"Canals in this country," says the Final Report of the Royal Commission on Canals and Waterways, "were constructed upon no general scheme or system. As soon as it was seen that they were a profitable investment, independent companies were formed in every district, and, according to their influence or their means, obtained from Parliament Acts conceding powers to make canals of the most varying length and character." If, in conceding these powers, Parliament {296}had established some central authority with a view to securing such uniformity in construction and such connected routes as were practicable, it would have rendered a greater service than by simply approving schemes put forward in what the Final Report itself describes as a "piecemeal" fashion. This, however, was not done; nor, in fact, was action taken to prevent the canal companies, after they had shown their enterprise and risked their millions, from becoming in the pre-railway days grasping monopolists whose one idea was to exploit the trader to their own advantage, leading him to welcome the railways, as an alternative to the canals, still more cordially than he had previously welcomed the canals as an alternative to the roads and rivers. So long as the locomotive remained in a comparatively undeveloped stage, the canal companies refrained from regarding railways as serious rivals, and continued to look upon them in the light, rather, of contributors of traffic to the waterways; but in proportion as the locomotive was improved and the rivalry of the railways became more and more pronounced the canal companies grew alarmed for the prospects of their own concerns. They entered on no new undertakings--the last inland canal, as distinct from ship canals, was completed about 1834--and they got anxious as to the future of those they had on their hands. They had first scoffed at the railways as "nothing but insane schemes," or as costly "bubbles," and they had then worked up a powerful opposition against them. Having failed in each of these directions, they next took steps which they would have done well to take earlier--they reduced their tolls, and they also began to consider how they could improve their canals. In 1835 there was a general reduction of rates on the Old Quay Navigation between Liverpool and Manchester, but this belated policy of seeking to make terms with the traders did not prejudice the fortunes of the new railway between those places. As regards the improvements sought to be introduced on the canals, Nicholas Wood, in the third edition (1838) of his "Practical Treatise on Rail-Roads," says:--