Part 7

The Jews in Great Britain, chiefly found in London and other great towns, number (1907) about 196,000 and have some 200 synagogues; at the head of their organization is a chief Rabbi resident in London.

Finally it may be mentioned that a small number of Englishmen, chiefly resident in Liverpool and London, have embraced Islam; they have a mosque at Liverpool. Various foreign churches which have numbers of adherents settled in England have also branch churches and organizations in the country, notably the Orthodox Eastern Church,--with a considerable number of adherents in London, Liverpool and Manchester,--the Lutheran, and the Armenian churches. (W. A. P.)

VII. COMMUNICATIONS

_Roads._--In England and Wales the high-roads, or roads on which wheeled vehicles can travel, are of two classes: (1) the main roads, or great arteries along which the main vehicular traffic of the country passes; and (2) ordinary highways, which are by-roads serving only local areas. The length of the main roads is about 22,000 m., and that of ordinary highways about 96,000. The highways of England, the old coaching roads, are among the best in the world, being generally of a beautiful smoothness and well maintained; they vary, naturally, in different districts, but in many even the local roads are superior to some main roads in other countries. The supersession of the stage coach by the railway took a vast amount of traffic away from the main roads, but their proper maintenance did not materially suffer; and a larger accession of traffic took place subsequently on the development of the cycle and the motor-vehicle.

The system of road-building by private enterprise, the undertakers being rewarded by tolls levied from vehicles, persons or animals using the roads, was established in England in 1663, when an act of Charles II. authorized the taking of such tolls at "turnpikes" in Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire. A century later, in 1767, the authorization was extended over the whole kingdom by an act of George III. In its fulness the system lasted just sixty years, for the first breach in it was made by an act of George IV., in 1827, by which the chief turnpikes in London were abolished. Further acts followed in the same direction, leading to the gradual extinction, by due compensation of the persons interested, of the old system, the maintenance of the roads being vested in "turnpike trusts and highway boards," empowered to levy local rates. The last turnpike trust ceased to exist on the 5th of November 1895, and the final accounts in connexion with its debt were closed in 1898-1899. Toll-gates are now met with only at certain bridges, where the right to levy tolls is statutory or by prescription. By the Local Government Act of 1888 the duty of maintaining main roads was imposed on the county councils, but these bodies were enabled to make arrangements with the respective highway authorities for their repair. Under the Local Government Act of 1894 the duties of all the highway authorities were transferred to the rural district councils on or before the 31st of March 1899.

It was not until the close of the 18th century, when the period of road-building activity already indicated set in, that English roads were redeemed from an extraordinarily bad condition. The roads were until then, as a rule, merely tracks, deeply worn by ages of traffic into the semblance of ditches, and, under adverse weather conditions, impassable. Travellers also had the risk of assault by robbers and highwaymen. As early as 1285 a law provided for the cutting down of trees and bushes on either side of highways, so as to deprive lawless men of cover. Instances of legislation as regards the upkeep of roads are recorded from time to time after this date, but (to take a single illustration) even in the middle of the 18th century the journey from the village, as it was then, of Paddington to London by stage occupied from 2½ to 3 hours. But from 1784 to 1792 upwards of 300 acts were passed dealing with the construction of new roads and bridges.

_Railways._--The history and development of railways in England, their birthplace, and in Ireland and Scotland, with illustrative statistics, are considered under the heading UNITED KINGDOM. The following list indicates the year of foundation, termini, chief offices and geographical sphere of the chief railways of England and Wales.

1. _Railways with Termini in London._

(a) NORTHERN.

_Great Northern_ (1846).--Terminus and offices, King's Cross. Main line--Peterborough, Grantham, Newark, Doncaster; forming, with the North-Eastern and North British lines, the "East Coast" route to Scotland. Serving also the West Riding of Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Nottingham and other towns of the midlands, and Manchester (by running powers over the Great Central metals). This company has so extensive a system of running powers over other railways, and of lines held jointly with other companies, that few of its more important express trains from London complete their journeys entirely on the company's own lines.

_Midland_ (1844, an amalgamation of the former North Midland, Midland Counties, Birmingham & Derby, and other lines).--Terminus, St Pancras; offices, Derby. Main line--Bedford, Leicester, Sheffield, Leeds and Carlisle, affording the "Midland" route to Scotland. Serving also Nottingham, Derby, and the principal towns of the midlands and West Riding, and Manchester. West and North line from Bristol, Gloucester and Birmingham to Leicester and Derby. Also an Irish section, the Belfast and Northern Counties system being acquired in 1903. Docks at Heysham, Lancashire; and steamship services to Belfast, &c.

