e issued, the company formed, and the directors
appointed, with only the terminal points surveyed. In the Ely railway,
not one person connected with the country through which it was to pass,
subscribed the title deed.

"The engineers who were examined in favour of particular lines, promised
all and everything in their evidence. It was humourously said of them,
'they plunge through the bowels of mountains; they undertake to drain
lakes; they bridge valleys with viaducts; their steepest gradients are
gentle undulations; their curves are lines of beauty; they interrupt no
traffic; they touch no prejudice.'

"Labour of all kinds increased in demand. The price of iron rose from
sixty-eight shillings to one-hundred-and-twenty per ton. Money remained
abundant. Promoters received their tens and twenties of thousands.
Rumours of sudden fortunes were very plentiful. Estates were purchased
by those who were content with their gains; and, to crown the whole, a
grave report was circulated, that Northumberland House, with its princely
reminiscences, and palatial grandeur, was to be bought by the South
Western. Many of the railways attained prices which staggered reasonable
men. The more worthless the article, the greater seemed the struggle to
obtain it. Premiums of 5 and 6 pounds were matters of course, even where
there were four or five competitors for the road. One company, which
contained a clause to lease it at three-and-a-half per Cent., for 999
years, rose to twenty premium, so mad were the many to speculate.

"Every branch of commerce participated in the advantages of an increased
circulation. The chief articles of trade met with large returns; profits
were regular; and all luxuries which suited an affluent community,
procured an augmented sale. Banking credit remained facile; interest
still kept low; money, speaking as they of the City speak, could be had
for next to nothing. It was advanced on everything which bore a value,
whether readily convertible, or not. Bill brokers would only allow
one-and-a-half per cent. for cash; and what is one-and-a-half to men who
revelled in the thought of two hundred? The exchanges remained
remarkably steady. The employment of the labourer on the new lines, of
the operative in the factory, of the skilled artisan in the workshop, of
the clerk at the desk, tended to add to the delusive feeling, and was one
of the forms in which, for a time, the population was benefitted. But,