In the third rank may be grouped those branch lines which, starting from a main passenger or goods line, are laid down to some outlying town, seaport, or mining centre, which, although small, is considered of sufficient importance to be brought into railway communication. In general, these lines are laid to the same gauge as the line with which they connect, and the transfer of merchandise waggons is readily effected at the point of junction. Others, from motives of economy, have been laid down to a narrow gauge, involving the transhipment of all goods and cattle at the station where the break of gauge takes place. Most of these branch lines are laid out through the open country, like an ordinary standard railway, but with a minimum of works and appliances. Others are laid down partly on level public roads, and partly through the fields, and are in consequence subject to a statutory low rate of speed when travelling over those portions on the public roads. In many cases the construction of second and third rank railways, both at home and abroad, has been largely assisted by state or provincial aid. Such assistance must always be valuable to poor or undeveloped districts, but judgment should be exercised so as not to encourage the introduction of any scheme which would interfere or become competitive with any existing undertaking constructed by public enterprise. So long as capitalists invest their money more from commercial motives than from feelings of philanthropy, it would, to say the least, be unjust and impolitic for any country to adopt a course of competition by national funds, and so check the flow of public money into public undertakings. Ordinary public commercial competition may be business, as each party can value and compare their own prospects; but the competition of a scheme enjoying national aid and free money grants is very apt to become one-sided.