_London & North-Western_ (1846, an amalgamation of the London & Birmingham, Grand Junction, and Manchester & Birmingham lines).--Terminus and offices, Euston. Main line--Rugby, Crewe, Warrington, Preston, Carlisle; forming, with the Caledonian system, the "West Coast" route to Scotland. Serves also Manchester, Liverpool and all parts of the north-west, North Wales, Birmingham and the neighbouring midland towns, and by joint-lines, the South Welsh coal-fields. Maintains docks at Garston on the Mersey, a steamship traffic with Dublin and Greenore from Holyhead, and, jointly with the Lancashire & Yorkshire Company, a service to Belfast, &c., from Fleetwood.

_Great Central_ (1846; until 1897, when an extension to London was undertaken, called the Manchester, Sheffield & Lincolnshire).--Terminus, Marylebone; offices, Manchester. Main line--Rugby, Nottingham, Leicester, Sheffield, Manchester. The former main line runs from Manchester and Sheffield east to Retford, thence serving Grimsby and Hull, with branches to Lincoln, &c. The main line reached from London by joining the line of the Metropolitan railway near Aylesbury and following it to Harrow. Subsequently an alternative route out of London was constructed between Neasden and Northolt, where it joins another line, of the Great Western railway, from Acton, and continues as a line held jointly by the two companies through Beaconsfield and High Wycombe. Here it absorbs the old Great Western line as far as Prince's Risborough, and continues thence to Grendon Underwood, effecting a junction with the original main line of the Great Central system. This line was opened for passenger traffic in April 1906. The Great Central company owns docks at Grimsby.

(b) EASTERN.

_Great Eastern_ (1862).--Terminus and offices, Liverpool Street. Serving Essex, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk. Joint-line with Great Northern from March to Lincoln and Doncaster. Passenger steamship services from Harwich to the Hook of Holland, Antwerp, Rotterdam, &c.

_London, Tilbury & Southend_ (1852).--Terminus and offices, Fenchurch Street. Serving places on the Essex shore of the Thames estuary, terminating at Shoeburyness.

(c) WESTERN.

_Great Western_ (1835, London to Bristol).--Terminus and offices, Paddington. Main line--Reading, Didcot, Swindon, Bath, Bristol, Taunton, Exeter, Plymouth, Penzance. Numerous additional main lines--Reading to Newbury, Weymouth and the west, a new line opened in 1906 between Castle Cary and Langport effecting a great reduction in mileage between London and Exeter and places beyond; Didcot, Oxford, Birmingham, Shrewsbury, Chester with connexions northward, and to North Wales; Oxford to Worcester, and Swindon to Gloucester and the west of England; South Welsh system (through route from London via Wootton Bassett or via Bristol, and the Severn tunnel), Newport, Cardiff, Swansea, Milford. Steamship services to the Channel Islands from Weymouth to Waterford, Ireland from Milford, and to Rosslare, Ireland, from Fishguard, the route last named being opened in 1906. The line constructed jointly with the Great Central company (as detailed in the description above) was extended in 1910 from Ashendon to Aynho, to form a short route to the great centres north of Oxford.

_London & South-Western_ (1839, incorporating the London & Southampton railway of 1835).--Terminus and offices, Waterloo. Main line--Woking, Basingstoke, Salisbury, Yeovil, Exeter, Plymouth; Woking, Guildford and Portsmouth; Basingstoke, Winchester, Southampton, Bournemouth, &c. Extensive connexions in Surrey, Hampshire and the south-west, as far as North Cornwall. This company owns the great docks at Southampton, and maintains passenger services from that port to the Channel Islands, Havre, St Malo and Cherbourg.

(d) SOUTHERN.

_London, Brighton & South Coast_ (1846).--Termini, Victoria and London Bridge. Serving all the coast stations from Hastings to Portsmouth, with various lines in eastern Surrey and in Sussex. Maintains a service of passenger steamers between Newhaven and Dieppe.

_South Eastern & Chatham_ (under a managing committee, 1899, of the South-Eastern company, 1836, and the London, Chatham & Dover company, 1853).--Termini--Victoria, Charing Cross, Holborn Viaduct, Cannon Street. Offices, London Bridge Station. Various lines chiefly in Kent. Steamship services between Folkestone and Boulogne, Dover and Calais, &c.

