The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-02-21 00:00:00

will at once set
" I am, d

Sir, yours, very truly,
" CHARLES LAWRENCE."

To this letter, which surely must he considered anything
but offensive, or indicative of a disposition to injure or quar-
rel with Messrs. Pickford, or to be otherwise than " just"
and " honest," Mr. Lawrence has not, nor has any other
gthenettlwemo
lettersnceiv e dany answer' w"etrh
ewhatev
Merchantser and Trade of
;unless, indeed,
Liverpool" are to be considered the answer.
Mr. Lawrence certainly gave no hope of the Company's
gentleman,
addressed
withdrawing from the carrying business, and only proffered
to give Messrs. Pickford the same advantages as the rest of
the public. These are the real points of offence. •
If the Company would wholly give up that business, no
doubt Messrs. Pickford would use the Grand Junction line
as Piny as it suited them; that is to say, till they could
thereby induce the Directors of the competing Railway and
Canals to reduce still further their Tolls to the Carriers. I
say only till then ; and in proof of this, the case of the Man-
chester and Birmingham Line, referred to by Messrs. Pick-
ford, is directly in point for, although that Company
" adopted the open system, <' yet, Messrs. Pickford continued
to keep their goods off that " direct route," and to send them

by the
an
Company's circuitous route until the Manches-
company's-rates became lower than the
'' On both these lines "the open system"
had been
latter Company s.
adopted; and yet Messrs. Pickford turned about
from
the one to the other (irrespective of directness of route)
dB Leeds.o , i,
inoh
a m
just as the one or the other were induced to offer them the
temptation of lower rates, their charge to the public remain-
ing, moreover, all the while the same,
Under all the circumstances, the Grand Junction Directors
do not consider
it prudent, with reference to the interests of
their constituents, thus to place them in the power of Alessrs.
Pickford, in order to the attainment of (at best) only a
temporary addition to the amount of their goods business,
with a probable future loss of a larger amount; they do not
consider that it would be wise to abandon their present
system, especially whilst under it there is a continual in-
crease of traffic, notwithstanding that they have a railway
co pmeftition m,
.besides that of two direct Canals, one on each
side o the
And with reference to the interests of the public, I need
only mention (and these are by no means rare instances),
First, that I have many delivery-notes of Messrs. Pickford
now before me, in which they have very lately charged 6s.
and is. per cwt. for goods between London and Liverpool,
for which our charge would only have been 3s. 6d. and ss. ;
Secondly, that, as a general rule, the charge per mile to the
public by Messrs. Pickford and the other carriers over all
those Railways on which the Companies themselves are not
carriers, are very much higher, and in some cases nearly, if
not quite, double the charge per mile made by the Grand
Junction Company, as carriers, over theirs; and, Lastly,
that the Company receive no complaints from "the Mer-
chants and Trade of Liverpool," who, doubtless, remember
the very much higher prices they had to pay for the carna
the low
e
of their goods before the Company entered on the business.
Messrs. Pickford say that they at present cause
rates on the Railway. The Directors altogether deny
have
this;
nor is it possible to conceive what means they
omrany,B
have of influencing this or any other Railway C
charges (especially as they usually take care to make much
higher charges themselves.) The chargesat and controlled,
Companies are and always will be regulated of all Railway
d
by public opinion,
f „. onvevanc.
primarily, by their Acts of Parliament an .
__A_ ~

and, next, by the competition of other moues
' —....„.........
(whether Railways or Canals); and the carriers charges to
the public will, in all ordinary circumstances, be at least the
Railway Company's charge to him, with the addition of his
own profit as " the middle-man" ; and just the amount
this profit (whatever he chooses;
interpto makeosed it) are the public
obviously damnified by his being between themand the Railway Company.
Indeed, the above comparison of the actual present state
of things would appear to show plainly, and quite unanswer-
ably, the inevitable result to the public of interposing
" middle men" (who must, also, be paid) between them and
the Railway Companies, who, let it be remembered, are i ot
only authorized by their Acts to be carriers,'hut actually and
of necessity perform and must continue to perform all the
services of " the carrier", except as to the items of collectijn,
matter, without
delivery, and sheeting, and who, therefore, are " the
Merchants and
car-
riers", whatever they may call themselves or be called by
IC:scn6epnagnery
others. There can be no more reason why the
should withdraw from the goods business in favour of Messrs.
Pickford, than for their also withdrawing from the
business, which was formerly conducted by Mr. Bretherton
, n
tcot i ot nh
e decision Directors
c f, e,
theth i s and other coach proprietors, and handing it over to them
Trade of Liverpool", to whom Messrs. Pickford have furTtlieer Gcoranniidnejnt;
• ..1.-..., thut- not only AMP Mac..._ r.ve aP"
_,

Ick t ord

Junction Railway. but that th
doing so every day, and that th.l Company's charges
in fact,
' 1 titicaay the, same to them as to any othet care u;[ ore
e
trcceaelett trregGl-71717;

I am, sir, your obedient servant,-
MARK HUISH, Secretary.
Grand June/ion Railway Office, Liverpool, 17th FeboB43

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and SON,
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NOTICE IS
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opened at Half-p,

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allowa:
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at One o'clock in the Atte

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W. WILSON, Ma

shortest notice

snt to the
See Di

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Solicitor

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-street
Mr.

ktnong

LIVERPOOL BANKING COMPANY.
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING of the PRO-
CLARENDON Rooms, I

LIVERPOOL GAS LIGHT COMPANY.
-lEREBY GIVEN, that the ANNUAL
'TEETING 'of the PROPRIETORS of
AS LIGHT COMPANY, will be
64,5 n at the COMPANY'S

ST. MARYLEBONE JOINT-
STOCK BANK.
•

t HALF-
be PRO-