The Sun.
London, England, 1847-10-01 00:00:00

teresta and those of the commercial community at
lame.—(Applause.)
The resolution was then put by the Mayoe, and
carried unanimously.
Mr. GREIG, manufacturer, of the firm of Watson,
Greig, and Co., proposed the next resolution, and
acknowledged that, having entertained a high opi-
nion of railways as an investment, and conceiving
that ultimately they would be of great advantage to
the country, he had invested a certain sum in them,
and had no reason to regret having done so ; for if a
person by investing in railways obtained more than
he could from a bank, he thought it was prudent and
judicious.—(Hear, hear.) He had, however, to pro-
pose, " That in the opinion of the meeting an at-
tempt, under present circumstances, to carry out the
large number of railway projects sanctioned by the
Legislature, would be to increase to a serious extent
the present derangement in our system of monetary
affairs by aggravating the evil, paralyzing the com-
merce of the country, and depressing to an alarming
degree the value of every species of investment,
whilst it is to be apprehended that from the inability
of shareholders to pay their calls for the construction
of new lines, these works will have to be suspended,
if not entirely abandoned, and the money of the
shareholders sacrificed." Any one who had taken
notice of the state of railways during the last few
months would be aware tha-, to a certain extent,
they were literally sacrified to their owners—he
alluded to lines in formation and others not actually
in progress. Scarcity of food had withdrawn from
this country a great deal of the capital that might
otherwise have been used for railways, and, had
it not been for this, we should not have met
with the present depression. —(Hear, hear.) There
were those who supposed that the monetary
Bill introduced by Sir R. Peel had had considerable
effect in producing this change, and that it had not
elasticity enough about it for the times ; but he was
one of those who thought there was good reason for
believing that those who had engaged in railway spe-
culations had only themselves to blame for any injury
that might be brought upon themselves.—(Applause.)
It was said that the directors had power to suspend
calls and works, but they would, he theught, look to
them for that suspension in vain. They had also been
told, if they went to Parliament, to get an Act to in-
terfere and suspend these works, that they would like-
wise refuse. They had besides this to encounter a
heavy importation of bread stuffs. Combined with
the present national embarrassment, let them look to
the unsettled state of the whole world. Let them cast
their eyes to India, and see what was going on there,
money being at the rate of 14 per cent. Let them
look at China, Spain, the Rio de le Plata, Portugal,
Italy, and Mexico. Failures, they found, were
commencing in America, as by advices by the last
steamer, and therefore, he maintained, that there
was an absolute necessity for steps being taken
whereby those engaged in railways might look, not
only to their own interests, but to the interests of the
whole of England; for in this question, he contended,
were involved the interests of the entire population of
Great Britain.—(Applause.) If by prudence, by dis-
cretion, by proper regulations being adopted, they
were brought merely to capitalize the money as the
country could afford it, then they would be sowing
the seeds of a truly good harvest; but unless they
proceeded in a prudent and cautisus manner, so that
prosperity might return to their manufacturing in-
terests, shareholders would he compelled to pay so
high a rate of interest for the money they obtained
from the Bank, that it would absorb the entire profit
that was made from the various trades in which they
were engaged.—(Applause.)
Mr. METCALFE, manufacturer, and member of the
town council, followed:—The present question was
one of an important and imposing character. It
was, moreover, a 3 new as it was important, and it
behoved every well-wisher of his country to aid, by
all means, in being useful at this crisis.—(Hear,
hear.) There could be no doubt that the present
derangement in the monetary affairs was to be attri-
buted to what he must designate as the unwarran-
table haste that had been exhibited in carrying
out the railway enterprise of this country.—
(Applause.) Eventually they would, no doubt, de-
rive great advantage from a right distribution of this
important element that had risen up among them ;
but there could not be a doubt in the mind of any re-
flecting man, but that too great and sudden a transfer
of capital from ordinary occupations and employments,
fastened and locked up in railway enterprise, was one
of the leading causes of the great suffering now press-
ing on the country.—(Applause.) Had' they taken
twenty years, instead of five or six, to fulfil these en-
gagements, they would have been acting with greater
discretion.—(Hear, hear.) They now, however, saw
the position in which they were placed. No doubt
the Legislature felt the delicacy of interfering with
private enterprise, and he thought they had acted
wisely in abstaiing from doing so; but the present
derangement was dreadful, and if they went on as
they were now doing the commerce of the country
would be paralysed still more than ever.
