three months. During that time some of the first statistical, scientific, and engineering authorities gave voluntary evidence on the subject. The Report, on the 12th of October, was brought up and ordered to be printed."
In the progress of their enquiry, the Committee extended their examination to the principal objections which had been urged to the application of steam on common roads. These were, the danger of explosion, the annoyance to travellers, the fright occasioned to horses by the noise of the machinery, and the smoke and steam which escape at the chimney. The committee state, that they are led to believe, by the result of their enquiries, that the substitution of inanimate for animal power on common roads, is one of the most important improvements in internal communication ever introduced; that its practicability has been fully established; that tolls to an amount which would utterly prohibit the introduction of steam-carriages have been imposed on some roads; that on others the trustees have adopted measures which place such carriages in an unfair position compared with ordinary coaches; and that the causes of these measures are two-fold,—1st, A determination on the part of the trustees to obstruct as much as possible the use of steam as a propelling power; and, 2d. The misapprehension of its effects on roads. The committee consider that legislative protection should be extended to steam-carriages with the least possible delay. Their Report goes on to say,—
"Without increase of cost, we shall obtain a power which will insure a rapidity of internal communication far beyond the utmost speed of horses in draught.
"Nor are the advantages of steam power confined to the greater velocity attained, or to its greater cheapness than horse draught. In the latter, danger is increased, in as large a proportion as expense, by greater speed. In steam power, on the contrary, 'there is no danger of being run away with,
