"There are other parts of the report equally fallacious, and incorrect conclusions have been drawn therefrom, to which we shall refer hereafter. It is absurd to assert that the Cunard Company obtain any support from the British Government beyond what appears on the face of the contract, namely, £145,000 per annum." STATISTICS OF THE UNION CANAL, PENNSYLVANIA. The Annual Report of the Managers of the Union Canal Company of Pennsylvanis to the Stockholders, made at their annual meeting, February 4th, 1851, has been published. It furnishes a clear and comprehensive statement of the business of the canal during the past year, and full statistics from its opening in 1828. We give below a statement of the tonnage of the several articles which passed the Union Canal from January, 1850, to January, 1851, and also a comparative statement of tonnage, tolls, &c., from its opening to the close of 1850. STATEMENT OF THE TONNAGE WHICH PASSED THE UNION CANAL FROM JANUARY, 1850, TO JANUARY, 1851. 65,181 Plaster..... 3,599 Lime, 33,485 bushels 239 Cord wood, 2,008 cords 6,095 Whisky, 426 barrels. 342 1.196 2,690 385 79 280 57 3,179 128,438 COMPARATIVE STATEMENT OF THE BUSINESS OF THE UNION CANAL FROM ITS OPENING TO The following gentlemen were elected at the annual meeting in February, 1851, to manage the affairs of the company during that year: Robert B. Davidson, President. Henry Bohlen, Herman Cope, P. F. Fontanges, William Riehle, Jr., David Lapsley, Edmund G. Dutilh, William R. White, Joseph Jeanes, James Magee, Seth Craige, R. Rundle Smith, and John Holmes, Managers Oscar Thompson, Treasurer and Secretary. PHILADELPHIA, WILMINGTON, AND BALTIMORE RAILROAD. By a resolution adopted in March, 1850, the fiscal year of the Philadelphia, Wilmington, and Baltimore Railroad Company is made to terminate on the 30th of November in each year, instead of the 31st of December as heretofore. By the Annual Report of the Directors, made January 13, 1851, it appears that the receipts of the company from January 1 to November 31, inclusive, (eleven months,) have been as follows: From passengers. Freight and express. Mail and rents. Total. The expenses, including maintenance of way, were $198,475 60; general and miscellaneous, $20,279 97; the interest accrued on all debts to November 30 was $121,796; to which add due construction fund for interest accrued on instalments on new stock, January 1, 1849, to October 1, 1850, $14,175; interest and construction fund amounting to $135,971, from which deduct interest received, $72,170 64; the total expenses amounted to $342,555 94. The receipts of the New Castle Line during same period, from all sources, amounted to $137,247 66. The expenses, including tax on capital, and interest on debts, were $102,158 44. The aggregate of eleven months' receipts were $640,435 87, and the surplus receipts, $195,721 48. After paying two dividends, in April of 14 per cent, and in October of 2 per cent, amounting to $135,885 75, there remained a balance from the business of eleven months, $59,835 73. The number of passengers transported over the railroad in both directions, through and way, in each year between 1846 and 1850, was as follows: 11 months. Adding passengers for the month of December in the same proportion in which they passed over the road in the first eleven months of the year, and it will be perceived that the aggregate number for 1850 would be 324,300, a very considerable increase upon the previous years. The number of passengers carried on the railroad one mile, in each of the following years, was as follows: The $350,000 new stock (7,000 shares) subscribed in 1848, to provide means for paying the floating debt, and to furnish a stated sum for construction or new work, has been paid in full; certificates have been issued therefor, and the matter closed without default. The receipts and expenses of the company for three years have been as follows:Expenses and interest. Surplus. Receipts. or nearly 4 6-10ths per cent per annum, on the outstanding capital of $3,850,000. The road is now being relaid with a heavy rail, and will probably be completed during the present year. The company have fortunately secured the services of S. M. FELTON, Esq., as President, who was in charge of the construction of the Fitchburg Railroad, and afterwards its superintendent. That road has been one of the best managed and most successful in the country. Mr. F. is, moreover, a most accomplished civil engineer, and his large experience in railroad management will doubtless insure not only the future prosperity of the company, but secure for the traveler all the benefits which naturally follows an intelligent and efficient administration of the affairs of a railroad. NEW YORK AND PHILADELPHIA LINE VIA THE CAMDEN AND AMBOY RAILROAD AND STEAMBOAT. THE Camden and Amboy Railroad Company have not published an annual report of the business of their road for the last year. We presume, however, that it has done a profitable one, and if the stockholders are satisfied with the dividends paid, and the public with the accommodation afforded, the most important points in such matters, and the prominent objects for which this, and every other corporation is organized, are in a good measure accomplished. The railroad companies of New York and Massachusetts, it is well known, are required either by the act of incorporation, or special legislation, to make annual returns, according to a specified form. These returns embrace detailed statements of receipts, expenditures, miles run, &c., of each road, and are highly interesting and useful, exhibiting as they do, all those "facts and figures," se important to the merchant, statesman, and statistician. We should be glad if New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and, indeed, all the other States, South and West, would pass laws requiring similar returns to be made. The late law of New York, on this subject, although not perfect in all its details, furnishes a very good model, and in order to impart to such returns the utmost utility, it is desirable that they should be as uniform in their requirements as it is possible to make them. If this plan were adopted by our State Legislatures, it would be the means, beyond all question, of furnishing a most valuable contribution to statistical science, and at the same time form the basis of many practical results. But we are digressing from our original purpose, which was to notice briefly the improvements that have been and are now being made on the route between the two great cities of