Masterpieces of Science 



In the meantime the discussion proceeded as 

 to the kind of power to be permanently employed 

 for the working of the railway. The directors 

 were inundated with schemes of all sorts for 

 facilitating locomotion. The projectors of Eng- 

 land, France, and America seemed to be let loose 

 upon them. There were plans for working the 

 waggons along the line by water-power. Some 

 proposed hydrogen, and others carbonic acid gas. 

 Atmospheric pressure had its eager advocates. 

 And various kinds of fixed and locomotive steam- 

 power were suggested. Thomas Gray urged 

 his plan of a greased road with cog-rails; and 

 Messrs. Vignolles and Ericsson recommended the 

 adoption of a central friction-rail, against which 

 two horizontal rollers under the locomotive, 

 pressing upon the sides of this rail, were to afford 

 the means of ascending the inclined planes. . . 



The two best practical engineers of the day 

 concurred in reporting substantially in favour 

 of the employment of fixed engines. Not a 

 single professional man of eminence could be 

 found to coincide with the engineer of the railway 

 in his preference for locomotive over fixed engine 

 power. He had scarcely a supporter, and the 

 locomotive system seemed on the eve of being 

 abandoned. Still he did not despair. With the 

 profession against him, and public opinion against 

 him for the most frightful stories went abroad 

 respecting the dangers, the unsightliness, and 

 the nuisance which the locomotive would create 

 'Stephenson held to his purpose. Even in 

 164 



