to see up-to-date condition of the harbour under the management of that Company, I solicited the requisite permission, and have to thank the officials, in general, and Capt. Lewis, in particular, for their courtesy in imparting to me the information here set forth. In the course of conversation I incidentally asked to “What think you of the prospects of the Hastings Harbour now in course of construction?” The reply to this question (accompanied by a smile) was “it is one thing to build a harbour and another thing to maintain it. The expense alone of keeping in the water and keeping out the drift is enormous”. Thus, although my object in going to Newhaven was purely one of historical enquiry, I became convinced that a harbour should be safe to enter, commodious when entered, and have not only a railway at its side, but also a navigable water-way behind it. I have been assured that even Rye Harbour could be endowed with all these advantages if sufficient capital were invested in the operation, though such an investment would have to be a large one. But these conditions cannot possibly be obtained at Hastings, and that fact will probably be realised by the harbour promoters when too late.
Having thus traced the history of the London, Brighton and South-Coast Railway Company in connection with the Hastings and St. Leonards and followed the Company’s course until it became associated with the West of France Railway Company in the formation of the Newhaven Harbour Company; having also described the vast up-to-date enlargements and improvements of that harbour, I will return to the Railway Company, by a attaching a cutting from the Brighton Herald of its report of half-yearly meeting of the Company in 1889. In that report, as well as in the Company’s own report, is mentioned the agreement with the South-Eastern Railway Company — an agreement which, of whatsoever advantage it might be to the Companies themselves, was rightly or wrongly regarded as inimical to the interests of Hastings and St. Leonards. — To the credit of the South-Coast Company, however, be it said that until quite recently, that Company was the pioneer in railway improvements. It was the first to place third-class carriages to every train, and the first to adopt vastly improved carriages. It was the first to apply the new system of breaks (sic), and it led the way in some other facilities, including the electric light in carriages.
The half-yearly meeting of the shareholders of the London and Brighton Railway Company was held on Wednesday afternoon at London Bridge, under the presidency of the Chairman of the Directors (Mr. Samuel Laing), who was supported by the other members of the Board and the chief officials of the Company, including the General Manager and Secretary (Mr Allen Sarle). The report showed a large increase of traffic (due partly to the fine weather, partly to the Paris Exhibition, but chiefly to a general development of traffic over the system). In comparison with the corresponding half-year of 1888, there had been an increase of £67,933 in the gross revenue, and an increase of £21,274 in the working expenses; the total receipts being about £6,000 more and the expenses about £6,000 more than shown by the published monthly returns, owing to a reserve having been made to meet the possible result of Mr Oakley’s award between this Company and the South-Eastern Company. Under this award the Company would have to pay the South-Eastern Company under the two agreements, for the use of the Red Hill lines and for the division of the competitive traffic, about £20,000 a year instead of about £14,000 a year, which has been the average payment for the last three years under the competitive traffic agreement.
In reference to a circular issued in support of a resolution against affording facilities for Sunday travelling by excursion trains and cheap fares, on the ground “that such a course is really beneficial neither to the public nor to the Company,” the Directors intimated that, apart from any question of the effect on the Company's dividends, they intended to oppose this resolution, as there could be no doubt that trains were only run to meet the demand of the public for these facilities, and any restriction in them, which would obviously have to be accompanied by similar restrictions on Sunday traffic by steam vessels, omnibuses, and other conveyances, was a large question of public policy which no single Railway Company could be allowed to decide in a sense adverse to established practice and the wishes of the general community. The Chairman, in moving the adoption of the report, congratulated the shareholders on the conclusion of the arbitration with the South-Eastern Company, which he believed both sides would loyally accept, and, though it would make their future dividends worse by £5,000 or £6,000, the advantages of peace were cheaply purchased at that price. (Hear, hear.) He stigmatised as ridiculous and absurd the suggestion that this Company had been keeping up its sleeve a scheme for crossing the river to Cannon-street. The increase of traffic during the past year had far surpassed his most sanguine expectations, not having been paralleled since the present Board came into office. Searching for any exceptional causes for this increase, he found that the Paris Exhibition had affected the railway traffic favourably to the extent of £4,000, and the steamers to the extent of £3,000; whilst Eastertide had yielded an increase of £5,500; Whitsuntide, which was wet, led to a loss of £1,450; whilst the Derby yielded a surplus of £450. All the rest of the increase, namely, £56,500, was attributable to the regular expansion of the ordinary traffic (hear, hear), and, as usual, that was mainly due to the increase of third-class traffic, which had contributed £31,000. He warned the shareholders that that expansion might not be repeated in the current half-year, but at the same time they might congratulate themselves on having passed the goal of 6 per cent., and that the prospect of its being maintained looked exceedingly favourable.
