nterprise as connected with the Midland Railway has
been told in a very bulky volume by Mr. J. Williams. I learn from it
that forty years have elapsed since, originating in the necessity of a
few coal-owners, it has gradually stretched out its iron arms till its
ramifications are to be found in all parts of the land. Actually, up to
the present time it has involved an expenditure of fifty millions, and
its annual revenue reaches five. Daily--hourly, it rushes, with its
heavy load of tourists, or holiday-makers, or men of business, past the
ancient manor-houses of Wingfield, Haddon, and Rousbery; the abbeys of
St. Albans, Leicester, Newstead, Kirkstall, Beauchief, and Evesham; the
castles of Someries, Skipton, Sandal, Berkeley, Tamworth, Hay, Clifford,
Codnor, Ashby, Nottingham, Leicester, Lincoln, and Newark; the
battle-fields of St. Albans, Bosworth, Wakefield, Tewkesbury, and
Evesham.

But it is to that part of the line between Carlisle and Settle that I
would more particularly refer--that boon to the southern tourist who, as
the writer did, takes his seat in a Midland carriage at St. Pancras, and
finds himself, without a change of carriage, the next morning at Greenock
in time for the far-famed breakfasts on board the _Iona_. The ordinary
traveller has no idea of the difficulties which at one time lay between
him and his journey's end. "It is a very rare thing," once said Mr.
Allport, the great Midland Railway manager, a name honoured everywhere,
"for me to go down to Carlisle without being turned out twice. Then,
although some of the largest towns in England are upon the Midland
system, there is no through carriage to Edinburgh, unless we occasionally
have a family going down, and then we make an especial arrangement, and
apply for a special carriage to go through. We have applied in vain for
through carriages to Scotland over and over again." And so the Midland
had no alternative but to have a line of their own. When it was known at
Appleby that their Bill had passed the Commons, the church bells were
rung, and, as was quaintly remarked, the people wrote to the newspapers,
and did all that was proper under the circumstances. No wonder Appleby
rejoiced and was glad; for, though the county town of Westmoreland, it is
not much of a place after all, and the railway must have been a boon to
the natives--especially to the ladies, who otherwise, it is to be feared,
would have wasted their sweetness on the desert