A list of all the private bills applied for during the present session of Parliament, for which a subscription contract, or undertaking in lieu of a subscription contract, has been deposited in the Private Bill-office, stating the amount of the estimate for each work, of the capital stock to be raised in each case, and the sum authorized to be borrowed over and above such capital stock; and showing the total amount of the estimates, capital, and money to be borrowed for each class of works.

Some incredulous persons express their wonder, "Where all the money is to come from to meet these undertakings." "Do not despair," we say. With Consols nearly at par, and money easily to be had at 2 per cent, without a single onepound note in circulation on this side the Tweed, and a national income increasing at the rate of fifty millions per annum, there seems no ground for serious apprehension of forthcoming instalments, if not from the present shareholders, from others who may purchase their liabilities. At all events, there will be something to show for the outlay; by interlacing the whole island with iron roads, there will be a useful result, which is more than can be said of every expenditure-the subsiding continental princes to wit, or sending out capital to work foreign mines, to open foreign roads, or fish up Spanish galleons in the bay of Vigo.

The flow of money to railways has certainly diverted the surplus resources of the country from investment in the funds, keeping down the prices of these securities, and preventing a saving of public revenue, by a reduction of interest in the Three per Cents. This appears the chief drawback, and is likely to continue so long as the whole world almost is making tempting offers for the loan of British capital, to insure the facilities of railway communications.

Meanwhile, let us glance at the advances of other nations in this direction. England has the honour of having set the example, and made the first start in this line of local improvement. The success which attended the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway became the signal not only for the extension of the railway system throughout England, but

had far more extensive influence. It at once awakened the emulation of the principal nations of Europe, most of which have been prompt to acknowledge the importance of rapid and extensive communication for the development of their resources. Belgium has since put into practical operation a system of railways, which, considering the extent of that kingdom, is the most complete in existence. France, though sensibly alive to the benefits thus to be realized, was for a period slow in her advances, but has at length entered upon the work with a degree of energy befitting her rank and power. The various German states have already done much, and are in the way of accomplishing more, towards bringing together the members of the great German family; and even Russia, which had made small beginnings in railways, is now occupied upon projects of a gigantic character, far exceeding anything hitherto done in Europe.

A still greater impulse has been given by our success to the energies of the citizens of the United States. Their widely extended, rapidly-increasing territory, and still more rapidlyincreasing population, and developed resources, rendered the extension of their means of intercommunication an indispensable condition to the maintenance of the federative union; nor have they been slow in applying, with economical amend ments, the corrective advances of our railway engineers. The adoption of these improvements in locomotion in the States, dates little more than ten years back from the present time, and already there are 150 railroads constructed and in operation throughout the Union, measuring in the aggregate nearly 6,000 miles.*

Countries mostly inert and unimpressible by passing changes appear to have shown signs of animation, and have been roused to exertion by the pervading passion. Joint-stock companies have been formed, and various lines of railway projected for improving the local communication of Spain, Portugal, and Italy. The Pope was at first opposed to the iron inroad into the Papal States, but has yielded to the general impulse; and a tour from Turin to Milan, and thence to Venice, and southward through Florence, to Rome and Naples, it is likely will, ere long, be an excursion of easy, economical, and expeditious accomplishment.

* Mr. Lyell, in his recent Geological Tour in the United States, often refers to the increased facilities he experienced from the new mode of transit; flying from north to south, from climate to climate, almost with the speed of a bird. "In less than four weeks," says he, "since we left Boston we have passed from the 43d to the 33d degree of latitude, carried often by the power of steam for several hundred miles, through thinly-peopled wildernesses, yet sleeping every night at good inns, and contrasting the facilities of locomotion in this new country with the difficulties we had contended with the year before, when travelling in Europe, through populous parts of Touraine, Brittany, and other provinces of France."-Travels in North America, I., 154.

Our own colonies and foreign possessions promise to share largely in the utilities of the new application. In Jamaica, Barbadoes, and other West India islands, railways have been constructed, or are in preparation. From west to east, from north to south, there is no region of the globe scarcely to which the movement has not extended. The chief cities of Hindostan are proposed to be connected by railways, and Mr. B. M. Stephenson's able report on the subject has been sanctioned by the Court of Directors. Surveys have been made, levels taken, gradients calculated, and the expense per mile and amount of traffic estimated on the route for the Great Eastern Railway, from Calcutta to Bombay, passing through the valley of the Nerbudda. So great was the enthusiasm for this undertaking in Bombay, that applications were made for 4,000 shares beyond the number fixed by the prospectus.

