284 IMPROVEMENT OF THE LOCOMOTIVE. CHAP. XIV. 



x, the cranked axle, and the fire-box firmly fixed to 

 the boiler. The first load of goods conveyed from Liver- 

 pool to Manchester by the " Planet" was eighty tons in 

 weight, and the engine performed the journey against a 

 strong head wind in two hours and a half. On another 

 occasion, the same engine brought up a cargo of voters 

 from Manchester to Liverpool, during a contested elec- 

 tion, within a space of sixty minutes. The " Samson," 

 delivered in the following year, exhibited still further 

 improvements, the most important of which was that of 

 coupling the fore and hind wheels of the engine. By 

 this means, the adhesion of the wheels on the rails was 

 more effectually secured, and thus the full hauling power 

 -. of the locomotive was made available. The " Samson," 

 shortly after it was placed upon the line, dragged after it 

 a train of waggons weighing one hundred and fifty tons, 

 at a speed of about twenty miles an hour ; the consump- 

 tion of coke being reduced to only about a third of a 

 pound per ton per mile. 



The rapid progress thus made will show that the 

 inventive faculties of Mr. Stephenson and his son were 

 kept fully on the stretch ; but their labours were amply 

 repaid by the result. They were, doubtless, to some 

 extent stimulated by the number of competitors who 

 about the same time appeared as improvers of the loco- 

 / motive engine. Of these, the most prominent were the 

 I Messrs. Braithwaite and Ericsson, whose engine, the 

 / " Novelty," had excited such high expectations at the 

 ' Rainhill competition. The directors of the railway, 

 desirous of giving all parties a fair chance, ordered from 

 those makers two engines on the same model ; but their 

 performances not proving satisfactory, they were finally 

 withdrawn. One of them slipped off the rails near the 

 Sankey viaduct, and was nearly thrown over the em- 

 bankment. The superiority of Mr. Stephenson's loco- 

 motives over all others that had yet been tried, induced 

 the directors of the railway to require that the engines 



