Railways have given an impetus to our country’s civilization. They are
the veins and arteries by means of which the circulation of the social
body is carried on. Remote places are, by this means, virtually brought
near to each other; and thus, while intelligence is diffused, an impulse
is given to commerce, each of which advantages most powerfully affects
the conditions of the people. The benefits of cheap and quick
communication to a great commercial state are too evident to require to
be enlarged upon. Time and money are thus importantly saved, and a rapid
and economical transit of goods, by lessening their costs, enable the
humblest to partake of comforts which were formerly considered as
luxuries only for the rich.
Amongst the railway enterprises in this kingdom, the Chester and Holyhead
line must be considered as possessing peculiar claims to public
attention. The stupendous character of the work—the difficulties which
had to be overcome, and the vast sum invested in the undertaking, place
this line in the foremost rank amongst the splendid achievements of our
days; indeed we may justly consider it the masterpiece of the human
intellect, and the wonder of the nineteenth century. In its course, it
divides broad estuaries, it penetrates the bowels of the loftiest hills,
forming an iron-road where the foot of man had never trod, and the
hardiest rocks have succumbed to the irresistible energy of human actions
and scientific skill—it crosses the important navigable river at Conway,
and the Menai Straits, by means of immense iron-tubes, at such an
elevation as not to impede the progress of the largest vessels. It
presents an extraordinary display of enterprise and wealth; so large an
accumulation of the conquests of energy, and the constituent elements of
riches, it may be safely said, was never before collected in the same
compass. The whole line is a noble exemplification of art subjugating
and triumphing over the opposition of natural difficulties. Its
completion formed an epoch in the history and application of mechanical
power. If only a few years ago it had been said that people could pass
over the Menai Straits, without inconvenience and without danger, at the
rate of from 30 to 40 miles per hour, the tale would have been treated as
one of those visionary stories, which in former days were the amusements
of the nursery.
Holyhead is the terminus of this extraordinary line—a line of great value
to this place, effecting as it has done a rapid communication between
this port and the eastern part of the county, as well as the
manufacturing districts of Cheshire, Lancashire, and the North; while,
uniting with other lines, a connexion is opened up with the Metropolis.