The Sun.
London, England, 1845-02-03 00:00:00

LONDON AND YORK RAILWAY.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
SIR,—My attention has been called to a letter in
the Morning Herald of the Ist instant, signed "In-
vestigator," which purports to be a reply to my com-
munication to you of the 23d of January last. I
have read "Investigator's " letter with attention ; and
lam sure, if your readers will do the same, they
will agree with me, that though he sets out with the
admission that my view of the case is one of minutiw
and detail, he studiously abstains from any attempt to
show either that the facts stated by me are incorrect,
or that the conclusions which I deduced from them
are erroneous.
" Investigator" has not ventured to state that a new
line of railway from London to Peterborough is called
for, or can be justified, in a national point of view,
or that it" made, it will be other than a directly com-
peting line with an existing railway. More than
this—he does not deny that every town on its route
may be amply pro‘id;4l for by other lines of railway
now under the consideration of the Board of Trade,
not one of which will interfere with existing inte-
rests.

Neither does "Investigator" tell us in what re•
spects the metropolitan terminus of the London and
York line can be compared, in national importance,
or in its accommodation to the traffic from the manu-
facturing districts and from Lincolnshire, with the
existing and projected termini of the Eastern
COllll tic... 3.
He observes the same politic silence also with re-
ference to the proposed communication be'ween the
main line of the London and York, and the Man-
chester and Sheffield, and Manchester and Leeds
Railways ; not venturing to challenge my assertion,
that by the London and York scheme the connexion
of Lincolnshire with the manufacturing and mineral
districts involves 43 miles of new railway, whilst by
the Midland scheme the same object is as well, or
better attained, by the construction of 12 miles only.
Again, as regards the communication between
London and York, " Investigator" does not deny the
following facts: that the direct line involves the con-
structi,n of 18.54 miles of railway, whilst the exten-
sion of the existing line involves the construction of
132 miles only-; that there will be no saving in time,
by the more direct route over the other; that the
distance saved is chiefly, if not entirely, saved between
Lor:don and Peterborough ; that from York the line
inu,it be made to Lincoln and from the south to Pe-
terborouvh ; that to accommodate the heart of Lin-
colnshire, and the population collected in the nume-
rous towns and villages along the Car Dyke, the line
must be continued from Lincoln direct to Peterbo-
borough ; that the chain of railway communica-
tion will then be complete from York to London via
Lincoln and Cambridge ; that another new, expensive,
and entirely competing line from Bawtry to London
cannot bt.j ustified on any ground ofnational importance,
and cannot hold out any reasonable prospect of return
to the proprietors. "Investigator" has charged me
with having stated "that for the first thirty miles
from London the York line invades some of the finest
garden ground to he found in England " I made no
such statement; what I did state was, "the first thirty
miles from London will require an enormous outlay
of capital, then the line will pass through some of the
finest garden land in England "—and this statement
is substantially and literally correct, as at or near
Biggleswade the line will pass through some of the
finest garden land in England. I refer to this trivial
charge against my accuracy as showing that the
writer could not impugn or call in question the more
important statements which my letter embodied, in-
asmuch as it is the only instance of mis statement or
misrepresentation which he has ventured to attribute
to n-ie.