venient to distinguish the town from the country populations by the salient feature which each exhibits. Now, it is almost a self-evident truism to say that, in proportion as settlement spreads throughout the country and the land becomes occupied by direct producers, there will be a continually increasing demand for more traders of various classes, by whom the increased exchanging and distribution must be carried on. If facilities of intercommunication, which is only another expression for cheapness of transport, have the effect (of which I, for one, have no doubt) of promoting the settlement of the country districts and stimulating production, the town populations must increase in a corresponding ratio. More producers will require more exchangers. Between the producer and the consumer there is almost always one middle man, and generally more than one. The wholesale dealer and the retail dealer, the sea carrier and the land carrier, often even an agent or broker between these, are all set in motion by increased production; and they are all, or nearly all, dwellers in towns. I now approach the last branch of my subject, and it is one which presents some complication, and therefore somewhat greater difficulty. The gains which I have enumerated will not, and cannot, be shared equally by all classes of the community, whilst the price which we must pay in order to secure these gains will (until railways pay a profit equal to the interest on the capital expended upon them) be borne by the whole population. No taxpayer can escape his contribution to the charge, howsoever small his share may be, while his remoteness from the lines of railway may deprive him of direct benefit. This is undoubtedly inseparable from all internal improvements, but if the people of every district could successfully oppose improvements in every other district, improvement could never begin. In the case of railways, however, the advantages are more generally diffused than those arising from ordinary local improvements. In the first place, a trunk railway is partially available to persons living at considerable distances from its line of progress. They will generally be able to send their produce to the nearest station, which will secure to them the benefit of a portion of the line. Thus the wave of cheap transport, as well as the wave of equalized prices, though continually diminishing in its advance, does in practice reach to considerable distances. Still, it must be obvious that there will always be remote localities, which the beneficial influence cannot directly reach. But there is an indirect consequence which is felt universally, and that alone, I think, is worth the small share of taxation which, as I have said, those who reside in localities remote from the railway lines cannot escape from. This benefit, arising out of cheapness, which indirectly reaches all and invigorates all, I will now endeavour to explain. If, as I trust I have proved, there is a saving from cheap transport spread over the whole community, what is done with that saving? A portion, no doubt, will not ultimately be saved at all. Those who find it hard to