important
work, if it were possible, to decide exactly what undertakings a
government should take upon itself, and what it should leave to the free
action of other people; but it is impossible to lay down any precise
rules upon this subject. The characters and habits and circumstances of
nations differ so much, that what is good in one case might be bad in
another. Thus in Russia the government makes all the railways, and the
same is the case in the Australian States; but it does not at all follow
that, because this is necessary or desirable in those countries,
therefore it is desirable in England, or Ireland, or the United States.
Experience shows that though the English Post Office is very profitable,
the Postal Telegraphs cannot at present be made to pay. There can be no
doubt that #it would be altogether ruinous to put the enormous system of
English railways under the management of government officers#. Each case
has thus to be judged upon its own merits, and all that the political
economist can do is to point out the general advantages and
disadvantages of government management.

#93. The Advantage of Government Management.# There is often immense
economy in having a single establishment to do a certain kind of work
for the whole country. For instance, a weather office in London can get
daily telegraphic reports of the weather in all parts of the kingdom and
many parts of Europe; combining and comparing these reports it can form
a much better opinion about the coming weather than would be possible to
private persons, and this opinion can be rapidly made known by the
telegraph and newspapers. The few thousand pounds spent by the
government yearly on the meteorological office are inconsiderable
compared with the services which it may render to the public by
preventing shipwrecks, colliery explosions, and other great disasters
and inconveniences which often arise from our ignorance of the coming
weather. It is certainly proper then to make meteorological observation
one of the functions of government.

Great economy would arise, again, if an establishment like the
post-office were created in Great Britain in order to convey small goods
and parcels. At present there are a great number of parcel companies,
but they often send a cart a long way to deliver a single parcel. In
London some half a dozen independent companies send carts all over the
immense town; each of the chief railway companies has its own system of
del