A more direct challenge to the Board of Trade and to Parliament could not easily have been devised. To appreciate how direct it was, it is necessary to bear in mind that in its circular of August 30, 1877, in which the requirements of a satisfactory train-brake were laid down, the Board of Trade threw out to the companies the very significant hint, that they "would do well to reflect that if a doubt should arise that from a conflict of interest or opinion, or from any other cause, they [the companies] are not exerting themselves, it is obvious that they will call down upon themselves an interference which the Board of Trade, no less than the companies, desire to avoid." In his general report on the accidents of the year 1877, the successor of Captain Tyler expressed the opinion that "sufficient information and experience would now appear to be available, and the time is approaching when the railway companies may fairly be expected to come to a decision as to which of the systems of continuous brakes is best calculated to fulfil the requisite conditions, and is most worthy of general adoption." At the close of another year, however, the official returns seemed to indicate that, while but a sixth part of the passenger locomotives and a fifth part of the carriages in use on the railroads of the United Kingdom were yet equipped with continuous brakes at all, a concurrence of opinion in favor of any one system was more remote than ever. During the six months ending December 31, 1878, but 127 additional locomotives out of about 4000, and 1,200 additional carriages out of some 32,000 were equipped; of which 70 locomotives and 530 carriages had been equipped with the Smith vacuum, which in three most important respects failed to comply with the Board of Trade requirements. Under these circumstances the Board of Trade was obviously called upon either to withdraw from the position it had taken, or to invite that "interference" in its support to which in its circular of August, 1877 it had so portentously referred. It decided to do the latter, and in March, 1879 the government gave an intimation in the House of Lords that early Parliamentary action was contemplated. As it is expressed, the railway companies are to "be relieved of their indecision."