The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1847-10-12 00:00:00

RAILWAY AFFAIRS,

Owing to the delay in perfecting the post-office ar-
rangements, the Trent Valley Line will not be available
for postal matters until the middle of November, if then.
Mr. G. Woodhouse, the chief agent of the Chester and
Holyhead Contractors, has been presented with a service
of plate, to commemorate the completion of the works.
NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE AND CARLISLE.—An inter-
mediate dividend has beon declared for the half-year end-
ing the 30th of June last, of £3 per whole share, and in
proportion for the quarter shares, such dividend to be paid
free from income tax, on and after the 22nd instant.
LIVERPOOL, MANCHESTER, AND NEWCASTLE JUNC-
TION RAILWAY.—At a meeting of t

areholders in

this company, hela at mancnester, GU Ermay, a Mill inutee
was appointed, to consult with the directors as to the
propriety of staying proceedings for the present.
At Redcar, on Saturday, at the railway terminus, the
goods' office, at a cost of net less than £2OOO, was rapidly
approaching completion, when it was visited by fire, and
in less than an hour the interior of the building was nearly
all destroyed.
GREAT WESTERN.—The express trains of this company
are now provided with an officer, called a travelling porter,
whose business it is to ride on the tender, and keep a
constant look-out ; and on an accident to any of the car-
riages, a signal from the guard, or any other sufficient
cause, he is to communicate with the driver, and stop the
train. It is also his duty to see that the carriages forming
the train are in every respect fit for travelling.
The arrival platform at the Euston-square station,..
which is upwards of 900 feet long, and will be covered
throughout, will now admit of several trains coming in
and despatching their passengers without the least delay.
The departure platform is also to be covered. The cliff"—
culties experienced in starting the trains will be effectually
surmounted by the employment of a second booking-
office and a second departure platform.
From official • returns it appears that the amount of
traffic for the last week, on upwards of 3,152 miles of
railway, was £202,320, thus accounted for :—£107,204
for the conveyance of passengers only, £49,021 for the
carriage of goods, and a remainder of £46,095 for pas-
sengers and 'goods together, not respectively apportioned ;
being an increase of £29,314 ever the corresponding week
of last year,
... when the mileage was about 2,525.
THE " nAIL"• AND THE AGRICULTURAL INTEREST.—
On Tuesday, seventeen trucks, containing between five
and six hundred sheep, and about a dozen oxen, passed
through Lancaster to Manchester by rail, from Sedbergh,
in Yorkshire, being about the weekly average consign-
ment from that quarter. Before the Lancaster and Car-
lisle Railway was opened, the same number of sheep and
cattle did not find their way to Manchester from Sedbergh
in a twelvemonth.—Lancaster Guardian.

A CHILD BURNED TO DEATH ON A RAlLROAD.—Yes-
terday week a child, named Ann Williams, met her death
in a singular manner on the Dock Branch Line of the
BriStol and Gloucester Railway. Some burning coke had
fallen on the line ; the child ran to look at it, when its
clothes caught fire, and it was burned to death. The jury
returned a verdict of accidental death, accompanying it
with a recommendation to the company to the effect that
no engine should be used on the branch without an ash-
box attached to it.
In a letter to the Morning Chronicle, Mr. W. F.
Spackman rebukes the " practical" men connected with
railways for not helping themselves at the present juncture
—"Do the shareholders in railway companies want to
limit, restrict, or suspend the calls ? Nothing is easier.
The law gives to the shareholders in all companies formed
since 1845 the power to call extraordinary meetings, and
to controul and regulate the acts of the directors. If,
then, the shareholders in any particular company are con-
vinced of their folly—if they are unable to pay the calls, or
carry out the works—let them meet and apply the remedy :
but let them cease to complain of a burden which their
own supineness only renders intolerable."
EAST LANCASHIRE RAILWAY.--An extraordinary
meeting was held at Bury, on Wednesday, Mr. J. Grundy
in the chair, to borrow £232,000, under the provisions of
their various acts. The report stated, that although calls
have been made upon the shareholders to a large extent,
up to the present time the total number of calls in arrear
(exclusive of the call now in course of payment) does not
exceed £26,000, and that the capital already raised, and
authorised by the existing acts, will, it is anticipated, be
sufficient to complete the whole of the undertaking, as
authorised by parliament. Another call would probably
not be made till November, or the end of the year. The
resolution was carried.
THE NEXT DIVIDENDS.—A correspondent has analysed
the receipts of twenty-nine railways, for the week ending
September 25, present year, as compared with the cor-
responding week of 1846, the result of which shows that
there is, so far, no prospect of a diminished dividend.
He has shown' that the increase of receipts is about pro-
portioned to the increase of mileage in the week selected ;
but he has also shown that this week is under the average
of the weeks elapsed since the closing of the last half-
year's accounts. That, of course, was to be expected, as
the takings and the excess differences decrerse as the year
advances. However, if the additional workings be one
more economically in propori ion to the excess of distance,
as we presume they will be, it will tend to raise the profits.
—Herapath.
EFFECT OF RAILWAYS ON TURNPIKES.—On Thurs-
day a general meeting of the trustees of the Surrey and
Sussex roads was held at the Sessions-house, Newington,
for the purpose of letting the tolls arising from the gates
and bars at Newington, Camberwell, Kennington, Vaux-
hall, Kingston, Croydon, East Grinstead, &c., which were
put up at the sum of £32,350, for which they were let on
the previous year. Much interest was excited on this oc-
casion, as, in consequence of the extension of the line of
the South Western Railway from the Nine Elms to York-
road, which will cause a loss of revenue of about £6OOO
per annum, it was thought that a reduction would be pro-
posed to that amount. The tolls were put up, but there
was no offer for them, and it was stated, in the course of
the sale, that during the last four weeks there had been a
falling off of £lOO per week in consequence of the. rail-
ways south of the Thames,