among them 200 miles in every minute.
The length of the line open increased by 436 miles,
and became 10,869 miles ; and the gross receipts of
the year £28,565,355, considerably exceeded the
interest cf the national debt, and amounted to about
8 per cent, on the capital. The total raised by shares
and loans increased from £348,130,127, at the end
of 1860, to £362,327,338, an increase of more than
£14,000,000 in the year. The working expendi-

Lure rose to above 48 per cent., and net receipts only
increased by about £130,000, or less than one per
cent. on the increase of capital. The net receipts were
rather over 4 per cent, on capital. 284 persons were
killed upon railways in the course of the year, and
883 injured; but the accidents to passenger trains
in which passengers were killed or injured were but
43 in number, causing the death of 46 passengers
and injury to 781 more—one passenger killed or in-
jured in about 220,000. In addition to this 14 ac-
cidents were reported to the Board of Trade in
which no passenger was injured, and 20 passengers
were killed through getting into or out of trains in
motion, and 13 more through their own misconduct
or want of caution. The number of passengers
killed or injured, not through such rashness, but
from causes beyond their own control, was—in 1858,
445 ; in 1859, 384 ; in 1860, 509 ;
in 1861, 827.
In the latter year the sum of £135,062 was paid as
compensation for personal injury. 128 servants of
the companies, or of contractors, were killed in the
year, 57 trespassers, and 17 persons crossing at
level crossings.
CANADIAN PARTRIDGES.

'ive nT
Taylor's o rA'isr.
A correspondent of a contemporary writes as
follows :—I am somewhat amused at the statement
Romsey, about the sup-
posed effect produced on two of his patients and a
cat eating Canadian
by eat' partridges. According to
Taylor,account
Mr.
nearly resulting in death in the case of
ofit was something akin to
cmc, of the patients. To make the case the more
law/fling, Mr. Taylor assures us that " the birds
were perfectly fresh, having been packed in ice."
Now, as I have lived over 40 years in Canada,—
paralysis,
that is, ever since I was born,—l must be permitted
to express some surprise at this assumption against
my country-bird the partridge, and I have slain
and eaten many hundreds, if not thousands, of them
in my time. During the last two winters they were
unusually abundant and fine in Lower Canada, and
I seldom dined without a slice of this delicious
bird, but never experienced anything but agreeable
effects from it. _ _

Mr. Taylor says, " It is reported to be known in
o theet igmr eo
su
npdo
tsho
enyo ua sr
e;
tChaantawdahetnhatthethsenseewbiirsdlsonarge
somi
driven by hunger to feed on the b •
ernes of some
shrub which makes th • eir flesh unsafe for human
food." The doctor •
might, from his own experience,
have added, "also for feline food." But it seems
strange that the birds
poisonous effects of the berries and still retain so
much of the virus in their flesh as to poison women
and cats. To have sustained his assumption, Mr.
Taylor should have had a careful chymical analysis
made of the remainder of the " case of partridges,"
or, at least, of the bits which he doubtless caused
to be " emetted," if he will allow me to coin a word,
from the stomachs of his patients. He should also
have ascertained what else his patients and the cat
had dined on.

------
The importance of makitig these investigations
may be judged of from what occurred to myself on
Saturday last. Having lunched on a score of
oysters, I dined about three hours later at the
Exhibition, and was shortly after taken vio-
lently ill. On returning home I stated my
case to my medical adviser, who asked me what
1 had eaten. I said " Oysters for lunch," think-
ing of what I had often heard of English oyster!,
that they were more or less poisonous, from their
being supposed to feed on deposits of copper
"at l
bottom of the sea. The Doctor asked, Ute tin"
sil
what did you dine on ?'' I replied,
boiled beef, which they give you at the beef."
for that honoured English dish,
„ea:
y a capital
" Nothing else ?" says the Doctor. ,
0 the' so-called
birC:el°Vl
salad, which alone served to Tia„kp on some very
corned beef tolerable, and wbienrtiohne
?utnof stout." "Then."
fair doublo Glocester and.aocou to acquit the oys-
says the Doctor, " I advisslsir. Taylor may find it
ters this time."
iu his heart to acquitis
Fe•rhaife Canadian
„a little further.
investigates the c 4—