began building the Lancaster and Carlisle Railway of , which was considered to be one of their greatest lines. It passed through the Lune Valley and then over Shap Fell. Its summit was high and the line had steep gradients, the maximum being 1 in 75. To the south the line linked by way of the Preston–Lancaster line to the Grand Junction Railway. Two important contracts undertaken in 1845 were the Trent Valley Railway of and the Chester and Holyhead line of . The former line joined the London and Birmingham Railway at Rugby to the Grand Junction Railway south of Stafford providing a line from London to Scotland which bypassed Birmingham. The latter line provided a link between London and the ferries sailing from Holyhead to Ireland and included Robert Stephenson's tubular Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait. Also in 1845 Brassey received contracts for the Caledonian Railway which linked the railway at Carlisle with Glasgow and Edinburgh, covering a total distance of and passing over Beattock Summit. His engineer on this project was George Heald. That same year he also began contracts for other railways in Scotland, and in 1846 he started building parts of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway between Hull and Liverpool, across the Pennines. A contract for the Great Northern Railway was agreed in 1847, with William Cubitt as engineer-in-chief, although much of the work was done by William's son Joseph, who was the resident engineer. Brassey was the sole contractor for the line of . A particular problem was met in the marshy country of The Fens in providing a firm foundation for the railway and associated structures. Brassey was assisted in solving the problem by one of his agents, Stephen Ballard. Rafts or platforms were made of layers of faggot-wood and peat sods. As these sank, they dispersed the water and so a firm foundation was made. This line is still in use and forms part of the East Coast Main Line. Also in 1847 Brassey began to build the North Staffordshire Railway. By this time the "railway mania" was coming to an end and contracts in Britain were becoming increasingly more difficult to find. By the end of the "railway mania", Brassey had built one-third of all the railways in Britain. Expansion in Europe Following the end of the "railway mania" and the drying up of contracts in France, Brassey could have