The Sun.
London, England, 1845-12-19 00:00:00

RAILWAY MUTUAL PROTECTION
SOCIETY.
T.: 8 Society is a voluntary association of persons interested in the
K.. cgs and judicious administration of railways ; and especially for
owe:tat:dug, the present state of the law as affecting the rights and
of those connected with railways and railway projects.
That in the undefined state of the law touching the various rela-
tions in which persons connected with railways find themselves
"'placed, great inducements are offered to the resistance of just de-
mands, and to the enforcement of groundless claims ; in either case
imposing very serious expenses, amounting in the one to the denial
Of Justice, and in the other to the infliction of positive wrong.
It is obvious that individuals having to enforce their rights against,
Or to resist unwarrantable claims by bodies corporate in their cha-
rade?, and having in their hands large funds, will do so at a serious
disadvantage, without an arrangement for co-operation and mutual
assistance, and the aid of a subscribed fund. It is therefore agreed
that a fund shall be provided by subscription, and that the following
rules and regulations shall be binding upon the members of the
Society.
That a Committee of seven persons, including the President, to be
called the Council, shall be appointed to conduct the business of the
Society.
That a president shall be appointed, whose sanction, with two of
the Council, shall be necessary to all decisions touching the institution
or defence of proceedings at law or in equity.
That the Council shall consider the case of any member of the
Society which may be brought before them, and shall advise whether
any and what proceedings shall be taken, either at law, in equity, or
otherwise, for the protection or assertion of the rights of such mem-
ber, and that all such proceedings as may be suggested by the Council
shall be submitted to the solicitors of the Society.
That, fur the guidance of the Council, and for the satisfaction of
the members of the Society, the opinions of several counsel at the
equity and common law bars shall be taken upon the various and
most prominent questions which may affeot the rights and liabilities
of the subscribers and allottees of shares, as well as the Directors,
Managing and Provisional Committeemen, of railways and railway
projects.l
That the names of persons seeking to become members of the So-
ciety shall be submitted to the Council, who shall have the absolute
power of admission.
That an annual subscription of Two Guineas shall be paid by each
member of the Society, on or before the let of January in each year,
and no person shall be deemed a member until such subscription
be paid.
That members who shall not renew their subscriptions on or before
the Ist day of January, 1847, and so on from time to time, on or
before any succeeding Ist of January, shall cease to be members of
ne Society.
That any subscriber who may desire to confide his owu case to the
until of the Society, may do so in strict confidence, and if his case
:_,ne which the Council deem to be within the scope of the Society,
rurty then have the option of requiring his interests to be considered
I,r the solicitors of the Company upon the payment to the funds of
tLa tiociety of such further sum of money as may appear to the Coun-
cil appropriate and reasonable, or of placing the business in other
hands upon his own responsibility.
That all subscribers shall be entitled to the benefit of the opinions
of counsel proposed to be taken for the guidance of the Council, and
sine of the advice of the counsel and of the solicitors.
That Daniel Whittle Harvey, Esq., be appointed the President of
the Council.
That R. P. Davis, Esq., be appointed the Treasurer, and Messrs.
Amory, Sewell, and Moores, the solicitors of the Society.
That the Council shall have power to make rules for the manage-
ment of the business of the Society, provided they are not repugnant
to the above rules. And that no subscriber shall be liable for any
costs, charges, and expenses whatever beyond his subscription, and
such other expenses as shall have been provided for by his engage-
ments with the Council.

LONDON AND YORK RAILWAY.
Copy of a Letter addressed to George Hudson, Esq., M.P.,
Chairman of the Eastern Counties Railway.
London and York Railway,
Office, 7, Lothbury, Dec. 16, 1845.
Slr,—The Directors of this Company have taken into consideration
your Letter of the 3d instant, wherein on behalf of the Eastern
Counties Railway, you make the following proposition, viz :
" That the Shareholders of the London and York Company shall be
amalgamated with those of the Eastern Counties Company, and
have appropriated to them 2,000,0001. of Eastern Counties stock, in
shares of 201. each, and that a deputation from each Board shall
meet and determine upon all other matters."
and have requested me to forward to you the following reply :
Your proposition virtually suggests, that we should disregard the
labours of the Committee on Group X. (which in the last session of
Parliament sat for more than eighty days), and throw overboard their
report, carried by a majority of three to one, in favour of the merits
of our scheme (see the printed resolutions) in preference to the lines
recommended by the Board of Trade ;—lines nearly identical with
your newly re-proposed Eastern Counties Extensions,—that report
also being confirmed in the House of Commons by 79 to 19, and pass-
ing the third reading without any division.
