ut meeting any fresh incident
until we passed Prescot, where we found two of the three engines at the
6.5 mile post, where a turning had been effected, but the third had gone
on to Liverpool; we then detached the one we had borrowed, and the three
set out to meet the six remaining trains of carriages. Our carriages
were then connected with the grand cars, the engine of which now drew the
whole number of nine carriages, containing nearly three hundred persons,
at a very smart rate. We were now getting into vast crowds of people,
most of them ignorant of the dreadful event which had taken place, and
all of them giving us enthusiastic cheers which we could not return.

"At Roby, his Grace and the Childwalls alighted and proceeded home; our
carriages then moved forward to Liverpool, where we arrived about seven
o'clock, and went down the great tunnel, under the town, a part of the
work which, more than any other, astonished the numerous strangers
present. It is, indeed, a wonderful work, and makes an impression never
to be effaced from the memory. The Company's yard, from St. James's
Street to Wapping, was filled with carriages waiting for the returning
parties, who separated with feelings of mingled gratification and
distress, to which we shall not attempt to give utterance. We afterwards
learnt that the parties we left at Manchester placed the three remaining
engines together, and all the carriages together, so as to form one grand
procession, including twenty-four carriages, and were coming home at a
steady pace, when they were met near Newton, by the other three engines,
which were then attached to the rest, and they arrived in Liverpool about
ten o'clock.

"Thus ended a pageant which, for importance as to its object and grandeur
in its details, is admitted to have exceeded anything ever witnessed. We
conversed with many gentlemen of great experience in public life, who
spoke of the scene as surpassing anything they had ever beheld, and who
computed, upon data which they considered to be satisfactory, that not
fewer than 500,000 persons must have been spectators of the procession."

So far from being a success, the occasion was, after the accident to Mr.
Huskisson, such a series of mortifying disappointments and the Duke of
Wellington's experience at Manchester had been so very far removed from
gratifying that the directors of the company felt moved to exonerate
themselves from the load of censure by an official