Meanwhile, no abatement of force has been felt at the first fountain-head of this iron deluge. Much of the capital for these foreign undertakings is of British derivation, but apparently without enfeebling the springs of domestic enterprise. Railway speculations were never more rife in England than at this moment, and new projects are being brought forward at the rate of a dozen per week. For all these births, or nearly so-for we hear of few abortions-individuals are found ready to subscribe, "to plight their troth," and be forthcoming when called upon. Before us is an alphabetical list of the names,* descriptions, and places of abode, of all persons subscribing to the amount of £2,000 and upwards to any railway subscription contract deposited in the Private Bill-office during the past session of Parliament. † From this document it appears that the total number of railways subscribed for is 209; the number of subscribers, 5,513; and the total of their contract subscriptions amounts to £61,603,707: averaging £11,174 each. In this real or nominal moneyed phalanx there are few persons of title, peers of the realm, and notables of that sort; they mostly belong to the middle class, chiefly merchants, manufacturers, engineers, contractors, and share-brokers, with a profuse sprinkling of the equivocal denomination passing under the cognomen of "gentlemen." Nor are their resi

*We say names, because the number of actual persons may be less, there being instances of many applying for shares, and signing the subscription contract, under fictitious names; obtaining letters of allotment, and perhaps scrip, under each signature. These are the gamblers in shares for premiums; besides these are others, whose motives are often not less selfish in promoting share companies—namely, engineers, solicitors, surveyors, and secretaries, whose aims are offices, jobs, and employment. Independent of these is a third class, who seek only a good investment for their capital, or the advancement of local improvements.

† Parliamentary Paper, No. 319, Aug., 1845.

dences principally in the metropolis, but generally throughout the kingdom, especially the manufacturing districts. The speculative mania, indeed, seems to rage more violently in the country than in town; Liverpool and Manchester are reported to be delirious, and Leeds raving mad for "shares ;" each of these places has its bourse, or stock-exchange and share-market, of which the prices and monetary transactions form as regular an item of the daily London papers, as those of Capel Court. "And what will it all end in?" is the often-repeated interrogatory. The poor are frequently taxed with imprudence; but what excuse can be urged for the recklessness of the rich? Pecuniary ruin will doubtless be the result to many; still, we flatter ourselves a general benefit will survive the revulsion: and the present fever, like preceding ones, must run its course. The patient is plethoric, and must be bled; the Plutonian stream might flow into more noxious, or less fertilizing, channels than mending the highways and byways of the United Kingdom and the world.

LEAVES TORN FROM A RECORD OF LIFE.

BY THE AUTHORESS OF "OLD PICTURES," "FLIRTING AND COQUETRY."

"NoT exert myself for her sake, dear sir? Impossible! I should be a worthless being indeed if I did not. Only try me, sir; give me such a motive for exertion, and you shall see how resolute, how steady, I become. If once I may call her mine, I shall have such a motive for exertion as will make me break through every former habit, and become all that Mary or you could wish." ""Tis in vain you ask me," replied Mr. Dornford; "I will not risk the happiness of my only child. What security can I

have of your steadiness and application?"

"My word, sir," answered the young man, with a slight accent of offended pride. "Can you think I would break a solemn promise? I'm far too much the gentleman."

"I should be much better satisfied if you could tell me you were too much a man of integrity, of perseverance, of industry.

These are the qualities which I should value in the proposed husband of my daughter. You tell me you are a gentleman, and I know you to be a young man of talent, birth, and good manners. Now what have these things done for you? Why did you leave your last situation?"

"Oh, father, consider that Henry had been accustomed all his life to associate with the higher classes: the drudgery of a counting-house, the vulgar companions-all were new and disgusting to him," exclaimed Mary Dornford.

"Just so!" observed her father; "he is too much the gentleman for his associates, and, notwithstanding he knows himself to be almost penniless, has not resolution or industry to submit to circumstances and carve his way to fortune. No: with my consent you never shall have my daughter. Idleness leads to every other vice; the man who is ashamed to work has no scruple about gambling, and never shall my child's happiness rest on the throw of a dice-box or the colour of a card.”

Henry Sullivan was the only son of a wealthy manufacturer, who, with all the eagerness of a nouveau riché, that his humble origin might be forgotten, had bestowed on his son a first-rate education, according to the modern term, which implies that a youth should acquire a smattering knowledge of languages, a few extrinsic accomplishments, and the sublime arts of driving, dancing, and drinking, while the principal concern of his parents in the choice of a school is the number of titled and wealthy connexions he is likely to form. The school or " establishment where young Sullivan was placed was recommended principally by being also the residence of several young noblemen and wealthy heirs; and, as he was found to be generous as well as rich, he soon became a bosom friend to some who found it convenient to draw upon him for the settlement of their accounts. to drink his wine, and join "gratis" in his parties, while he poor fellow, thought them most sincerely his friends, and would never have been undeceived had not his father died suddenly, just before his departure for Oxford, leaving his affairs in a state of insolvency.

To Henry's affectionate heart, the sudden death of his only parent was a sufficient blow; but when he found that he was left in a state of utter destitution, his reason almost gave way. Need we record the bitter disappointment he experienced when he applied to his former friends for assistance? How he recoiled from the cold, contemptuous tone, the haughty stare, the deliberate insults, with which the one and another treated him! Surely such things are of too common occurrence to excite interest. We will sketch his subsequent career.

An old friend of his father offered him a situation in his counting-house, as foreign clerk, promising an increase of salary at the end of a year. Henry was grateful, and determined to exert himself, but he soon became disgusted with the monotonous