minute; after they had pushed the company up to the highest bid, they
well knew that this was above what they could get in the after
arbitration, and "closed," withdrawing their opposition the last day
in the Committee room. The opposition company, besides the grounds of
insufficient need for a new line, etc., always supports and comforts
the opposing landowners: but the great resource of the opposing
company is to hire a landowner to oppose, especially a local attorney
or agent who owns land proposed to be taken by the new line. Such an
attorney, employed professionally by the opposing company, cannot be
bought off at any price; he is a real Naboth, and in his character of
a dispossessed landowner he will fight for the company every point
that they cannot decently fight for themselves.

Opposing a railway bill in Parliament has thus become an art; so much
so, that no independent small line can be made unless they can get
the support of one (at least) of the great companies that are
supposed to occupy the area. The lines made (economically often) by
the great companies themselves are not primarily designed for the
accommodation of the public, but for the private purposes of the
great company; sometimes they are made merely to diddle another great
company.

It is well to compare the law regarding making a new railway with
that for making a new main-drain in the fens. In the latter case the
new drain company receives extraordinary powers and may put a rate on
the land benefited. In the case of a railway passing through a farm,
the common estimate is that it adds a shilling an acre value to the
rent of the farm; if there is a station on the farm it often adds
much more to the agricultural value. Landlords are up to this: a
landlord triumphantly told me, "I got L7000 from that company for