The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-09-27 00:00:00

Allowed

Struck out by the revising barrister 265
From this number must be deducted 50, viz.:—
Men who were registered in other places
„ in the Customs, and could not vote
Dead men
Ou the freemen's list, and will vote as a freeman
Duplicates to objections struck out
Do. to objections allowed 4— 50

Total loss to the radicals upon the revision 215

Objections made by radicals
Allowed

Struck out by the revising barrister .
From this number must be deducted 123, viz. :
Men who were registered in other places
„ in the Customs and Excise, and could not vote 59
Dead inert l3
On the freemen's list, and will vote as freemen .. 6
Struck out, but belonging to their own party .... 14
Duplicate objections struck out

RAILWAY INTELLIGENCE.

MORALITY OF RAILWAY MANAGEMENT.

The public have long had cause to suspect that the means
adopted to obtain the sanction of parliament to a railway
scheme were not of the most creditable description, and that
the morality of civil engineers, solicitors, secretaries, and
other parties engaged in the projection of these schemes, was
not of the very highest character. That deceit and falsehood
have been practised somewhere many a beggared shareholder
has experienced, when the various glittering bubbles in which
they have embarked their property have burst; then shares,

in which, on the faith of parliamentary estimates, they have
invested at high premiums, have been proved well nigh
worthless, and, having " gone up like a locket," have at
last " come down like its stick." In many instances, no
doubt, the disappointment experienced has been the neces-
sary result of too sanguine anticipations. In many instances
projectors of promising schemes have deceived themselves ;
but we fear there are some in which an investigation would
prove that the deception has been wilful, if not interested.
An instance has lately been brought to light which
exhibits the tactics pursued by railway officials in anything
but a creditable view. The shareholders of the great North
of England Railway—a very depressed concern—expressed
themselves somewhat loudly, at a recent meeting, upon the
,subject of the large excess of expenditure over the parlia-
mentary estimate. Men who imagine themselves to have
been tricked into investment in unprofitable concerns have
every right to complain, and to demand information ; and
the result of such demand is of vast interest to those having
investments in railways, or any similar species of property.
What was the reply in this particular case ? Why, the usual
one. The onus was thrown exclusively upon the shoulders ;
of the engineer, who was said by the directors to have
" greatly misled them." Here, had the ordinary termina-
tion of such affairs been adhered to, the matter would have
rested, and the engineer, one of a class of men who have
not much character for accuracy to lose, would have sate
down quietly under the charge, of which, nevertheless, half
the world, and the whole of those conversant with such
affairs, would have known him to be only partially guilty.
In the present case. however, the engineer pointed at—Mr.
Robert Storey—has not been disposed to acquiesce so
tamely, but has retorted, by implicating in the blame the
parties themselves by whom the charge is made.
Mr. Storey was accused of misleading the directors, who,
in turn, misled the shareholders, by under-estimating very
greatly the cost of the Great North•of England Railway and
its necessary works, stock, &c. Here is his retort, as given
in a letter addressed to a provincial paper, and copied into
the Railway Times :
" I hold," says Mr. Storey, " written directions from the
board of directors, the London deputation, and the company's
solicitor, that the parliamentary estimate was not to exceed
a given sum. On my stating that it was impossible to make
arid support such an estimate before a committee of either
House of Parliament, I had instructions to exclude certain
items in that for the county of Durham, and everything but
the bare line of railway through the county of York.
"This, the proprietors and the public will see, excluded
expenditure now incurred in locomotive engines, coaches,
trucks, horse and cattle carriages, coach and merchandise
stations, coal depots, and workshops at various places on
the railway, and will account for a larger portion of capi-
tal being required than was generally anticipated."
We say nothing here of the extraordinary conscience of
the man himself who must have aided in palming this insuf-
ficient estimate upon parliament, and even verifying it upon
oath ! But what are we to say of a board of directors who
could act as described above, and who, having first misled
the public into the purchase of shares in the concern in ques-
tion, have dragged the unfortunate holders of such shares
through a court of law into the payment of their calls—in
some cases to the infliction upon them of positive ruin?
The whole circumstances are far from creditable and—some
people would even say—suspicious.
There is, however, another circumstance or two connected
with this affair which the world may think requires explana-
tion. A line was projected and passed the legislature—if we
remember rightly previously to this—from Darlington to
Newcastle. To what circumstance is it owing that whilst
this, from Darlington to York, was pressed forward in all
haste, not a sod was touched upon the other. Were the
quaker coal owners of South Durham anxious only for the
public, or afraid a little that their monopoly of the Yorkshire
markets might be interfered with by the coal of North Dur-
ham and Northumberland ? Again, who was the chairman
of the parliamentary committee by whom the line to York,
with its insufficient estimates, was sanctioned? Was it not
one of the members for South Durham, himself a large
shareholder, and now treasurer of the company ? Did that
gentleman know that the engineer, the solicitor and the wit-
nesses, one and all, were bamboozling the innocent members
by their cut and carved estimates ? We presume not to say ;
for truth itself and the disciples of George Fox are reported
to be most intimate acquaintances.
Setting aside, however, these merely personal considera-
tions, who, we ask, can deny that this case—and we fear
many similar ones might be discovered—furnishes materials
for the serious consideration of parliiiment and the public,
with a view to prevent its future recurrence. All that we
have to guide us in forming investments in public under-.
takings of any kind, is our confidence in the statements of

those conducting them. The legislature affects to institute
a scrutiny into the correctness of estimates and other matters
connected with railways ; and that scrutiny should be some-
thing more than an expensive mockery, such as it is at pre-
sent. The best tribunal of inquiry may, however, be misled
by engineers, of the accommodating morality of Mr. Storey,
and directors, with consciences so peculiar as the Quaker
gentlemen above referred to ; and the only curative resource
that we can imagine in such a case is, that wherever wilful
perversion or suppression of the truth can be proved against
either directors or engineers. the shareholder—who is ordi-
narily made to pay the penalty—should be not only relieved
of his responsibilities, but provided with a remedy against
the parties by whom he has been duped. Let it be a valid
plea to an uction for calls, and a sufficient ground for an
action of damages as well, that fraud has been practised upon
the legislature or the shareholder; and we shall havefewer
private speculations carried out at the cost of the public!
PROPOSED UNION OF THE SHEFFIELD AND MANCHESTER

AND BIRMINGHAM AND MANCHESTER RAILWAY COMPA-

The following letter appears in the Railway Tinzes of this
week. We know nothing of the rumour referred to, and can
at present give no opinion with respect to its probability or
the prudence of the union in question. In one respect, how-
ever, we differ from the writer. Our firm impression is that
if any party will be benefitted, that party is the Manchester
and Birmingham Company. The Sheffield is, at bottom, the
better concern of the two. All, however, will depend upon
the terms agreed upon between the respective companies :