producing towns of Cheshire. The system of the Shropshire
Union railways and canal company, which is connected by lease with the
London & North-Western railway company, carries considerable traffic,
especially in the neighbourhood of Ellesmere Port. In the Black
Country and neighbourhood the numerous ramifications of the Birmingham
Canal navigations bear a large mineral traffic. This system is
connected with the rivers Severn and Trent and the canal system of the
country at large, and is controlled by the London & North-Western
company. The principal line of navigation from the Thames northward to
the midlands is that of the Grand Junction, which runs from Brentford,
is connected through London with the port of London by the Regent's
Canal, and follows closely the main line of the North-Western railway.
It connects with the Oxford Canal at Braunston in Northamptonshire,
and through this with canals to Birmingham and the midlands, and
continues to Leicester. Both the Severn up to Stourport and the Thames
up to Oxford have a fair traffic, but the Thames and Severn Canal is
not much used. There is some traffic on the navigable drainage cuts
and rivers of the Fens, but beyond these, in a broad consideration of
the waterways of England from the point of view of their commercial
importance, it is unnecessary to go.

See H. R. De Salis, _Bradshaw's Canals and Navigable Rivers of England
and Wales_ (London, 1904); _Report_ of Royal Commission on Canals
(London, 1909).

_Oversea Communications._--The chief ports for continental passenger
traffic are as follows:--

_Harwich_ to Amsterdam, Antwerp, Hamburg, Hook of Holland, Rotterdam
(Great Eastern railway); to Copenhagen and Esbjerg (Royal Danish mail
route).

_Queenborough_ to Flushing; (Zeeland Steamship company).

_Dover_ to Calais (South-Eastern & Chatham railway); to Ostend
(Belgian Royal mail steamers).

_Folkestone_ to Boulogne (South Eastern & Chatham railway).

_Newhaven_ to Dieppe (London, Brighton & South Coast railway).

_Southampton_ to Cherbourg, Havre, St Malo (South-Western railway).

The chief ports for trans-Atlantic traffic are Liverpool and
Southampton, and special trains are worked in connexion with the
steamers to and from London. The great development of harbour
accommodation at Dover early in the 20th century brought
trans-Atlantic traffic to this port also. Southampton a