282 IMPROVEMENT OF THE ROAD AND PLANT. CHAP. XIV. 



Then the stations must be protected by signals observ- 

 able from such a distance as to enable the train to be 

 stopped in event of an obstacle, such as a stopping or 

 shunting train being in the way. For some years the 

 signals employed on the Liverpool railway were entirely 

 given by men with flags of different colours stationed 

 along the line ; there were no fixed signals, nor electric 

 telegraphs ; but the traffic was nevertheless worked 

 quite as safely as under the more elaborate and com- 

 plicated system of telegraphing which has since been 

 established. 



From an early period it became obvious that the iron 

 road as originally laid down was quite insufficient for 

 the heavy traffic which it had to carry. The line was 

 in the first place laid with fish-bellied rails of thirty- 

 five pounds to the yard, calculated only for horse-traffic, 

 or, at most, for engines like the " Rocket," of very light 

 weight. But as the power and the weight of the loco- 

 motives were increased, it was found that such rails 

 were quite insufficient for the safe conduct of the traffic, 

 and it therefore became necessary to re-lay the road with 

 heavier and stronger rails at considerable expense. 



The details of the carrying stock had in like manner 

 to be settled by experience. Everything had, as it 

 were, to be begun from the beginning. The coal- 

 waggon, it is true, served in some degree as a model for 

 the railway-truck ; but the railway passenger-carriage 

 was an entirely novel structure. It had to be mounted 

 upon strong framing, of a peculiar kind, supported on 

 springs to prevent jolting. Then there was the neces- 

 sity for contriving some method of preventing hard 

 bumping of the carriage-ends when the train was pulled 

 .up ; and hence the contrivance of buffer-springs and 

 spring frames. For the purpose of stopping the train, 

 brakes on an improved plan were also contrived, with 

 new modes of lubricating the carriage-axles, on which 

 the wheels revolved at an unusually high velocity. In 



