Page:Rivers, Canals, Railways of Great Britain.djvu/32

10 goods twenty-two miles by land carriage, (to Rawcliffe), the expense whereof is not only very chargeable, but they are forced to stay two months sometimes while the roads are passable to market, and many times the goods receive considerable damage, through the badness of the roads by overturning."

The petition of the lord mayor and commonalty of the ancient city of York, in opposition to the bill, sets forth, "that the said city has chiefly its support and advantage by the River Ouze and water of Humber, which is a passage for ships and boats from York to Hull, and divers parts of this realm; and that by letters patent, 10th Edward IV. (1471) the said petitioners were appointed conservators of the River Ayre from the River Ouze to Knottingley Mill Dam; and have all along exercised their power accordingly; that if the bill pending in the house, for making the Rivers Ayre and Calder navigable, should pass, the River Ouze will be so drained by such navigation, that no boat or vessels will be able to pass thereon, whereby the trade of the city of York, carried on by the said River Ouze, will be quite carried into other remote parts, and the petitioners' said power of conservatorship destroyed, to the impoverishing the said city and countries adjacent, and praying that the said bill may not pass; the petitioners being ready to offer other reasons against the same." The petition of Francis Nevill, of Chevet, Esq. against the bill, states, that "the petitioner is proprietor of several corn, fulling, and rape mills, and dams, upon the River Calder, and that by back water his mills will be inevitably stopped from going at all, to his great prejudice."

The tolls granted by this act were, from the 1st of May to the 1st of October, any sum not exceeding ten shillings per ton; and from the 1st of October to the 1st of May, any sum not exceeding sixteen shillings per ton, for the entire distance between Leeds or Wakefield, and Weeland, or vice versa, and proportionably for any greater or less weight, or for any less distance than the whole.

In order to carry into execution the powers granted by this act for making the rivers of Aire and Calder navigable, the undertakers immediately advanced about £12,000, to which, in the course of a few years, other sums, to the amount of about £16,000 were lent and advanced; these sums, with all the money