Sir Francis Bond Head

“ The duties which the engine-driver has to perform are not only of vital importance, but of a nature which peculiarly illustrates the calm, unpretending, bull-dog courage, indigenous to the moist healthy climate of the British Isles. Even in bright sunshine, to stand—like the figure-head of a ship—foremost on a train of enormous weight, which, with fearful momentum, is rushing forward faster than any race-horse can gallop, requires a cool head and a calm heart ”

“ When every person has succeeded in liberating himself or herself from the train, it is amusing to observe how cleverly, from long practice, the Company’s porters understood the apparent confusion which exists. To people wishing to embrace their friends—to gentlemen and servants darting in various directions straight across the platform to secure a cab or in search of private carriages—they offer no assistance whatever, well knowing that none is required. ”

“ Indeed, when a gale of wind and rain from the north-west, triumphantly sweeping over the surface of the earth at its ordinary rate of say sixty miles an hour, suddenly meets the driver of the London and North-Western, who has not only to withstand such an antagonist, but to dash through him, and in spite of him to proceed in an opposite direction at the rate of say forty miles an hour—the conflict between the wet Englishman and Æolus, tilting by each other at the combined speed of a hundred miles an hour, forms a tournament of extraordinary interest. ”

“ The Company’s cattle and merchandise waggons are usually painted blue, their sheep-waggons green. On the arrival of a train of cattle it is interesting to see such a quantity of polished horns, bright eyes, streams of white breath, and healthy black wet noses projecting above the upper rail of their respective waggons, and fatal as is the object of their visit to John Bull’s metropolis, it is some consolation to reflect that—poor things—they are, at all events, in ignorance of the fate that awaits them. ”

“ This extraordinary whirl of business, set to music by the various noises proceeding from the working of the steam-cranes, steam-doller, steam-capstan, common cranes, and other machinery above the platform—from the arrival, turning, backing, and departure of spring-waggons beneath it—from the rumbling of porters’ trucks crossing the platform, as also of the railway vans as, laden with goods, they are successively rolled away—forms altogether, we repeat, a scene which, though rarely visited, is astounding to witness, and which, we are sensible, we have but very faintly described. ”

“ About four minutes after the up-train has been authorised by the air-pipe to leave Camden Station, the guard who stands listening for it at the Euston tunnel, just as a deaf man puts his ear to a trumpet, announces by his flag its immediate approach; on which the signal-man at the little office on Euston platform again touches his trigger, which violently convulsing his bell as before, the cab-horses begin to move their feet, raise their jaded heads, prick up their ears, and champ their bits; the servants in livery turn their powdered heads round ”

“ But among all the subterranean pipes laid bare before us there is certainly no one which has more curious contents than the three-inch iron pipe of the Electric Telegraph Company; and yet, of all the multitudes who walk the streets, how few of them ever care to reflect what a singular contrast exists between the slow pace at which they themselves are proceeding, and the rate at which beneath their feet forty-five electric wires are transmitting in all directions, and to a variety of distances, intelligence of every possible description! ”

“ The spring waggons and carts of the Company’s agents, like bees in search of honey, with extraordinary intelligence migrate in all directions to the various localities of the metropolis in search, piecemeal, of that enormous traffic, large and small, which by every diurnal pulsation of the heart of London is projected into our manufacturing districts, which in return send back to the metropolis very nearly the same amount. ”

“ The scene in the refreshment-room at Wolverton, on the arrival of every train, has so often been witnessed by our readers, that it need hardly be described. As these youthful handmaidens stand in a row behind bright silver urns, silver coffee-pots, silver tea-pots, cups, saucers, cakes, sugar, milk, with other delicacies over which they preside, the confused crowd of passengers simultaneously liberated from the train hurry towards them with a velocity exactly proportionate to their appetites. ”

“ To any one who will carefully observe the practical working of a railway, it is not only alarming, but appalling, to reflect on the accidents which sooner or later must befall the public if the master-mind which directs the whole concern, but which cannot possibly illuminate the darkness of every one of its details, were suddenly to be deprived of the talisman by which alone he can govern a lineal territory four or five hundred miles in length—namely, an abundant supply of MONEY. Parliament may thunder—Government may threaten—juries may punish—the public may rave ”