2. _Provincial Railways._

The two most important railway companies not possessing lines to London are the North-Eastern and the Lancashire & Yorkshire.

_North Eastern_ (1854, amalgamating a number of systems).--Offices, York. Main line--Leeds, Normanton and York to Darlington, Durham, Newcastle and Berwick-on-Tweed. Connecting with the Great Northern between Doncaster and York, and with the North British at Berwick, it forms part of the "East Coast" route to Scotland. Serving all ports and coast stations from Hull to Berwick, also Carlisle, &c. Owning extensive docks at Hull, Middlesbrough, South Shields, the Hartlepools, Blyth, &c.

_Lancashire & Yorkshire_ (1847, an amalgamation of a number of local systems).--Offices, Manchester. Main line--Manchester, Rochdale, Tormorden, Wakefield and Normanton, with branches to Halifax, Bradford, Leeds, Huddersfield and other centres of the West Riding. Extensive system in south Lancashire, connecting Manchester with Preston and Fleetwood (where the docks and steamship services to Ireland are worked jointly with the London & Northwestern company), Southport, Liverpool, &c.

Among further provincial systems there should be mentioned:--

_Cambrian._--Offices, Oswestry. Whitchurch, Oswestry, Welshpool to Barmouth and Pwllheli, Aberystwyth, &c.

_Cheshire Lines_, worked by a committee representative of the Great Central, Great Northern and Midland Companies, and affording important connexions between the lines of these systems and south Lancashire and Cheshire (Godley, Stockport, Warrington, Liverpool; Manchester and Liverpool; Manchester and Liverpool to Southport; Godley and Manchester to Northwich and Chester, &c.).

_Furness._--Offices, Barrow-in-Furness. Carnforth, Barrow, Whitehaven, with branches to Coniston, Windermere (Lakeside), &c. Docks at Barrow.

_North Staffordshire._--Offices, Stoke-upon-Trent. Crewe and the Potteries, Macclesfield, &c., to Uttoxeter and Derby.

_Cross-Country Connexions._--While London is naturally the principal focal point of the English railway system, the development of through connexions between the chief lines by way of the metropolis is very small. Some through trains are provided between the North-Western and the London, Brighton & South Coast lines via Willesden Junction, Addison Road and Clapham Junction; and a through connexion by way of Ludgate Hill has been arranged between main line trains of the South-Western and the Great Northern railways, but otherwise passengers travelling through London have generally to make their own way from one terminus to another. Certain cross-country routes, however, are provided to connect the systems of some of the companies, among which the following may be noticed.

(1) Through connexions with the continental services from Harwich, and with Yarmouth and other towns of the East coast, are provided from Yorkshire, Lancashire, &c., by way of the Great Northern and Great Eastern Joint line from Doncaster and Lincoln to March.

(2) Through connexions between the systems of the South-Eastern & Chatham and the Great Western companies are provided via Reading.

(3) Through connexions between the systems of the Great Central and the Great Western companies are provided by the line connecting Woodford and Banbury.

(4) Through connexions between the Midland and the South-Western systems are provided (a) by the Midland and South-Western Junction line connecting Cheltenham on the north-and-west line of the Midland with Andover Junction on the South-Western line; and (b) by the Somerset & Dorset line, connecting the same lines between Bath, Templecombe and Bournemouth.

(5) The line from Shrewsbury to Craven Arms and Hereford, giving connexion between the north and the south-west, and Wales, is worked by the North-Western and Great Western companies.

Canals and rivers.