The resolution was put to the vote, and carried by
acclamation.
Mr. DAVID Peres then proposed, " That in the
opinion of this meeting the interests of the country at
large, and especially of the railway interest, require
the postponement of new undertakings ; and this
meeting strongly recommends all railway companies
to defer the commencement of new works until the
lines now in course of construction are completed, and
to apply to the Legislature that an extension of time
might be allowed in consideration of the lines then
proposed to be postponed." At the commencement
of 18-1-t an endeavour was made by the Board of
Trade to exercise a superintendence over all the rail-
way projects. The Board executed those functions for
the greater part of the year, and made some most excel-
lent reports, which should have been the means of
correctly guiding the Legislature in the duties they
had to perform towards railway projectors and the
public ; but, unfortunately, a struggle appeared to
commence between the Legislature and the Rail way
Board, and that Board not being fully and decidedly
supported ultimately succumbed, and the consequence
had been that railway legislation had not taken the
regular and proper course that it ought to have done.
—(heat., hear.) In fact, the functions of the execu-
tive Government were thrown entirely into the hands
of the legislative body, and that body--exercising its
functions by means of separate committees dispersed
through a variety of rooms, one committee deciding
en one principle, and another on another, and a third
on no principle at all—(Cries of "Hear")—did not
know the extent to which they were going, and then
the House, guided by the direction of their committees,
allowed the Bills to come out without any order
or connexion, and an immense amount of railway
property was sanctioned, which the country, without
damage to its commercial interest and manufacturing
industry, was utterly unable to carry out ; and it was
either by acting on the directors of the different lines,
upon the bodies of shareholders, the Executive, or the
Legislature, that they would be able to work a re-
medy for the inconvenience and embarrassment.—
(Applause.) He saw the trade of the country para-
lysed—individuals suffering—men of the highest
honour and integrity, who had carried on their busi-
ness on a perfect system of calculation, brought into
trouble by the pressure and depression,
and unable to
fulfil their engagements—a pressure
depressionand
wholly unexpected, wereblessed
seeing that they
with abundance, and favoured this year
everr with
kw
a har-
vest probably more proliic than they had
before.—(Applause.) Distress not only existed o
in
England, but throughout Europe, and it was to be
hoped that some panic would work out their deli-
verance from the monetary pressure with which
they were now menaced.—(Applause.) Let them
advance with railway works gradually. They were
in a country of great wealth, where they did not
expend their revenue, where every quarter of a
year there was 'an immense amount for investment;
and even the • railways themselves, if they would
give them time to be completed, would, in themselves,
yield a considerable revenue.—(Hear, hear.) But if
everything was pushed on simultaneously and incon-
siderately, the money power of the country and of
individuals would be
hopes they would
unequal to the call. Be was in
consider
it( Government
to make an
application to the executive eent through the
mayor, and to the directors and shareholders ;e to put a
again
enjoy ari of it he
result
atop to the inconvenience;
and
ee th e
hoped, would be, that they would a
ex-
tended trade, and be relieved from the effects
present unexampled crisis ; that the retartdsat?fon
railway works, the operations of production a °f
and
re-
investment, might be carried on, and the country
be allowed to resume its wonted mercantile ntr"tran-
quillity.—(Applause.)
Mr. JOHN RAwsoN, a director of various northern
railways, seconded the resolution, and said, he could
not plead to the non-possession of railway stock,
having embarked his money in railway enterprises,
from a conviction that he was promoting a great
national work. It was of the present excess he com-
plained, and he could liken it to nothing but the folly
of a tailor, who should expend all his money on
buttons instead of buying cloth.— (Laughter.) In
like manner, they have been doing nothing with
their surplus capital during the last two years but
constructing railways, which in exchange for their
cottons and calicoes offered them a conveyance, some
five years hence, upon their line.—(Laughter.) They
nad met on that occasion, more, he presumed, to point
out an evil than propose a remedy, and it was not to
be supposed that railway directors would pay atten-
tion to those in the cotton trade, provided they had
money to proceed with the works, seeing that they
'would only consider what was most conducive to the
advantage of the shareholders. They would all agree
with him that it was only the shareholders in the
different lines who could come to their relief and carry
out their objects.—(Hear, hear.) It might have
been supposed that bodies of directors who were in
the same boat with themselves would have been will-
ing to carry out their wishes as regarded these calls
and extensions, but he was sorry to say that this was