In a pamphlet published in 1824, under the title of "A Statement of the Claim of the Subscribers to the Birmingham and Liverpool Rail-road to an Act of Parliament; in reply to the Opposition of the Canal Companies" (quoted in the fifth, or 1825, edition of Thomas Gray's "Observations on a General Iron Rail-way"), it is stated that the amount of capital originally subscribed for the old Birmingham Canal Company was about £55,000, in shares of £100, subject to a stipulation that no one person should hold more than ten shares. The pamphlet proceeds:-- {237}"By various subsequent Acts and collateral cuts, this canal, which has now changed its name to the style of the 'Birmingham Canal Navigation Company,' is extended to a distance of about 60 miles of water, containing 99 locks or thereabouts, 10 fire engines to raise water, number of bridges not known to the present writer. "The original shares are computed to have cost the proprietors £140 each. In 1782 they were marketably worth £370, and in 1792, £1110. In 1811 an Act increased the shares 500 to 1000, or, in other words, for marketable convenience divided them. In 1813 the half share was sold as high as £585. In 1818 power was given to the company of proprietors further to subdivide the shares as they should deem advisable, on due public notice, etc. The shares are now in eighths. Thus at the present time, and at the last quoted prices in Wetenhall's list, there are 4000 shares of eighths, marketably worth £360 per eighth, each receiving an annual dividend of £12-10-0. Thus the original cost, compared with the present value of the 500 shares, is as £70,000 to £1,444,000, the original share having risen from £140 sterling (or thereabouts) to the sum of £2840." Shares in the Loughborough Navigation cost the first holders £142-17-0 each. In the "European Magazine" for June, 1821, they are quoted at £2600 a share, and the dividend then being paid is given as 170 per cent. In the issue of the same magazine for November, 1824, the price per share is £4700, and the dividend is shown to have risen to 200 per cent. Among other canal shares quoted in the "European Magazine" for the dates mentioned are the following:-- 1821 1824 COMPANY. SHARE. PRICE. DIVIDEND. PRICE. DIVIDEND. £ £ £ £ £ Coventry 100 970 44 1350 44 and 61 Erewash 100 1000 56 -- 58 Leeds and Liverpool 100 280 10 570 15 Oxford 100 630 32 900 32* Staffordshire and Worcestershire 100 700 40 950 40 Trent and Mersey 200 1750 7575 2250 75* * And bonus. {238}The following further quotations are from "Wetenhall's Commercial List" for December 10, 1824:--