But the railways brought many other changes. Those loads of earth brought from distant parts of the line not only altered the appearance of the country where they were deposited, but caused other alterations as well. Grass soon grew on the slopes of these embankments, but with the grass came up also strange weeds and plants. These seeded, the wind scattered the seeds, and, in the fields on either side of the line, these new weeds showed themselves the next season. For a year or two, probably, nobody noticed this very particularly; but, before very long, whole districts might be overrun with varieties of weeds never seen in that district before. In some places marshes had to be drained, and, in consequence, many broad, shallow stretches of water disappeared. Such "sedgy pools" in quiet districts were once the haunt of many varieties of wild fowl. As the pools have disappeared the wild fowl which made these their haunt disappeared also, and with them the wild flowers and water-plants belonging thereto have died out as well. In much the same way insects have been imported in the loads of earth and found a home in a new district where they have, so to speak, "settled", and have done in some cases good, and in other cases harm, to the land. Many cuttings through the beds of gravel and rocks have taught us something of the changes which have taken place in the earth's crust. It has been possible to examine the structure of the soil of many parts of England more thoroughly in the deep railway cuttings and tunnels than could have been done in any other way. Geologists have gathered much most valuable information from the soil and rock dug out in railway excavations. [Illustration: _The Town Hall, Carlisle, built in time of Elizabeth. From a drawing made in 1780_] CHAPTER L Government There was not much change for many centuries in the way in which towns and villages were governed. The borough towns, which gained their charters back in the days of King John, or King Henry III, had them confirmed by various kings in later times; but the powers of the towns were not much altered. The corporation of a borough was usually made up of men chosen by the freemen; but, if the freemen did not admit many persons to the freedom of the borough, the power of electing, in the course of years, fell into the hands of a very few people. This was what actually happened in a very large number of cases, and at the end of the eighteenth century there were many old boroughs which were governed by "close corporations"--the bulk of the people living in the borough having no voice in the management of the affairs of the town. All that was altered in the early part of the nineteenth century. Many of the old boroughs lost their privileges, as they had become such small unimportant places. All other boroughs now have regular elections of town councillors by the inhabitants each first of November. The councils elect the mayor on each 9th of November.