_Inland Navigation._--The English system of inland navigation is confined principally to the following districts: South Lancashire, the West Riding of Yorkshire, the Midlands, especially about Birmingham, the Fen district and the Thames basin (especially the lower part). All these districts are interconnected. The condition of inland navigation, as a whole, is not satisfactory. The Fossdyke in Lincolnshire, connecting the river Trent at Torksey with the Witham near Lincoln, and now belonging to the Great Northern and Great Eastern joint railways, is usually indicated as the earliest extant canal in England, inasmuch as it was constructed by the Romans for the purpose of drainage or water-supply, and must have been used for navigation at an early period. But the history of canal-building in England is usually dated from about 1760, and from the construction, at the instance of Francis, Duke of Bridgewater, of the Bridgewater canal in South Lancashire, now belonging to the Manchester Ship Canal Company. The activity in canal-building which prevailed during the later years of the 18th century was, in a measure, an earlier counterpart of the first period of railway development, which, proceeding subsequently along systematized lines not applied to canal-construction, and providing obvious advantages in respect of speed, caused railways to withdraw much traffic from canals. Some canals and river navigations have consequently become derelict, or are only maintained with difficulty and in imperfect condition. The inland navigation system suffers from a want of uniformity in the size of locks, depth of water, width of channels and other arrangements, so that direct intercommunication between one canal and another is often impossible in consequence; moreover, although the canals, like railways, are owned by many separate bodies, hardly any provision has been made, as it has in the case of railways, for such facilities as the working of through traffic over various systems at an inclusive charge. Lastly, the railway companies themselves have acquired control of about 30% of the total mileage of canals in England and Wales, and in many cases this has had a prejudicial effect on the prosperity of canals. Notwithstanding these disabilities, there has been in modern times a new development in the trade of some canals, born of a realization that for certain classes of goods water-transport is cheaper than the swifter rail-transport. Various proposals have been made for the establishment of a single control over all inland waterways.

The lower or estuarine courses of some of the English rivers as the Thames, Tyne, Humber, Mersey and Bristol Avon, are among the most important waterways in the world, as giving access for seaborne traffic to great ports. From the Mersey the Manchester Ship Canal runs to Manchester. The manufacturing districts of South Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire are traversed and connected by several canals following transverse valleys of the Pennine Chain. The main line of the Aire and Calder navigation runs from Goole by Castleford to Leeds, whence the Leeds and Liverpool canal, running by Burnley and Blackburn, completes the connexion between the Humber and the Mersey. Other canals are numerous, among which may be mentioned the Sheffield and South Yorkshire, connecting Sheffield with the Trent. The Trent itself affords an extensive navigation, from which, at Derwent mouth, the Trent and Mersey Canal runs near Burton and Stafford, and through the Potteries, to the Bridgewater Canal and so to the Mersey. This canal is owned by the North Staffordshire railway company. The river Weaver, a tributary of the Mersey, affords a waterway of importance to the salt-producing towns of Cheshire. The system of the Shropshire Union railways and canal company, which is connected by lease with the London & North-Western railway company, carries considerable traffic, especially in the neighbourhood of Ellesmere Port. In the Black Country and neighbourhood the numerous ramifications of the Birmingham Canal navigations bear a large mineral traffic. This system is connected with the rivers Severn and Trent and the canal system of the country at large, and is controlled by the London & North-Western company. The principal line of navigation from the Thames northward to the midlands is that of the Grand Junction, which runs from Brentford, is connected through London with the port of London by the Regent's Canal, and follows closely the main line of the North-Western railway. It connects with the Oxford Canal at Braunston in Northamptonshire, and through this with canals to Birmingham and the midlands, and continues to Leicester. Both the Severn up to Stourport and the Thames up to Oxford have a fair traffic, but the Thames and Severn Canal is not much used. There is some traffic on the navigable drainage cuts and rivers of the Fens, but beyond these, in a broad consideration of the waterways of England from the point of view of their commercial importance, it is unnecessary to go.

See H. R. De Salis, _Bradshaw's Canals and Navigable Rivers of England and Wales_ (London, 1904); _Report_ of Royal Commission on Canals (London, 1909).

_Oversea Communications._--The chief ports for continental passenger traffic are as follows:--

_Harwich_ to Amsterdam, Antwerp, Hamburg, Hook of Holland, Rotterdam (Great Eastern railway); to Copenhagen and Esbjerg (Royal Danish mail route).

_Queenborough_ to Flushing; (Zeeland Steamship company).

_Dover_ to Calais (South-Eastern & Chatham railway); to Ostend (Belgian Royal mail steamers).

_Folkestone_ to Boulogne (South Eastern & Chatham railway).

_Newhaven_ to Dieppe (London, Brighton & South Coast railway).

_Southampton_ to Cherbourg, Havre, St Malo (South-Western railway).

The chief ports for trans-Atlantic traffic are Liverpool and Southampton, and special trains are worked in connexion with the steamers to and from London. The great development of harbour accommodation at Dover early in the 20th century brought trans-Atlantic traffic to this port also. Southampton and Liverpool are the two greatest English ports for all oceanic passenger traffic; but London has also a large traffic, both to European and to foreign ports. The passenger traffic to the Norwegian ports, always very heavy in summer, is carried on chiefly from Hull and Newcastle.

