1.  Lord George’s railway bill was simple and comprehensive.  In order to encourage the making of railways in Ireland, he proposed for every L100 properly expended on such railways, L200 should be lent by the Government, at the very lowest interest at which, on the credit of the Government, that amount could be raised.  He undertook to prove “that the State shall not lose one single farthing by the proposition.”  The current interest was L3 6s. 8d. per cent., but he would assume it to be 3-1/2 per cent., and that the Government was to lend it at that rate, and take the whole security of the railway for the loan; consequently, a line paying L7 upon L300 expended would afford ample security for the L200 lent by the State, at L3 10s. per cent., because, of such L300, one hundred would be laid out by the company, and L200 by the Government, who, taking the whole railway for their security, would have a legal claim upon the produce of the money expended by the shareholders as well as by themselves.  He took the returns of traffic on the very lowest line—­that from Arbroath to Forfar, to show that even at the lowest traffic yet known on any railway, the Government would be secured against loss.

2.  He next dealt with the position of shareholders under his Bill.  He said they need not be alarmed at Government taking the whole railway as security, because, as matters stood, the shares of all lines stopped for want of means were valueless, or all but so, in the market; the effect of the Government loan would be to bring those dead shares to life again; for where there was a certainty of any line being finished, there was a fair prospect of a dividend from that line.  The advantage, therefore, of the loan to shareholders was self-evident.  He read a letter from Mr. Carr, then chairman of the Great Southern and Western Railway of Ireland, in which the Peel Government were asked, in May, 1846, by that Company, for a loan of L500,000 to go on with their works, they undertaking to employ 50,000 men over those works, provided their request was complied with.  The money was not given.  No one, said Lord George, can come to any other opinion but that this offer of the Great Southern and Western Railway ought to have been accepted.  If the money now asked for be lent, he said, there need be no crowding of labourers on any point, for they can be distributed over the whole country; as, according to the railway bills passed for Ireland, lines will run through every county but four.  “Now, Sir,” he continued, “in introducing this measure to the House, it has not been my wish to bring forward any proposition either of hostility or rivalry to the Government of my noble friend.  I have assured the House publicly and privately, I have pledged my honour to my noble friend the First Minister, that I seek no advantage from the carrying of this measure, and that it is my anxious hope that we may come to the consideration of it as if it were a great private Bill, and we were all selected members of the committee to inquire into its worth.”