Line Development 145 particular specialties, this in the case of the Royal Mail and Through Lines being the passenger and express trades. They also agreed to give a kickback to Bethune for each passenger transferred from a subsidiary trade.21 The process of annual renegotiation, which had the potential for being as disruptive as the regular tendering of the mail contract had been, actually facilitated the orderly withdrawal from the trade of some of the interests involved. Several of the forwarders moved into the railway contracting business, while D. Bethune & Co. went bankrupt (this time largely a function of dishonesty in the company office). For a time the annual meeting began to function as a shipping conference, with the management of other lines operating the length of Lake Ontario participating in the deliberations. Few details, unfortunately, have survived regarding this development.22 Ultimately the cartel failed because of the completion of the Grand Trunk Railway and the financial panic of 1857. Together they represented one of the worst possibilities a business organization can face: a sharp short-term decline in demand coupled with a dramatic increase in the supply of its particular service. Moreover, no matter how poorly the railway fared in the marketplace, the government was prepared to keep the line out of receivership using a generous selection of concessions, subsidies and financial sleights of hand. But while the railway would not be allowed to go bankrupt one by one the region's shipowners were suffering exactly that fate.23 After most of his associates either voluntarily or involuntarily withdrew from the trade, John Hamilton found himself in sole control of the line again. But despite using virtually every competitive edge at his disposal, including at one stage an agreement with the Grand Trunk, Hamilton could not escape the fate of most of the others. In the spring of 1861 all his property was assigned to three trustees in order to avoid formal bankruptcy proceedings.24 Nevertheless, to conclude the study at this point would be to cast it as a classic tragedy, with the protagonist succumbing in the end to the overwhelming power of 21 Ibid., sections 15, 16, 19. 22 Gerald J.J. Tulchinsky, The River Barons; Montreal Businessmen and the Growth of Industry and Transportation, 1837-1853, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1977), 42-3; Henry C. Klassen, L.H. Holton: "Montreal Businessman and Politician, 1817-1867," (PhD thesis, University of Toronto, 1970), 1128-9; Patterson V. Holland, Grant's Chancery Reports, v. 7, 2-3; British Whig, 23 Apr., 30 Apr. 1850, 13 Apr., 18 Apr., 19 May 1854;Great Western Railway, General Meetings of Shareholders, Minute Book, 12 Mar. 1856, LAC, RG 30, v. 1. 23 G.R. Stevens, Canadian National Railways, (Toronto: Clarke, Irwin, 1960) I, Chap. IX; A.W. Currie, The Grand Trunk Railway of Canada, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1957), 47-8; Robertson, Landmarks of Toronto, II: XXX; Daily News, 14 Nov. 1857, 7 Apr. 1858. 24 Canada, Commission Appointed to Inquire into the Affairs of the Grand Trunk Railway, Report, App. IV, 33-5; La Societe de Navigation du St Laurent & du Richelieu, Minutes, 5 avril 1860, Queen's University Archives, Canada Steamship Lines Papers [CSL Papers], v. 15; Dun and Bradstreet Papers, R.G. Dun & Co. Credit Ledgers, Canada, v. 15, 104, Harvard University, Baker Library; Weekly British Whig, 21 Mar. 1861.