Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 8.djvu/65

 'The ^fiddlesex Canal.

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��The new dam was the occasion of a lawsuit brought by the proprietors of the Sudbury meadows, claiming^ damages to the extent of $10,000 for flooding their meadows. The defend- ants secured the services of Samuel Hoar, Esq., of Concord, assisted by the Hon. Daniel Webster, who accepted a retaining fee of $100 to " manage and argue the case in con- junction with Mr. Hoar. The cause was to have been tried November, 1833. Mr. Webster was called on by me and promised to examine the evidence and hold himself in readiness for the trial, but for some time before he was not to be found in Boston, at one time at New York, at another in Phila- delphia, and so on from place to place so that I am satisfied no dependance can be placed with certainty upon his assistance, and," plaintively con- cludes the agent, " our $100 has gone to profit and loss account."

On the other side was the Hon. Jeremiah Mason, assisted by Franklin Dexter, Esq. This case was decided the following year adversely to the plaintiffs.

With the accession of business brought by the corporations at Lowell, the prospect for increased dividends in the future was extremely encouraging. The golden age of the canal appeared close at hand ; but the fond hopes of the proprietors were once more destined to disap- pointment. Even the genius of Tames Sullivan had not foreseen the railway locomotive. In 1839 a pe- tition was presented to the Legislature for the survey of a railroad from Bos- ton to Lowell. The interests of the canal were seriously involved. A committee was promptly chosen to draw up for presentation to the Gen-

��eral Court "a remonstrance of the Proprietors of Middlesex Canal, against the grant of a charter to build a railroad from Boston to Lowell." This remonstrance, signed by William Sullivan, Joseph Coolidge, and George Hallett, bears date of Boston, Feb. 12, 1830, and conclusively shows how little the business men of fifty years ago anticipated the enormous devel- opment of our resources consequent upon the application of steam to transportation : —

The remonstrants take pleasure in declaring, that they join in the common sentiment of surprise and commendation, that any intelligence and enterprise should have raised so rapidly and so permanently, such establishments as are seen at Lowell. The proprietors of these works have availed themselves of the canal, for their transpor- tation for all articles, except in the winter months .... and every effort has been made by this corporation to afford every facihty, it was hoped and believed, to the entire satisfaction of the Lowell proprietors. The average annual amount of tolls paid by these proprietors has been only about four thousand dollars. It is believed no safer or cheaper mode of con- veyance can ever be established, nor any so well adapted for carrying heavy and bulky articles. To establish therefore a substitute for the canal alongside of it, and in many places within a few rods of it, and to do that which the canal was made to do, seems to be a measure not called for by any exigency, nor one which the Legislature can permit, without implicitly declaring that all investments of money in pubHc enterprises must be subjected to the will of any applicants who think that they may benefit themselves without regard to older enterprises, which have a claim to protection from public authority. With regard, then, to transportation of tonnage goods, the means exist for all but the winter months, as effectually as any that can be provided.

There is a supposed source of revenue

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