New York and Philadelphia, by the Camden and Amboy Company. The distance from New York to Philadelphia, by that route, is 90 miles, 27 of which is by steamboat, from New York to South Amboy, the eastern terminus of the road. The "John Potter," which plies between New York and South Amboy, is a new and beautiful boat of 700 tons burthen, and 400 horse power. Her length is 300 feet, with 31 feet breadth of beam. She has the celebrated Scotch tri-angular engine, made by HOGG & DELAMATER. The boat which is altogether one of the most unique and best of its class in the United States, was, we believe, built on a model furnished by ROBERT L. STEVENS, Esq., a large stockholder in the company, and a prodigy of skill, sagacity and taste in all matters pertaining to steam navigation. The internal ap pointments of the "John Potter" are in perfect keeping with the architectural and me chanical construction of the boat. Two spacious and splendid saloons, fitted up in the most tasteful manner, afford the traveler, while lounging upon the elegant sofas, di vans, &c., with which they are furnished, all the comfort and repose of the most luxu rious parlor or drawing-room at home. But men as well as things enter largely into account with the traveler, and, therefore, we may be permitted to allude to Jous SIMPSON, ESQ., the efficient and gentlemanly commander of this steamer. Capt. Simpson has filled various public and responsible stations; for many years he was Post master at New Brunswick, N. J., and he may with propriety say, in all of them, with the late "Billy Gray," of Boston, who was taunted for being a drummer in early life, after he became a great and rich merchant-" Well, didn't I drum well ?" Passing from the boat of the Camden and Amboy Company, we find comfortable and commodious cars, which are dispatched with great expedition-the transfer of the passengers and baggage crates does not detain the trains more than five minutes. The Company are now engaged in straightening the curves in the original road, and relaying the whole with a new rail, weighing some ninety-five pounds to the yard, the heaviest, if we are not greatly mistaken, used on any railroad in this country. Several miles have already been relaid. The average time now made between New York and Philadelphia is 4 hours, and we recently made the trip from Philadelphia to New York in four hours. A few years since five hours was considered pretty good time. When the entire road is relaid, it is the intention of the Company to put their express trains through in 31, or, at most, 3 hours. It has been a very common observation, that south of New York one must take his leave of comfort and speed in railroad travel. This reflection, it affords us pleasure to say, can no longer be cast upon the Camden and Amboy Railroad. It will, in every respect, and we speak from personal experience, compare favorably with the best managed roads either in New England or New York. MOHAWK VALLEY RAILROAD. This road is proposed to run between Schenectady and Utica, on the south side of the Mohawk River. The very able report of the directors to the subscribers, signed by Hon. A. C. FLAGG, president, is chiefly taken up with a consideration of the necessity for the road. From it we extract the following particulars :— Comparing the tonnage coming to tide-water on the Erie Canal for the year 1836, with that of 1850, and it shows an increase of 270 per cent, in fifteen years, equal to 18 per cent for each year. And in 1850 there were 241,824 more tons than the average for each of the preceding five years; and the increase of the last year, over the preceding, is 22 per cent. The Utica and Schenectady Railroad was put in operation in August, 1836; from that time to the close of 1840, four years and five months, the receipts of the road, from passengers, and United States Mail, amounted to..... $1,567,062 From 1841 to 1845, both inclusive, five years, the receipts from passen- 1,773,578 931,780 3,515,406 Total receipts... $6,856,046 2,637,842 Expenditures for the same period.... Excess of earnings, over current expenses, in about fourteen years...... $4,218,204 This road, seventy-eight miles in length, was constructed and put in operation for a million and a half of dollars. Since its commencement a double track has been laid, so that in starting an account between the instalments paid to the company, and the dividends paid by the company to the stockholders, and computing the interest on the payments, on each side, at 7 per cent per annum, up to February 1, 1851, and including the dividend made on that day, the result is as follows, namely:Amount of instalments paid in.. Interest on same to February 1, 1851... Total....... $4,124,000 00 2,317,316 38 $6,441,316 38 1,577,806 90 5,805,706 90 $635,609 00 Dividends paid to, and including February 1, 1851.... $4,227,900 00 Dividends and interest less than instalments and interest There is no case of a public work, on this continent, which has yielded profits equal to this, or come near it, except the Erie Canal, which passes through the same valley, and draws its revenue from the same source. The estimated cost of the Mohawk Valley Road, by the engineer, is, for a double track, $2,679,365: the annual expense of running the road, $250,000: and the income of the first year, $297,000, or 11 per cent. RECEIPTS OF THE ROCHESTER AND SYRACUSE RAILROAD. This road forms a part of the line of railroads between Albany and Buffalo. The distance between Syracuse and Rochester is 104 miles. The following table exhibits the receipts of the Auburn and Syracuse and Auburn and Rochester Railroad Company, now the Rochester and Syracuse Railroad Company, for the past four years, and including the first three months of the present year :— SHORTEST PASSAGES FROM WHARF TO WHARF FROM LIVERPOOL TO NEW YORK. The California Courier states that $100,000 have already been subscribed towards the construction of a railroad between San Francisco and the beautiful valley of Santa Clara, and that a committee is about to visit San Francisco to invite further subscrip tions. The whole amount of money wanted is $250,000 The work seems to be feas ible, and there is a reasonable prospect of its being carried through. It seems that the project of building a rilroad between San Jose and San Francisco is entertained with a feeling of sincerity by its projectors. At a meeting, recently held at San Francisco, the committee on the subscriptions made a very encouraging report, and it was resolved that the books should be opened immediately. |