Page:Rivers, Canals, Railways of Great Britain.djvu/320

 Great Dinford, Little and Great Wolston, Woughton, &amp;c. to King's Langley, and from that place through a short tunnel, by Grove Park to Rickmansworth, at a little distance from which town a branch of two miles extends to Watford; from Rickmansworth, as far as Uxbridge, in a parallel line with the River Colne, which it crosses several times; from Uxbridge it proceeds to Norwood and Osterley Park, where, intersecting the River Brent, it falls into the Thames, between Brentford and Sion House, completing a course of above ninety miles.

It was in the year 1792 that this undertaking first had its origin. In the beginning of that year the Marquis of Buckingham instructed Mr. Barnes, the eminent engineer, to make a survey of the country between Braunston, in Northamptonshire, the place where the Oxford Canal has its junction with the present canal, and the Thames near London, in order to mark out a line of canal, whereby the circuitous course by the Thames Navigation from Oxford might be avoided, and the transit of goods to the metropolis accelerated. Mr. Barnes's survey was laid before a public meeting at Stoney-Stratford, in June of the above year, when his plan was approved, and a committee formed for carrying on the scheme. The first act was consequently obtained, and received the royal assent on the 30th April, 1793. It is entitled, An Act for making and maintaining a navigable Canal from the Oxford Canal Navigation at Braunston, in the county of Northampton, to join the River Thames at or near Brentford, in the county of Middlesex; and also certain collateral Cuts from the said intended Canal. By this act the shareholders, who were incorporated under the title of "The Company of Proprietors of the Grand Junction Canal," are empowered to raise £500,000, in shares of £100 each, to be deemed personal estate; and should that sum be insufficient to carry the powers of the act into effect, they may raise £100,000 more, either amongst themselves, or by the admission of new subscribers, or by mortgage of the tolls of the canal. By this act it is provided that the canal shall unite with the Thames, at the place where that river receives the eastern branch of the River Brent, near Sion House; and it is also enacted that a collateral cut for the navigation of boats, barges, and other vessels, shall branch from it at the north-east