78 EARLY SPECULATIONS ON THE SUBJECT, CHAP. VI. 



lit his lamp, the water shortly began to boil, and off 

 started the engine with the inventor after it. He soon 

 heard distant shouts of despair. It was too dark to 

 perceive objects ; but he shortly found, on following 

 up the machine, that the cries for assistance proceeded 

 from the worthy pastor of the parish, who, going to- 

 wards the town on business, was met on this lonely road 

 by the hissing and fiery little monster, which he subse- 

 quently declared he had taken to be the Evil One in 

 \proprid persona. No further steps, however, were taken 

 A by Murdock to embody his idea of a locomotive carriage 

 * in a more practical form. 



We next find the discussion of steam-power as a 

 means of haulage of heavy articles taken up in the 

 colliery districts of the North, where the want of some 

 more effective means of transport than horse-power was 

 most generally felt. One Thomas Allen took out a 

 patent in 1789 for conveying goods from one place to 

 another by the power of steam only. From his plan, 

 which is in the possession of the Society of Antiquaries 

 at Newcastle-upon-Tyiie, it appears that he intended the 

 wheels of his machine to be cogged ; yet he anticipated 

 a speed on a common road of about ten miles an hour. 

 It will be observed that no one had yet proposed to 

 apply steam-carriages to railways, but only to common 

 roads, though it is easy to see how the steam-engine 

 and the iron-road should have come together in the 

 ordinary course of things. The use of tramroads and 

 railways had now become quite general in the mining 

 districts, and their extension throughout the country 

 for the conveyance of general merchandise began 

 to be seriously discussed. Thus, in 1800, we find 

 Mr. Thomas, of Denton, Northumberland, reading a 

 paper before the Literary and Philosophical Society 

 of Newcastle, in which he urged " the propriety of 

 introducing roads on the principle of the coal-waggon 

 ways, for the general carriage of goods and mer- 



