The Sun.
London, England, 1867-08-30 00:00:00

Railway and other Companies.

S 0 UTH -EASTERN.

The half-yearly meeting of this company was held
yesterday at the City Terminus Hotel, Cannon-
street ; Mr. E. W. Watkin, KY., the chairman,

presided.
Mr. CHUBB, the secretary, having read the notice
convening the meeting, the report, an abstract of
which has appeared in The Sun, was taken as read.
The CHAIRMAN, in moving the adoption of the
report, said they had made arrangements for admit-
ting some of the Brighton Company's trains to run
into the Cannon-street station on Monday next as
well as the South-Eastern trains. They were
anxious to give the public the advantage of coming
into that station as soon as possible under the agree-
ment with the Brighten Company. The report of
the directors was very full, and gave the proprietors
all the information that was necessary to enable
them to judge of their affairs. lle had thought it
would be to the advantage of the company to charge
the interest to revenue on all the expended capital
of the company, although it might be looked upon
as a hard measure. In the expectation of having
the Tunbridge-wells line open for traffic he had
been disappointed. Some delay had taken place in
consequence of the wet weather, and therefore it was
not advisable to open it until the works were more
consolidated. They thought it better to postpone the
opening for a short time, until everything was per-
fectly ready for traffic. But as it would be opened soon
they would not suffer much from charging all the
interest to revenue on productive capital. By this
means the company would be placed on a hard
and solid basis, and he trusted that with the aid
of downright hard work and economy they would be
enabled to increase the net revenue available for
dividend, and thus make the future of the company
satisfactory to all concerned. They were paying in-
terest on the cost of a large amount of plant to pro-

vide for the working of the new Tunbridge line, and
also for the development of the traffic for the next
few years. He hoped it would be a long time before
they again had to ask them for money to purchase
new plant. A number of new engines were added to
the stock in the past half year, and their coat would
appear in the next account. He found that in the
past half year there had been an increase in the pas-
senger traffic of £50,000 ; but at the same time there
had been a decrease in the merchandise traffic of
£4,200, which had arisen from bad trade and com-
mercial distress. As to the passenger traffic, it was
upon the whole satisfactory. During the first two
months the Exhibition was open in Paris it was a
failure, and a very small increase iu the number of
passengers was due to its opening. The continental
passenger traffic showed an increase of £26,000 the
half year, and the local passenger traffic an increase
of £24,000. The local goods traffic had fallen off
from the depression of trade. He found that the
total net increase of the traffic in the half year was
£57,000, and it was earned by an additional expen-
diture of 50i per cent. on that account. He found
that the increased receipts on the Great Northern
Railway were earned at an expense of 524 per cent.
of the increased receipts, and that the increased re-
ceipts on the Midland Railway had been earned at
an expense of 120 per cent. of the increased receipts,
so that the working expenses had wore than eaten
up the increase of traffic. The increased traffic on
the Lancashire and Yorkshire, which was an exceed-
ingly well managed line, was earned at an expense
of 80 per cent. He thought they would see that their
general manager, Mr. Eborall, had not lost any of
his usual care and vigilance, as he had worked their
increased receipts at 501 per cent. The number of
passengers conveyed during the past half year over
their lines was 9,700,000, showing, as compared
with the corresponding half of last year, an increase
of 1,228,000 passengers, of whom 931,000 were
carried on the line between . Cannon-street and
Charing-cross. He told them that 9,700,000 pas-
sengers were carried over the company's railways
during the past half-year, and he had now to tell
them that 7,150,000 passengers were conveyed in
and out of the Cannon-street and Charing-cross
stations, and this showed them the great importance
of those metropolitan stations, and that their chief
traffic emanated from London. He had no doubt
that great as the expenditure on these stations had
been, when the traffic to and from them was deve-
loped, they would pay the company a fair interest
on the outlay. The receipts on the Greenwich
branch showed a decrease of £l6O, in consequence
of the distress in the east and south of London
during the half year. But there had been an in-
crease of £10,870, or 163 per cent. in the receipts
between Cannon-street and Charing-cross. From
observations he had made in travelling to and fro
he had suggested to the general manager that it
would be better to do away with the second-class
carriages between Charing-cross and Cannon-street,
and have only first-class and third-class, charging
for the first-class return ticket 81., and for the third
class return 4d. The increase in traffic between
Charing-cross and London-bridge as compared with
London-bridge only was £40,000, and as compared
with London-bridge, Charing-cross, and Cannon-
street and London-bridge only, £74,000, exclusive
of £17,500 the local traffic on the Charing-cross line,
making together £91,500. That showed the kind of
increase that would take place. The increase in season
tickets had been £6,500. Oa Easter Monday they
had conveyed on their lines without accident
135,000 passengers. There was now a steady in-
crease in their receipts of £3,500 a week, and he
thought as to traffic receipts and other matters they
had fairly turned the corner, and as time went on their
affairs would improve. There were two tests of careful
management in conducting railway. traffis —viz.,
making but few bad debts, and having to pay very
little compensation for lost luggage. The whole
expense for the latter was £8 9s. 2d., and for bad
debts under £lO during the half-year. (Hear.)
This showed that they had people who knew how to
attend to their t usiness. During the half-year the
directors had offered a certain amount of debenture
stock to the proprietors, and it was all readily taken
up by them. (Hear.) Ile called the attention of
the proprietors to an Act passed in the last session
of Parliament " to atnend the law relating to rail.
ways." They would remember that a decision of
Lord Cairns had caused great consternation among
debenture-holders in the case of the London, Chat-
ham, and Dover. It was practically to the effect
that the directors of a railway company might get
the company into debt, which no directors had any
business to do ; and, according to Lord Cairns, the
trade debt would claim before the debenture-holder
and might cause the engines and rolling stock to be
seized and sold, the working of the line might thus
be stopped, and the security of the debenture would
be endangered. By the provisions of the new Act
the debenture and debenture stock would have
priority against the company over all other claims
except rent charges and land claims ; and this placed
all railway debentures in a safe position. (Hear,
hear.) He would ask them to divide the ordinary
shares of the company into two equal portions, but
it would not be compulsory on any holder to divide
his shares. It was suggested by sonic very
large holders of ordinary shares that, if they
could fix one portion of the ordinary capital
entitling it to take the ordinary dividend pay-
able to the undivided share until it amounted
to 6 per cent. on the preferred portion, it would
be a great advantage, leaving the deferred
portion to take any dividend that might remain
as coining to the whole stars. It' was believed
that a share thus divided would, bring a
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into stock. He also intended to ask them to ap-
point an audit committee of five shareholders to
select auditors every year, after the plan which had
been successfully adopted by the London and North
Western Railway Company since the year 1851.
The five gentlemen he proposed to name held in the
aggregate £300,000 of the company's stock, namely,
Mr. Fielding, M.P., Mr. Fletcher, Mr. Sealy, Mr.
H. Wheeler, and Mr. Fort. The next matter he
had to propose was that as Mr. Eborall, their gene-
ral manager, was at present in a very unsatisfactory
state of health he should have leave of absence for
two months, and he hoped be would return. less