The Sun.
London, England, 1849-01-17 00:00:00

I

Rochester, and the result will show that the capital was adequate to
the purpose.
The line from Gravesend to Rochester is on a different footing;
the company were authorise 1 by their Act to purchase the railway
and canal, and to fill up the canal, and double the line of railway,
so as to form a part of the South-Eastern North Kent line, but ne
provision was made by Parliament far the payment of the purchase
money, nor any authority given to raise money for that purpose.
Parliament had. however, previously recognised the principle and
necessity of a grant of power to raise money for the purpose of exe-
cuting, the works, by auth wising the Gravesend and Rochester Rail-
way and Canal Company to raise 85000/. by the creation of shares,
and 56,6161. by mon gage, and all the powers of the .Gravesend and
Rochester Railway and Canal Company were vested in the South-
Eastern Railway Company by the Act of Parliament authorising
them to purchase the railway and canal.
The South. Eastern Railway Company purchased the Gravesend
and Rochester Railway ant Canal for the sum of 310,0001. ; paying
31,0001. in cash, and giving boosts for 279,0001., payable, with inte-
rest at three and a half per cent. per annum, in the year 1851, and
application will consequently be made to Parliament to raise the
sum of 35'&985/., for payment of the purchase-money and interest.
The filling up of the canal, and doubling of the line of railway,
has b,en executed by the South-Eastern Railway Company ; and
the line was opened by them for traffic as a double line on the 23d of
August, 1847.
In addition, the proprietors authorised the payment of interest on
the No. 3 and No. 4 Shares ; but they did not provide any specific
fund for such payment. The amount paid up to the Ist instant is
159,1661. 175., and the further amount that will he payable under this
head is dependent in some measure on the time of opening the new
lines—it may be taken at 205,0161. 6s. 6d.
Had this payment of interest on the No. 3 and No. 4 Shares not
been made, it would have been out of the power of the company to
maintain, as they are doing, full faith with Parliament in construct-
ing those lines, to the completion of which Parliament itself looks,
and justly, with considerable interest.
The additional suns of 350,9851. will make the whole paid-up

. _ .
capital of the company 9,466,3601., which will represent 296 miles of
railway open for traffic, and a locomotive and carrying stock of the
value of upwards of 600,0001., free from mortgage and other debt,

earning revenue, and subject only to the deduction of the working
expen.es, rates and taxes, and of the rents of the Greenwich, the
Reading, Guildford, and Reigate, and the Canterbury and Whitstable
Railways, and the proportionate toll over the 6 mires and 40 chains

of the south-Western Railway.
The revenue produced by the lines open during the last year,
162 miles and 66 chains in length, was 449,725/. I Is. id., or 2,7631.
per mile.
The policy of the company for the last four years, that they should
themselves be the carriers of goods on th^ir own lines, has been
adopted with entire success : the receipts from goods, which aver-
aged weekly GOS/. in 1844, amounted to 1,8101. per week in 1846 ; or
in the former year to 61. 12s. per mile per week, and to 121. per mile
per week in the latter.
This policy the directors believe will be still more successful
when applied to the traffic of the whole South-Eastern system of
Railways, and will then produce more than a corresponding increase

of receipts.
The proprietors will take into consideration, In estimating the ad-
ditional revenue to be obtained when the whole 296 ;idles of railway
are open, the anticipated improvement of the continental traffic in
passengers and merekandise, the return to be derived from the
North rent line; the Bricklayers' Arms Junction, and the other
railways in progress, as well as the general prospects of the country,
and the hope of a greater development of the existing traffic of the
South-Eastern district, and they will probably arrive at the conclu-
sion that the permanent dividend to be derived from their property is
not likely to be less than 6 per cent. ; and if the proprietors have not
erred in the anticipations on which their original investment was
made, still greater advantages are to be expected.
The South• Eastern Railway Company holds, from its natural post-

tion, the key to the land traffic passing from Europe into Great Bri-
tain, and cannot be dispossessed of it ; and while it would be of no
advantage to speculate on the results whieh must attend this situa-
tion, yet it would be improper not to express the opinion of the di-
rectors, that this position must be of great importance and advan-
tage to the company.

