heaviest goods. There a single engine draws a load of fifty tons at the rate of six miles an hour, and has been known to convey a load of passengers at fifteen miles. Higher speeds are thought to be possible——” 

 “I’ll never believe it!” Wolley growled, anxious to assert himself. 

 “But not desirable,” Ovington continued blandly. “At any rate, if we wait too long——” 

 “There’s no talk of waiting!” Acherley exclaimed. Neither he nor Sir Charles was in the habit of meeting on an equal footing the men with whom they were sitting to-day; he found the position galling, and what was to be done he was anxious should be done quickly. He had heard the banker’s exordium before. 

 “No, we are here to act,” Ovington assented, with an eye on Grounds, for whose benefit he had been talking. “But on sober and well-considered lines. We are all agreed, I think, that such a railroad will be a benefit to the trade and district?” 

 Now, to this proposition not one of those present would have assented a year before. “Steam railroads?” they would have cried, “fantastic and impossible!” But the years 1823 and 1824 had been years not only of great prosperity but of abnormal progress. The seven lean years, the years of depression and repression, which had followed Waterloo had come to an end. The losses of war had been made good, and simultaneously a more liberal spirit had been infused into the Government. Men had breathed freely, had looked about them, had begun to hope and to venture, to talk of a new world. Demand had overtaken and outrun supply, large profits had been made, money had become cheap, and, fostered by credit, the growth of enterprise throughout the country had been marvellous. It was as if, after the frosts of winter, the south wind had blown and sleeping life had everywhere awakened. Men doubled their operations and still had money to spare. They put the money in the funds—the funds rose until they paid no more than three per cent. Dissatisfied, men sought other channels for their savings, nor sought in vain. Joint Stock Companies arose on every side. Projects, good and bad, sprang up like mushrooms in a night. Old lodes and new harbors, old canals and new fisheries, were taken in hand, and for all these there seemed to be capital. Shares rose to a premium before the companies were floated, and soon the bounds of our shores were found to be too narrow for British enterprise. At that moment the separation of the South American countries from Spain fell out, and these were at once seen to offer new outlets. The romantic 

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