The Sun.
London, England, 1854-09-08 00:00:00

pony for twelve months ending on the 81st July last,
passing from Tunbridge and places beyond Tunbridge to
London, amounted to 414,0941., and the part of that
amount earned by bringing that traffic from Tunbridge
to London in the twelve months was 231,000/. lam
quite aware, that I make the statement at once to pre-
vent myself being accused of exaggeration, that when the
line from Strood to Canterbury is completed the 231,000/,
will be reduced to 191, 387/. by the abstraction ofa portion
of the earnings from the traffic between London and Tun-
bridge, amounting to 39,7141.; which would, in the case
mentioned, in all probability pass by the North Kent line
from Canterbury to London. And when the line to Maid-
stone from Strood is opened, another reduction of 7,942/.
would take place ; and the sum in jeopardy would then
be 183,4451. of annual revenue. This sum, then, of
183,4451. of present annual income is left for abstraction
by the construction of the hostile line from London to
Bromley and Farnborough to Tunbridge. I can scarcely
conceive a more suicidal act than that which has been
committed by the majority of the board of directors who
sit here and ask for your confidence—who refuse to re-
commend you, or even to give you an opportunity Tour-
selves of resolving to spend 136,000/. in constructing a
protective line of six miles, vital to your safpty and pro-
tection, which would have warded off opposition
cost : having had in their hands the
ab-
stracting as large a sum from you uanpnowalelyr
taos
makeiits
own
it,
million of money, to cover expenditure to the year
and at the same time asking you to grant them hlaBlsf9a.
the which my honourable colleagues
Ard now, gentlemen, I have to call yourateteonntieaon to
so
financial statement.
My honourable colleagues dis-
have laid before you.
covered that the contentsofthelast reportwhich
presented to you, and which you adopted, anno wasunced
in the most distinct manner that the expenditure of
capital on the Ist of February Last exceeded the amount
raised by stock or borrowing powers by the sum of
192,578/. lis. ; and they assume great astonishment at
finding that to pay the dividend declared at the last
meeting it was necessary for you to accept from your
hon.bankers
colleagues assiB
ancetaltkowzdos mofaktihneg
rethpaitalpyayment. My
approaching
maturity d
of other very large liabilities for which no pro-
visio ha been made. G-entlemen, I never heard of any
provision being made for mortgage bonds but the renewal
of those bonds as ty fall due, either through the same or
through other hands; and I beg leal;- to join-issue witht.tehe
hon.gentlemen inthus,for an evidente rapuosseeireaggera i g
difficulties, and I join issue the morel:elle
from me, in answer to an extraordinary do y received
hieh
came into my hands from them, a clear ex rent
trwn of
the whole state of the case. y answer wpa datedalo o
the 18th April, and I referred them to the aceo ts inn
which this mare's nest of theirs was palpably set forth
and I replied to their statement, " that no person but
myself was acquainted with the monetary affairs of the
company or its financial condition," by quoting the re-
port of the committee of proprietors, under date of 6th
June, 1853, on the subject, and which I now hold in
my hand. Observe, gentlemen, the plea of ignorance
was put forward by Messrs. Coles Child, Warren, and
Byng, as to the financial affairs of the company • but
the report of the committee of proprietors, dated. the
6th of June, 1853, page 3, contains the current
and prospective liabihties of the company and its
assets. Now, gentlemen, the accounts were prepared
for the consideration of the directors by the accountant
of the company, with the assistance of the house of
Quilter, Ball, and Co., whom the auditors of the com-
pany had appointed as their public accountants. In
these accounts, as I-have stated, all the resources of the
company were set forth, and all its liabilities. All that
depended on estimates were based on official reports
from the gentlemen who bad charge of the respective
departments. There has been no alteration made in
regard to them by any act of mine, or of the honourable
colleagues with whom I was placed prior to the last
general meeting, except such as are alluded to by the
auditors of the company in the report in March last, and
such as are alluded to by the auditors of the company in
their report now on the table before you. Gentlemen, the
alterations in the items that have taken place are in
some excesses under particular heads, which naturally
occur upon estimates in every undertaking. The majo-
rity of your present board of directors assume that cer-
tain of the assets are not to be treated as assets for
realisation, but to be retained by the company. Gen-
tlemen, that is wholly matter of opinion, and I still hold
the view that it would not be a prejudice to the intereat
of the company, but the contrary, that the Lord Warden
Hotel, at Dover, and that the Pavilion Hotel, at Folke-
stone, should be realised, and become the property of
other parties, in whose hands such property would be
as beneficial to the company as it is now, without any
complication as to the management, or any care as to
the tenants who should occupy it. Well, gentlemen,
this report of the proprietors is signed by Mr. Morgan,
Mr. Smith, Mr. R. A. Grey, Mr. Wilkinson, and Mr.
