In his anti-Puseyite zeal _Punch_ mendaciously declares that a railway from Oxford to Rome has been projected with the Pope's approval. In fact, any stick was good enough to beat the speculators with. "Locksley Hall" is parodied as "Capel Court," and the rush to deposit plans at the Board of Trade, when special trains were chartered by rival promoters, is described in humorous detail in a _Punch_ ballad. Padded suits are suggested in 1846 as a protection against railway accidents, but the best summary--with all its exaggerations--of the discomforts of railway travelling in the mid 'forties is to be found in the "Rules and Regulations for Railways":-- The French Government has published a royal _ordonnance_, fixing the regulations that are henceforward to be observed by all railway companies in working their lines. As it is a pity these things should be better managed in France, we publish a set of regulations for English railways. Lord John Russell is welcome to them, if he likes. Every passenger in the second or third class is to be allowed to carry a dark lantern, or a penny candle, or a safety lamp, into the train with him, as the directors have kept the public in the dark quite long enough. No train is to travel slower than an omnibus, let the excursion be ever so cheap, or the occasion ever so joyful. Cattle are to be separated from the passengers as much as possible, as it has been found, from experiments, that men and oxen do not mix sociably together. No stoppage at a railway station is to exceed half an hour. No railway dividend is to exceed 100 per cent., and no bonus to be divided oftener than once a month. No fare is to be raised more than at the rate of a pound a week. No third-class carriage is to contain more than a foot deep of water in wet weather, but, to prevent accidents, corks and swimming belts should always be kept in open carriages. The ladies' carriages are to be waited upon by female policemen. Every tunnel must be illuminated with one candle at least. Never less than five minutes are to be allowed for dinner or refreshment.[5] One director must always travel with every train, only he is to be allowed the option of choosing his seat, either in the second or third class--whichever of the two he prefers. Hospitals are to be built at every terminus, and a surgeon to be in attendance at every station. There must be some communication between every carriage and the stoker, or the guard, either by a bell, or a speaking tube, or a portable electric telegraph, so that the passengers may have some means of giving information when their carriage is off the line, or falling over an embankment, or a maniac or a horse has broken loose.