“ As soon as these irons are perfectly clean and dry rubbed, they oil them from their can; and then—crawling beneath the open doors of the carriages and beneath the feet and ankles of a crowd of exuding travellers of all ages, who care no more for oilmen than the oilmen of this world care for them—they hurry to the buffer-rods of the next carriage—and so rapidly do they proceed, that before the last omnibus has driven off, the buffer-rods of the whole train are as bright as when new. ”

“ As soon as an infant railway can run alone—we mean as soon as its works are all constructed, its permanent way finished, its buildings executed, its locomotive engines as well as its carriages constructed, and its whole establishment of officers and men appointed and organised—the chief engineer, like a month-nurse, usually departs to new troubles, leaving the maintenance of the way to those of his assistants whom he considers, and who in the opinion of the Directors of the Company are deemed, the most competent to execute its various details. ”

“ From a spacious open yard covered with stacks of old scrap-iron, much of which was of the size of common buttons, a door opens into a large shop containing twelve forges solely used for the construction of engine-wheels, which are forced on as well as off their axles by an ingenious machine of extraordinary power. Adjoining the open yard we saw in operation Nasmyth’s great steam-hammer, on the summit of which there sat perched up a man who could regulate its blow from say twenty-five tons to a little tap sufficient only to drive a common-sized nail. ”

“ As the train now flies through our verdant fields, the cattle grazing on each side do not even raise their heads to look at it; the timid sheep fears it no more than the wind; indeed, the hen-partridge, running with her brood along the embankment of a deep cutting, does not now even crouch as it passes close by her. ”

“ But on our railways, when once a man has tied himself to the tail of a locomotive engine, it matters but little, especially in a fog, whether he flies at the pace of fifty miles an hour, or whether he crawls, as it is now termed, at the rate only of twenty; for, in either case, if there be anything faulty in the works, machinery, or management, accidents may occur to him which it is fearful to contemplate. ”

“ If ordinary houses could suddenly be placed on its path, it would, passengers and all, run through them as a musket-ball goes through a keg of butter; but what would be the result if, at this full speed, the engine by any accident were to be diverted against a mass of solid rock, such as sometimes is to be seen at the entrance of a tunnel, it is almost impossible to calculate, or even to conjecture. ”

“ While the travellers of a train are peacefully taking their seats, artillery-men, horses, and cannon, on a contiguous set of rails, are occasionally as quietly embarking in carriages, horse-boxes, and trucks, which are subsequently hooked on to a mass of passengers perfectly unconscious of the elements of war which are accompanying them. ”

“ And if such be the irresistible power of the locomotive engine when feebly walking in its newborn state, unattended or unassisted even by its tender, is it not appalling to reflect what must be its momentum when, in the full vigour of its life, it is flying down a steep gradient at the rate of 50 miles an hour, backed up by say 30 passenger-carriages, each weighing on an average 51⁄2 tons? ”

“ So long as the manager of a railway has ample funds he ought to be prepared, regardless of expense, to repair with the utmost possible despatch the falling-in of a tunnel or any other serious accident to the works—in short, the whole powers of his mind should be directed to the paramount interests of the public, which, in fact, are identical with those of the Company. ”

“ There are private houses of every form—shops of every colour—columns, steeples, fountains, obelisks ad infinitum. Conspicuous over one door there is to be seen a golden pestle and mortar—from another boldly projects a barber’s pole—a hatchment decorates a third—the Royal Arms a fourth—in short, it would be endless to enumerate the circumstantial evidence which in every direction proves the truth of the old saving, “Many men, many minds.” ”

“ Among the servants of a railway company, or rather we should say of the public, there is no one who, in his secluded station, has more important duties to attend to than “the pointsman,” in charge of the switches for diverting a train from one set of rails to another. As it is of course necessary that these switches should be carefully worked and guarded by night as well as by day, there are usually appointed to each station two pointsmen, each of whom remains on duty twelve hours at a time, taking the night and day work week about. ”

“ Indeed, without entering into details, the wealth which has been created and amassed since the period in question, added to that with which we have not only irrigated, but almost without metaphor top-dressed the greater portion of the old as well as of the new world, and, lastly, the extraordinary improvements that have taken place in light, heat, locomotion—electrical as well as by steam-power—machinery, in short in everything that administers to human comfort, form altogether the golden harvest of our labours ”

“ In our metropolis, there is scarcely a street which does not appear to take pride in exposing as often as possible to public view a series of pipes of all sizes, in which fire of various companies, pure water of various companies, and unmentionable mixtures, abominable to all, pass cheek by jowl with infinitely less trouble than the motley human currents flow above them. ”