THE LOCOMOTIVE. 



average speed in miles per hour, will give the daily work on the 

 road in time. The flowing are the details of this for the lines 

 worked by the North- Western Company : 



Total mileage of engines . . . .7, 532230 

 Number of engine drivers and firemen . . 275 



Annual distance worked per head . . 27390 miles 

 Daily distance worked per head . . . 75 ,, 



Time daily on the road (at the average speed 



of 28 miles per hour) .... 2| hours 



If it be assumed that the engines, one with another, work on 

 alternate days, the actual distance run in each trip by each 

 engine on the system of lines worked by the North- Western Com- 

 pany will be 90 miles ; which in time, at 28 miles an hour, would 

 he 3^ hours. 



It appears, therefore, that the locomotive power is worked to 

 greater advantage on these than on the continental lines generally. 

 We have seen that the average distance run by each engine lighted 

 on the Belgian lines was about 78 miles. 



39. It has been customary, in some of the reports presented to 

 the railway companies, to institute comparisons between one line 

 of railway and another, founded upon the relation between the 

 locomotive stock and the length of the line. 



Now such a mode of comparison can afford no legitimate conse- 

 quence of the least importance, either in a financial or mechanical 

 point of view. The quantity of locomotive power does not in any 

 manner depend on the length of the railway. The locomotive 

 power is used to draw the traffic, and for no other purpose. Its 

 quantity, therefore, will depend on the quantity of the traffic, 

 and the average distance to which it is carried, or, in other words, 

 on the mileage of the goods and passengers. 



Two railways having the same traffic mileage will require the 

 same locomotive stock, be their length equal or unequal. If a 

 million of tons of goods require to be annually transported an 

 average distance of 500 miles, and ten millions of passengers 

 also require to be annually transported 300 miles, it is manifest, 

 that the same locomotive power will be requisite to execute the 

 traffic, whether the railway on which it is carried be 400 miles or 

 800 miles in length. 



If the object be to compare the merits of the management of 

 the locomotive power, then the test of comparison should be the 

 quantity of work executed by a given quantity of this power ; and 

 the quantity of work must be decided by the useful mileage of 

 the engines, and not by the length of the line. 



Nevertheless, we find railway authorities in high repute 

 announcing, that to stock a line requires so many engines per 

 142 



