39 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



locomotives to carry one hundred tons a day. Where rivers and 

 gorges have to be crossed and very uneven ground is to be 

 passed over, no expensive bridging or grading has to be done. 

 It is not necessary to buy the land over which the line runs ; 

 only a right of way need be acquired — for the tracks being ele- 

 vated, the road does not interfere with the use of the ground for 

 agricultural or other purposes. At Glynde this consideration was 

 an important one, and the fact of the tracks being elevated was 

 also important for the reason that sometimes in winter some of 

 the fields over which the line passes are several feet deep in water. 

 The presence of an electric line of conveyance may be an actual 

 convenience for agricultural operations ; for a root - cutter, a 

 shearing-machine, a thrashing-machine, a circular saw, or any 

 other agricultural machinery, may be driven by attaching a small 

 electro-motor to the machine, and connecting it by wires with the 

 rods of the line. 



A train of ten loaded skeps, on a road of flexible rods such as 

 has just been described, weighs about two tons, yet lines can be 

 designed, especially when stiff rails are used, that will carry 

 almost as heavy loads as desired. Yet telpher lines are especially 

 applicable where the traffic is not large enough, or the difficulties 

 of construction are too great, to make an ordinary railroad profit- 

 able, and where the goods would be conveyed in carts or on 

 pack-horses. Prof. Perry estimates that on a railway the cost of 

 transporting freight is about Id. per ton per mile, if there is a 

 sufficient amount of traffic ; that on a telpher line the cost is from 

 2id. per ton mile to 3id. ; whereas cartage can not be performed 

 at much less than Is. per ton mile, and even at this high price 

 the cost of constructing the cart-road and keeping it in repair is 

 left out of account. Telpherage is claimed to be superior to the 

 wire-rope haulage system in its power to turn sharp corners 

 with ease. 



It was reported in the spring of last year that the Glynde line 

 had given every satisfaction under continuous working for over 

 three years, and that negotiations were in progress for the erec- 

 tion of telpher lines both in England and abroad. Among the 

 contracts then recently made was one for two lines in Cornwall, 

 for the carriage respectively of one thousand and five hundred 

 tons of tin ore a week. 



In regard to possible applications of telpherage Prof. Perry 

 has said : " As we have it at present, it will not only be very use- 

 ful in bringing ore from mines, but it is easy to arrange for a 

 telpher line which will load or unload a vessel which is unable to 

 come close to shore on account of the shallowness of the water, 

 and we can imagine these trains of skeps running out over the 

 sea, running down into the hold of a vessel, running up again, and 