At the moment, however, when the railway from Boulogne to
Paris was completed, the French revolution took place, and from
that time to the present there has not been as much Gontirental
traffic as there was before the opening of the French lines of
railway.

The disruption of the political relations of Europe, by which com-
merce generally has suffered, has naturally been visited on the South-
Eastern Railway, as the great highway to the continent.
In the' last twelve months only 44,110 passengers crossed to and
from Folkestone and Boulogne by the steam-ships, and in the pre-
ceding twelve months, when the French lines were not opened, the
number of passengers was 49,514.
The establishment of a settled Government in France, and the
continuance of peace throughout Europe, may fairly be expected to
be attended by a resumption of the ordinary exteit of communica-

tion with this country; and it will be a solitary exception in nil-
way experience, if the means now existing of reaching raris daily
in twelve hours from London, by the South-Eastern route, have
not the effect of increasing greatly the number of travellers.
The directors have always looked to the extension of the railway
system on the Continent and to the completion of the lines pointing
to the Mediterranean with peculiar interest.
To do justice to the Continental traffic, it is essential that the
short sea passage from Folkestone and Dover to Boulogne and Calais
should be performed at hours to suit passengers, and by the best
class of steam-ships, and this, it is well known, has been admirably
effected by the steam-ships of the South-Eastern and Continental
Company, which have made 3,433 passages without a single accident
—the time occupied in the voyage of 26 miles from Folkestone to
Boulogne varying front one hour and three-quarters to two hours
and a quarter.

The revenue if the London, Folkestone, and Dover line, depend-
ing, to an important extent, on the facilities and certainty of quick
passages to and from Boulogne and Calais, the directors are of opi-
nion that it is desirable that the South-Eastern and Continental
Steam-ship Company should be merged in the South-Eastern Rail-
way Company, as the sea service requires to Le performed more with
reference to its advantage to the railway than to that of the proprie-
tors of the steam-boats.

It is requisite that greater facilities should be given for the con-
veyance of merchandize between Folkestone and Boulogne, by which
the South-Eastern Railway Company has hitherto benefited but
little, than the steam-boat proprietors as an isolated company can
afford to provide; and, although the case might be met by a general
guarantee from the railway company on all the passengers and mer-
chandize carried by it and the steam-ships, there would be greater
simplicity, and more effective combination, were the two undertak-
ings united.
It has been shown that the ultimate capital of the railway will be
9,466,3601., whilst 130,0001. has been sufficieLt to provide eight splen-
did steam-ships for the daily service to France.
With regard to the disputed claims on the company, alluded to in
a previous half-yearly report, and which are all referred to arbitre-

tion, comprising the claims of the contractors, engineers, surveyors,
and solicitors, amounting to 196,8001., the directors believe that they
will be settled for the sum set apart to meet them, viz., 138,0401.,
which has been invested for that purpo,e in the stock of the South-
Eastern Railway Company, as offers have been made to the
directors to compromise the principal claims on a reduction of up-
wards of 60,0001.
The directors consider that the science of working railways with
economy is still in its infancy, and can be only attained by care
and great experience ; and they have the most confident expects
tion that great improvements will continue to be made under
this head. _ _ .

The extortionate parochial assessments to which this company
has been subjected, and to which it was compelled, for many rea-
sons, reluctantly to submit, during the pressure of Parliamentary
contests, are now systematically resisted, and will soon, so far as

the existing law, which bears very hardly on railway companies
permits, be, the directors trust, equitably adjusted.
The proprietors will not fail to observe that the difficulties at-
tendant on the commencement and completion of au undertaking
like the South-Eastern Railway are apparent to every one; the
prospective advantages which follow the full establishment and de-
velopment of a great commercial institution, are not so striking,
but are properly to be considered, and taken into account in attempt-
ing to arrive at any fair estimate of its value.
The directors trust that the unabated confidence which they en-
tertain in the South-Eastern Railway will be shared by the proprie-
tors ; and it will be the study of the directors to promote the inte-
rests of the company to the best of their ability,

:GOR, Chairman.

Parliament.