[Picture: Punch Illustration]

CHAPTER XXVI.

The Railway Mania--Deposit of plans.

The accompanying illustration from _Punch_ (18 Oct.) justly holds up to
ridicule the Railway Mania, which might then be said to have been at its
height. It is called "THE MARCH OF SPECULATION.--'This is the young
Gent, as takes my Business, Mem. I'm agoin' into the Railway--Director
Line myself.'"

As a proof of this Madness, see this paragraph: "Oct. 25. During the
past week there were announced, in three newspapers, eighty-nine new
schemes, with a capital of 84,055,000 pounds; during the month, there
were 357 new schemes announced, with an aggregate capital of 332,000,000
pounds."

On 17 Nov. the _Times_ published a table of all the railway companies
registered up to the 31st October, numbering 1,428, and involving an
outlay of 701,243,208 pounds. "Take away," it said, "140,000,000 pounds
for railways completed, or in progress, exclude all the most extravagant
schemes, and divide the remainder by ten, can we add, from our present
resources, even a tenth of the vast remainder? Can we add 50,000,000
pounds to the railway speculations we are irretrievably embarked in? We
cannot, without the most ruinous, universal and desperate confusion."

Here is a Parody on the situation, 1 Nov.:

"There was a sound, that ceased not day or night,
Of speculation. London gathered then
Unwonted crowds, and moved by promise bright,
To Capel Court rushed women, boys and men,
All seeking railway shares and scrip; and when
The market rose, how many a lad could tell
With joyous glance, and eyes that spake again,
'Twas e'en more lucrative than marrying well;--
When, hark, that warning voice strikes like a rising knell.

Nay, it is nothing, empty as the wind,
But a "bear" whisper down Throgmorton Street;
Wild enterprise shall still be unconfined;
No rest for us, when rising premiums greet
The morn, to pour their treasures at our feet;--
When, hark! that solemn sound is heard once more,
The gathering bears its echoes yet repeat--
'Tis but too true, is now the general roar,
The Bank has raised her rate, as she has done before.

And then, and there were hurryings to and fro,
And anxious thoughts, and signs of sad distress,
Faces all pale, that, but an hour ago
Smiled at the thought of their own craftines