You offer to our shareholders in exchange for their Bill, two
millions of stock in the Eastern Counties Railway (which has hither-
to paid less than two per cent.) as being in your own view of greater
value than the five millions of our own. It must, however, be re-
marked, that the incorporation of this 2,000,000 of stock with that of
the Eastern Counties depends upon the assent of Parliament to your
extension schemes from Cambridge to York, which were last sum-
mer brought before the Commons, and there distinctiy negatived, and
there is, therefore, no security that this allotment of stock would
ever be legalised.—So much for the bearing of your proposition on the
pecuniary interests of our shareholders.
To the public you propose a scheme repudiated by a select Com-
mittee in 1845, a scheme avoiding nearly every town that ours would
serve, and longer than ours from twelve to fifteen miles, leaving the
district bordering on the Great North-road from London to York,
without railway accommodation.
We therefore unanimously feel that an acceptance of your offer
would be a gross breach of faith with the public and the original
subscribers, and an abandonment of our pledges to the landowners
And inhabitants of the towns through which our line is intended to
pass, who have embarked considerable capital in the undertaking.
Your attention cannot have been seriously directed to the eleventh
section of the report of the Committee on ,Group X, for there the
merits of our scheme are minutely contrasted with yours, aad the
preference decidedly given to ours, in the following terms :
" Lord Courtenay reported from the Select Committee en the
Group (X) of Railways, That—A Report from the Board of Trade
upon the subject of railway communication between London and
York having been referred to them by the House, the Committee
think it right to state that they have not adopted the recommenda-
tion which it contains, while they concur with the Board of Trade in
the opinion expressed in that Report, That the London and York
scheme on the whole presents a larger and more compre-
hensive system of communication ;' they have been led by the evi-
dence adduced in support respectively by the two schemes to a dif-
ferent conclusion from that at which the Board of Trade has arrived.
Having had the opportunity of examining the estimates of the cost
of construction more thoroughly than it can have been practicable
for the Board of Trade to have done, and having been led to a dif-
ferent conclusion upon that point, they have decided, upon a full
comparison of the evidence, on preferring the London and York line
to that combination of lines recommended by that Board, for the
following among other reasons :
".Ist.—Because it affords the best through communication between
'Andon and York, by a new trunk line half-way between the London
..nd Birmingham and the Northern and Eastern lines. thus accom-
modating a larger district otherwise unprovided with north and'south
ommunication, and giving a fresh exit from, and entrance into, the
:metropolis.
".idly .—Because it places a large number of market towns on the
through line giving them in addition good communication with each
other.
" 3dly.—Because it affords to the public a better security that the
scheme of railway communication which it seeks to effect will con-
tinue to be under one management, and to be independent of other
g r_ at lines of railway-
" 4thly.—Because they consider that though in the first instance the
F, home of the Board of Trade may be more cheaply executed than
tie competing one, it would not supply the accommodation which the
wants of the country, through NI hich the line propose to run, de-
e.and, and; that the adoption of that scheme would probaidy
4,s'entually involve a greater outlay than that required for the ex-
, 'talon of the London and York scheme."
Will you permit me to ask what satisfactory reasons for accepting
cur offer I could give in the House of Commons to those Members
who undertook the labourious investigation of the merits of railway
schemes, and selected ours from among the various projects as the
best new line between London and York? How could it be expected
and Committees would, in future, work as they have done, if their
labours are liable to be thrown to the winds, and their reports
though confirmed by the House, become subject to barter or sale for
stock, in a scheme which a Committee had previously discarded ?
Can you believe that the House would consent to be so trifled with,
or permit a Eill rejected in 1845 to pass in 1846, in lieu of that which
had been preferred in 1845 ?
What defensible statement could we make for so entire an
abandonment of our scheme, when no change has taken place in any
of its circumstances ?
You have ripen various occasions endeavoured to decry our line,
and your success in railways has obtained for your opinion con-
siderable influence ; but Parliament and the public must surely see
that this proposal to our gharholders to give up their Bill and to
take stock in your newly adopted line, is only a bold effort on
your part, to raise the value of the Eastern Counties Stock, and
as Chairman of the Midlands, to get rid of a rival.
Again let me ask why in your new position of Chairman to the
Eastern Counties you should be so zealous of a line passing through
Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire, while you proclaim that the Eastern
Counties Railway, with its present lines and branches may be made
to pay ten per cent.—that portion of the Kingdom lying upon and
East of the London and Cambridge line, forming a district quite as
extensive as the one proposed for the London and York?
Why should you wish to compel passengers to go even twelve
miles round by Cambridge, while that town will certainly have its
railway to the east, west, north, and swath ? Why then endeavour
to prevent Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire from having similar ad-
Tantages
You surely cannot have calculated upon our giving your proposal
a favourable consideration, and you will therefore not be surprised to
learn that my colleagues unanimously decline to discuss with you so
unreasonable a preposition as that set forth in your letter of the 3d,
Involving as it dses a total abandonment of our whole scheme.
