compensating the Families of Persons Killed by Accidents," became law.
This enactment was due principally to the railway accidents that
occurred. They were relatively more numerous than they are now, for the
many modern appliances for ensuring safety had not then been introduced.
The Act provided that compensation would be for the benefit of wife,
husband, parent and child of the person whose death shall have been
caused. The Act did not apply to Scotland. Perhaps it was because the
laws of the two countries differed more then than now, and the life of
the railways in Scotland was young, England being well ahead. Probably
England thought she was doing enough when she legislated for herself by
passing this Act. It must be observed, however, that the Act applies to
Ireland as well as England.

In the year 1854 Parliament considered that _regulations_ were necessary
to further control the companies and passed an important statute, the
_Railway and Canal Traffic Act_. Known, for short, in railway parlance,
as "the Act of '54," its main provisions dealt with:--

Reasonable facilities for receiving and forwarding traffic
The subject of undue preference, which was forbidden
Railways forming part of continuous lines to receive and forward
through traffic without obstruction
The liability of railway companies for loss of, or damage to, goods or
animals

and it preserved to railway companies the _protection_ of the _Carriers'
Act_, to which I have referred.

The Select Committees of 1858 and 1863 sat on the subject of the great
length of time and the immense cost which railway promotion in those days