reliminary expenses of surveys, notices to landowners, etc.,
commenced in 1844, and the Bill was introduced into the House of Commons
in 1845, when it was opposed by the London and North-Western, the Eastern
Counties, and the Midland Railways. It was further opposed successively
by two other schemes, called the London and York and the Direct Northern.
The contest lasted eighty-two days before the House of Commons, more than
half the time having been consumed by opposition to the Bill. The Bill
was allowed to stand over till next year (1846), when it began, before
the Committee of the House of Lords, where it left off in the Lower House
in the year 1845 on account of the magnitude of the case. The Bill was
before the Upper House between three and four weeks, and in the same year
(1846) it was granted. The promoters of the rival projects were bought
off, and all their expenses paid, including the costs of the opposition
of the neighbouring lines already named, before the Great Northern bill
was passed; and the 'preliminary expenses,' comprising the whole
expenditure of every kind up to the passing of the bill was 590,355
pounds, or more than half-a-million sterling, incurred at the end of two
years of litigation. Subsequently to the passing of the Act an
additional sum of 172,722 pounds was expended for law engineering
expenses in Parliament to 31st December, 1857, which was spent almost
wholly in obtaining leave from Parliament to make various alterations.
Thus it would appear that a sum total of 763,077 pounds was spent as
Parliamentary charges for obtaining leave to construct 245 miles, being
at the rate of 3,118 pounds per mile."

THE RECTOR AND HIS PIG.

"I have been a rector for many years," writes a clergyman, "and have
often heard and read of tithe-pigs, though I have never met with a
specimen of them. But I had once a little pig given to me which was of a
choice breed, and only just able to leave his mother. I had to convey
him by carriage to the X station; from thence, twenty-three miles to Y
station, and from thence, eighty-two miles to Z station, and from there,
eight miles by carriage. I had a comfortable rabbit-hutch of a box made
for him, with a supply of fresh cabbages for his dinner on the road. I
started off with my wife, children, and nurse; and of these impediments
piggy proved to be the most formidable. First, a council of war was held
over him at X station by the railway officials,