You are doubtless aware that in order to avail ourselves of the
resolutions of the two Houses, respecting Railway Bills carried up to
a certain point in last session, it is necessary that the Bill and its
clauses should not be varied in the most minute particular. Our
Board, therefore, think it better at once to state to you, that we can
no more enter into any arrangement to change or give up a portion
of our line, as sanctioned by the House of Commons last summer,
than we can consent to abandon the whole.
We shall ask :leave to proceed with our Bill as rapidly as the
forms of the house will permit, having without any flintier call
ample funds in hand to meet all expenses. As required by the
standing orders, our new share deed is in the course of signature by
A most extensive body of Shareholders, notwithstanding the efforts
made to alarm them. More than nine-tenths of the scrip having
within the short interval since the 12th instant been sent in for
exchinege-
Public opinion is decidedly In favour of a new line between London
and York, independent of existing interests and management. We,
therefore, confidently expect that the merits of our scheme, which
obtained for us a verdict in the Commons, will be equally appre-
ciated by a Committee of the Lords.
The interests of so large a body of Shareholders being involved, it
1.9 right I should add we feel bound to make public this communlea-
tion.—l have the honour to be, Sir, your obedient humble servant,
(Signed) Writ. ASTELL,
Chairman of the London and York Railway.
To George Hudson, Esq., M.P., Chairman of the
Eastern Counties Railway.

GREAT
MANCHESTER, RUGBY, AND
SOUTHAMPTON RAILWAY,
WITH DIRECT LINE FROM DERBY TO RUGBY.
I, Royal Exchange-buildings, Louden, Dec. 19, 1845.
At a CENERAL MEETING of the SHAREHOLDERS in this
undertaking, held at the offices of the Company, on Wednesday, the
17th of December instant, it was unanimously resolved—" That an
pdverdsetnent be inserted in the daily papers, to the effect that all
p..rties to whom Shares in the Great Manchester, Rugby, and South-
ampton Railway have been allotted upon their application, and who
have not paid their deposits or any portion thereof, that if the sum
of Two Shillings per Share upon the number allotted to them, be not
paid on or before SATUIWAY, the 3d day ofiJanuary next, their names
a:,l addresses shall be published as defaulters in this undertaking, as
winch with a view of operating as a warning to future companies, as
of endeavouring to obtain Justice for this Company ;" the said resolu-
tion to be accompanied by an intimation that on payment of Two
shillings per Share, either at the offices of the Company, or on the
deposit of the b-iikers' receipt for the same, the letters of application
shall be returned to the alluttees, and they shall be released from all
:lirther liability.
By order of the Committee of Management,
HORATIO CARTER, Assistant Secretary.

THE CONDEMNED CONVICTS.
The wretched woman, Martha Browning, convicted on
Wednesday at the Central Cruninal Court of the murder of
her fellow lodger, as aged female, named Elizabeth Mull,
dell, was, immediately on the conclusion of the trial, re-
moved to the apartment appropriated for the reception of
capital criminals in Newgate. The prisoner had been quite
unable to stand during the trial, and when the awful result
become known to her, but for the assistance of the officials
in attendance, she would have sunk exhausted on the floor
of the dock. Having been removed in an almost senseless
condition to that portion of the prison above referred to,
she remained in a state! of comparative insensibility until
visited by the Bev. Mr. Davis, the ordinary of the gaol, at
A late hour in the evening. Mr. Davis remained with the
unhappy woman for a considerable period, but the excite-
ment under which she laboured was so great that his
endeavours to afford her religious consolation had very
little effect. At eleven o'clock, thoroughly overcome by
exhaustion and fatigue, she fell asleep and slept soundly
for several hours. The wretched woman appears to be almost
friendless, and those of her connexions who have been commu-
nicated with are in the poorest circumstances. She hasla bro-
ther and two or three sisters living, but only one sister resides
in London. The latter has visited the convict since her
committal to Newgate, but not subsequently to her con-
demnation. Yesterday the reverend Ordinary had another
interview with the unhappy woman, who was somewhat
more composed than on the previous day. Mr. Sheriff Laurie
and Mr. Sheriff Chaplin have also visited the prisoner since
her conviction.
Samuel Quennell, convicted yesterday of the murder of
Fitzgerald, bore his sentence with extraordinary firmness,
nor has the fortitude which he displayed during the trial de-
serted him since. On leaving the dock, he was delivered into
the custody of Mr. Abbott, under-sheriff of the county of
surrey, and Mr. Keane, the governor of Ilorsemonger-lane
gaol, by whom he was conducted back to Newgate, and
thence, at three o'clock, conveyed in a cab to Horsemonger-
lane gaol, where the dreadful sentence c the law will be
carried into effect.