304 



RAILWAY. 



Railway, ^usceptibe. In proof of this, we further notice that 

 v -^ p ^i<~ < ^ one person is sufficient to conduct the horse-load upon 

 a railway, while three individuals are generally requir- 

 ed for the same purpose upon a canal. We may also 

 mention, that inland navigation is subject to interrup- 

 tion by the frosts of winter and the droughts of sum- 

 mer. The comparative facility of loading and discharg- 

 ing are likewise much in favour of the traffic on a rail- 

 way ; while nearly the same proportion of labour in the 

 trackage of empty or return boats and waggons is inci- 

 dent to both. Without calculating upon the immense 

 loads, extending to fifty tons, which have been tracked 

 by the steam waggon, or of thirty tons and upwards, 

 which have occasionally been moved by one horse upon a 

 level railway, we can state that an active horse, weighing 

 ten cwt. conducted by only one man, upon a well-con- 

 structed level edge railway, will work with ten tons of 

 goods. In the same manner we may take thirty tons as 

 employing the effective labour of one horse and three 

 persons upon a canal ; from which it will therefore ap- 

 pear, that the expence of trackage per ton |is pretty 

 much the same in both systems, while the first cost, 

 and consequently the toll or dues, must be greatly in 

 favour of the railway. For very weighty and bulky 

 goods, the canal is allowed to be more suitable ; yet, in 

 practice, many of such articles may be so placed as to 

 bear upon the wheels of more than one waggon on a 

 railway. Upon the whole, we are of opinion, that in 

 every case it is better to construct a railway than a 

 small canal, excepting where the union of similar works 

 is to be effected. The case is different where it is in- 

 tended to transport sea-borne sliips across a country, 

 from shore to shore, as on the Forth and Clyde, the 

 Crinan and the Caledonian canals in Scotland. 

 Origin of In treating this subject, it may be proper to give 

 railways, some short account of the introduction and progress 

 of the railway system. There can be no doubt that 

 it is of British origin ; and being still in a great mea- 

 sure peculiar to this country, it has not unaptly been 

 termed the " British Roadway." Wooden railways 

 seem first to have been known in Northumberland, 

 particularly in the neighbourhood of Newcastle, and 

 that probably as far back as the sixteenth century ; bi t 

 we believe it was reserved for Mr. William Reynolds of 

 Coalbrookdale, in Shropshire, about the year 1767, first 

 to put the crude material of roads into the crucible of the 

 refiner, and thus introduce the use of rails wholly of 

 iron. Rails of this description were soon afterwards ap- 

 plied, by a Mr. Curr, to the under-ground works of the 

 Duke of Norfolk's collieries near Sheffield. The first 

 public railway company is understood to have been 

 instituted at Loughborough, in the year 17^9. where 

 the late eminent Mr. Jessop had the merit of first 

 employing the edge-rail. About ten years after- 

 wards, Mr. Benjamin Outram introduced the plate- 

 rail, with props of stone at the joinings of the rails 

 instead of timber. Hitherto both the edge and plate- 

 rails were made of cast iron, but, hi the year 1811, 

 the former was, we believe, first made wholly of mal- 

 leable iron at Lord Carlisle's coalworks in Cumberland. 

 Stone tracks in large blocks, laid in the form of what 

 may be termed rails, are of great antiquity, as appears 

 from the construction of some of the famous Roman 

 ways still to be seen at Rome, and in other cities of 

 Italy. An attempt is now making to introduce these 

 tracks on streets and common roads, the stones of which 

 are not much larger than those of the best aisler cause- 

 way, formed and laid after a particular manner, sug- 

 gested by Mr. Stevenson, engineer. 



In noticing the progress of railways, it would now 



6 



be difficult even to enumerate the various works of this Railway. 

 description which have been executed throughout the 

 United Kingdom, as railways are universally employed 

 at all the principal coal and iron works, in situations way : , JS . 

 altogether inaccessible to a communication by water, tern. 

 In not a few instances they have been constructed by 

 joint stock companies, and sometimes by individuals 

 as public thoroughfares. 



The only public railway of extent in Scotland, is in Scot- 

 that between the manufacturing town of Kilmarnock land, 

 and the harbour of Troon ; which, agreeably to act of 

 Parliament, is open to all upon payment of a cer- 

 tain toll. This extensive work, like those of the Duke 

 of Bridgewater's in England, was executed at the sole 

 expence of the Duke of Portland, for the improve- 

 ment of his Ayrshire estates. The Troon railway is 

 about ten miles in length, and is laid with two sets 

 of cast-iron tracks, of the description technically term- 

 ed plate-rails. It crosses the river Irvine by a stone 

 bridge of four arches, each of forty feet span, and the 

 whole line forms an inclined plane, falling towards 

 the shipping port, at the rate of about one-iixteenth of 

 an inch perpendicular to one yard horizontal. In its 

 track it encounters a difficult pass through Shaulton 

 moss ; and towards the harbour, the uniform line of 

 draught is preserved by an embankment of about two 

 miles in length. This work, with the great pier found- 

 ed in about eighteen feet water in the lowest tides, to- 

 gether with the graving-docks and whole establishment 

 at Troon, were executed agreeably to a design of the 

 late Mr. Jessop's, and, with the coaljillings in the neigh- 

 bourhood, are understood to have cost about L.150,000. 

 The other railways in Scotland which may be mention- 

 ed as of extent or interest, are those of the Carron Com- 

 pany, the establishment of which are understood to 

 have reduced the average monthly expenditure for car- 

 riage from L. 1200 to L.3QO, the coal works of the Earls 

 of Elgin and Mar in Fife and Clackmannan shires, Sir 

 John Hope of Pinkie, Mr. Wauchope of Edmondstone, 

 and Mr. Cadell of Cockenzie, in Mid-Lothian; Mr 

 Dickson, and others in Lanarkshire ; and Mr. Taylor 

 and others in Ayrshire. These are edge-railways, and 

 such of them as have lately been laid, are chiefly of 

 malleable iron. 



In England, at all the coal and manufacturing districts, In Eng- 

 railways are employed for facilitating and economising ' ancl ' 

 the operations. In the counties of Northumberland 

 and Durham alone, the coal-workings and railwavs re- 

 quire a separate map (Aikenhead's map) to show their 

 position. Here the system of way-leave was first intro- 

 duced, a source of revenue in the form of a tonnage, 

 paid to landed proprietors for liberty to pass through 

 their grounds with a line of railway to the shipping 

 port. In Durham, a public railway is now construct- 

 ing between the coal-works in the neighbourhood of 

 Bishop Auk land, the town of Darlington, and its port 

 of Stockton. In Cumberland, perhaps the most in- 

 teresting railways are those of the under-ground works 

 of Lord Lonsdale at Whitehaven. In the great ma- 

 nufacturing and commercial county of Lancashire, rail- 

 ways are very numerous; near Preston, the valley of 

 the Ribble is crossed by two inclined planes of consi- 

 derable extent, along which the waggons are transported 

 by means of stationary or fixed steam engines. A high- 

 ly interesting work also occurs at the Duke of Bridge- 

 water's under- ground works at Worsley, about seven 

 miles from Manchester. Here the works are soaccommo- 

 dated, that boats containing about ten tons of coal are let 

 down upon an inclined plane fitted with cast-iron plate- 

 rails, measuring eight inches broad, and an inch and a 



