e railway were not yet quite satisfied; and a
third journey was made to Killingworth, in January, 1825, by several
gentlemen of the committee, accompanied by practical engineers, for the
purpose of being personal eye-witnesses of what steam-carriages were able
to perform upon a railway. There they saw a train, consisting of a
locomotive and loaded waggons, weighing in all 54 tons, travelling at the
average rate of about 7 miles an hour, the greatest speed being about 9.5
miles an hour. But when the engine was run with only one waggon attached
containing twenty gentlemen, five of whom were engineers, the speed
attained was from 10 to 12 miles an hour.

In the mean time the survey was proceeded with, in the face of great
opposition from the proprietors of the lands through which the railway
was intended to pass. The prejudices of the farming and labouring
classes were strongly excited against the persons employed upon the
ground, and it was with the greatest difficulty that the levels could be
taken. At one place, Stephenson was driven off the ground by the
keepers, and threatened to be ducked in the pond if found there again.
The farmers also turned out their men to watch the surveying party, and
prevent them entering upon any lands where they had the power of driving
them off.

One of the proprietors declared that he would order his game-keepers to
shoot or apprehend any persons attempting a survey over his property.
But one moonlight night a survey was obtained by the following ruse.
Some men, under the orders of the surveying party, were set to fire off
guns in a particular quarter; on which all the game-keepers on the watch
made off in that direction, and they were drawn away to such a distance
in pursuit of the supposed poachers, as to enable a rapid survey to be
made during their absence.

When the canal companies found that the Liverpool merchants were
determined to proceed with their scheme--that they had completed their
survey, and were ready to apply to Parliament for an Act to enable them
to form the railway--they at last reluctantly, and with a bad grace, made
overtures of conciliation. They promised to employ steam-vessels both on
the Mersey and on the Canal. One of the companies offered to reduce its
length by three miles, at a considerable outlay. At the same time they
made a show of lowering their rates. But it was too late; for the
project of the railway had now gone so far that the promoters (