VIII. INDUSTRIES

_Agriculture._--In the agricultural returns for Great Britain, issued annually by the government, the area of England (apart from Wales) has been divided into two sections, "arable" and "grass," corresponding with a former division into "corn counties" and "grazing counties," except that Leicestershire is included not in the "grass" but in the "arable" section. Most of the eastern part of England is "arable," while the western and northern part is "grass," the boundary between the sections being the western limit of Hampshire, Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Warwickshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire, and of the East Riding of Yorkshire.

The division is thus as follows:--

_Grass Counties._ _Arable Counties._

Northumberland. Yorkshire, East Riding. Cumberland. Lincolnshire. Durham. Nottingham. Yorkshire, North and West Ridings. Rutland. Westmorland. Huntingdonshire. Lancashire. Warwickshire. Cheshire. Leicestershire. Derbyshire. Northamptonshire. Staffordshire. Cambridgeshire. Shropshire. Norfolk. Worcestershire. Suffolk. Herefordshire. Bedfordshire. Monmouthshire. Buckinghamshire. Gloucestershire. Oxfordshire. Wiltshire. Berkshire. Dorsetshire. Hampshire. Somersetshire. Hertfordshire. Devonshire. Essex. Cornwall. Middlesex. Surrey. Kent. Sussex.

The average area under cultivation of all the counties is about .76 of the whole area. The counties having the greatest area under cultivation (ranging up to about nine-tenths of the whole) may be taken to be--Leicestershire, the East Riding of Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Huntingdonshire, Rutland, Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire. Those with the smallest proportional cultivated area are Westmorland, Middlesex, Northumberland, Surrey, Cumberland, the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire, Lancashire, Durham and Cornwall. Geographical considerations govern these conditions to a very great extent; thus the counties first indicated lie almost entirely within the area of the low-lying and fertile Eastern Plain, while the smallest areas of cultivation are found in the counties covering the Pennine hill-system, with its high-lying uncultivated moors. In the case of Cornwall and Cumberland the physical conditions are similar to these; but in that of Middlesex and Surrey the existence of large urban areas belonging or adjacent to London must be taken into account. These also affect the proportion of cultivated areas in the other home counties. The presence of a widespread urban population must also be remembered in the case of Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire.

Distribution of crops.

The geographical distribution of the principal crops, &c., may now be followed. The grain crops grown in England consist almost exclusively of wheat, barley and oats. Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire are especially productive in all these; the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire produce a notable quantity of barley and oats; and the oat-crops in the following counties deserve mention--Devonshire, Hampshire, Lancashire, Cumberland, Cornwall, Cheshire and Sussex. There is no county, however, in which the single crop of wheat or barley stands pre-eminently above others, and in the case of the upland counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and Derbyshire, the metropolitan county of Middlesex, and Monmouthshire, these crops are quite insignificant. In proportion to their area, the counties specially productive of wheat are Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Essex; and of barley, Norfolk, Suffolk and the East Riding of Yorkshire. In fruit-growing, Kent takes the first place, but a good quantity is grown in Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and Essex, in Worcestershire and other western counties, where, as in Herefordshire, Somerset and Devon, the apple is especially cultivated and cider is largely produced. Kent is again pre-eminent in the growth of hops; indeed this practice and that of fruit-growing give the scenery of the county a strongly individual character. Hop-growing extends from Kent into the neighbouring parts of Sussex and Surrey, where, however, it is much less important; it is also practised to a considerable degree in a group of counties of the midlands and west--Herefordshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire and Shropshire. Market-gardening is carried on most extensively on suitable lands in the neighbourhood of the great areas of urban population; thus the open land remaining in Middlesex is largely devoted to this industry. From the Channel and Scilly Islands, vegetables, especially seasonable vegetables, and also flowers which, owing to the peculiar climatic conditions of these islands, come early to perfection, are imported to the London market. Considering the crops not hitherto specified, it may be indicated that turnips and swedes form the chief green crops in most districts; potatoes, mangels, beans and peas are also commonly grown, Beyond the three chief grain crops, only a little rye is grown. The cultivation of flax is almost extinct, but it is practised in a few districts, such as the East and West Ridings of Yorkshire.

Livestock.