Ivyleafe ; and the report of the directors is signed by
whom ? It is signed by Mr. Coles Child, Mr. James
Byng, and Mr. Daniel Warren, besides all the other
gentlemen whose presence the company then had the
advantage of on the direction. I must own that our
finance has of late been conducted in a way entirely novel
to me, and I should think equally new to you ; and
when I read to you, from a communication made to me
by the majority of the board of directors—for I have it
under their hands—" that as the finance committee could
not go round the money market in a body, the members
continued to make inquiries, and to ask assistance in all
quarters likely to afford it, reporting their proceedings
to the chairman, and he reporting his to them." Now,
gentlemen, if ever a mode of creating competition against
yourselves was invented, I think my honourable col-
leagues, the majority of your board, are entitled to
a patent for that invention. Gentlemen, I take my
stand upon the joint report of the committee of pro-
prietors and of the board of directors, dated upon the
6th and 9th June, 1853, and circulated amongst the
whole body of proprietors. Additional expenditure
in the engineering department, under particular
beads, is what must naturally occur and be antici-
pated ; and it cannot by any honourable and candid mind
be looked-upon in any other light than as one of the
ordinary incidents of a gigantic concern. Gentlemen,
during later years our company has been emerging from
an expenditure of a colossal character. Throughout the
whole period during which I have had the honour to act
at the board of directors your payments have been punc-
tually met ; and with regard to providing for a dividend
with resources such as yours, and with traffic daily ac-
cumulating, as yours does, in your bankers' hands, why,
gentlemen, it is puerile to speak of it as a difficulty ; it is
ridiculous to assert that here, in the centre of the money
market of London, with your resources and with your
revenue, and with the balance which you must keep at
your bankers, for the ordinary payments of the day,
that any difficulty can or ought to arise in acquiring a
temporary loan of money. Why, gentlemen, during the
whole half-year, though you have been nominally bor-
rowers from your bankers almost every day, you have
also been lenders to them. Let this speak for itself. The
ignorance of the financial state of the company asserted
by Messrs. Coles Child, Byng, and Warren is singular
and strange. They signed the report of the directors in
June, 1853, which bad special reference to, confirmed,
and was attached to the report of the committee of pro-
prietors, which was drawn up by that committee, after
considering a statement of the company made to them,
which exhibited in the most minute and distinct manner
the then current and prospective position of the com-
pany and its finances. The report of the directors to
that committee, and the report of Mr. Ball, their secre-
tary, on the accounts, were printed and placed in the
hands of each member of the committee of proprietors
and of the board of directors. Gentlemen, considering
that nothing could be more injurious to the credit of the
company than what I heard of these proceedings of the
finance committee out of doors—as it was opposed
to all the usages of conducting business in which
credit was involved, and I was not summoned to their
meetings—l felt myself necessitated to withdraw my
name from that committee. Yonr credit had been un-
impeached, and your bond debt had been raised on most
favourable terms, and you will remember that it is not
long since you declined to allow me and my then col-
leagues to consolidate that debt as we suggested at as
low a rate as 3.1 per cent. per annum. I will ask you
for one minute more to explain to you the circumstances
under which I ceased to bold the office you did me the
honour to confer upon me of managing director of the
company ; and I may preface by venturing to state that
there is no man in this country to whom the emolument
with which you were pleased to accompany that appoint-
ment would not be an object, or who would resign it
after five years of unremunerated service, except from
the gravest conviction of a sense of duty to you ; but
the conviction was ineffaceably impressed on my mind
that as the majority of my honourable colleagues had
thought fit to appoint another director in my place as
chairman, it was impossible that I could, hold the office
of managing director and exercise its functions with ad-
vantage to you, or that the office would then carry
it that amount of authority essential to make it 4fective
for your interests. I have had the
o convi
proofs of the propriety of that decision mostve hadncin
thge
most undeniable evidence that I should not have been
supported by the present board in a way that would have
insured public safety or he useful to you. I will ve
you evidence of it. The board of directors proceeded to
determine without loss of time that they would appoint
a general manager of the company—and here, perhaps,
I may be permitted to read the terms of the letter in
which I tendered my resignation to my colleagues, which
are these. I addressed the letter to my successor, my
honourable colleague, the present chairman :--
" London-bridge Terminus, March 23, 1854.
" Dear Sir,—The vote of the majority of
the SO
for my-
self,
Eastern board has substituted you
,as chairman
" No step has been taken by the board as to the other
position I have the honour to hold, managing
that of
di-
' rector.

" But, after the best consideration, lam entirely con-
vineedthat that position, to be useful and advantageous to
the company, is inseparable from the office of chairman.
I am certain that when you become as conversant as long
labour has wade me with the magnitude and importance
of the company's'interests, your impression on this subject
will be the same as my own.
4‘ With this conviction on my mind, I feel that it would
be unjustifiable on my pii,ft towards the prOprietary to re-
tain the office of managing director, and I must therefore
request you to place nay resignation of that office before
my colleagues at the board this day.
" I am, dear sir, your obedient servant,
(Signed)
" Sir J. N. It. Campbell." " J. MACGREGOR.
The appointment of the general manager was to take
place upon the 24th of Aptil, and the directors had
advertised for candidate,s,forithq office, Nineteen candi-
dates had answered. Two were of
your own establish-
ment—your superintendent and Sour deputy superinten•
dent. The directors reduced the number for considera-
tion to six. The directors did not examine the testimo•
nials of any of the four applicants who were not in your
employ, but they proceeded at once to the election of
the
the superintendent to the office of general manage; of
y. Now, I felt it my duty, from a.stroag.
sense of the propriety of my hon. colleagues being
=am
aware of facts connected with the management of the