ABSTRACT

THUS once more, thanks to the brilliant advocacy of Sir EdmundBeckett, Mr. Oakley's great talent as a witness, and above all, to the straightforward honesty of its policy, the Great Northern had gained a notable victory in Parliament. Such successes, however, prove often of doubtful advantage, and certainly the shareholders by this time had reasons for wishing that the Company's many applications to Parliament in the earlier seventies had not been quite so favourably received. For it was no longer possible to disguise the fact that in the flush of exceptional prosperity and under the pressure from outside of many powerful influences, some "political," others local, the Company had then committed itself to a greater number of extensions than it could possibly carry out simultaneously without decline of dividend. Even if they had been its only liabilities, and could have been carried out under continuously favourable conditions, these extensions must have involved some loss of profit. Accompanied as they had been by other unforeseen, but very large, liabilities for the maintenance and improvement of the existing system, and needing to be completed, as they now did, at a time of depressed trade, they had become a burden which was grievous to be borne.