878 MATHEMATICAL AND PHYSICAL SCIENCE. [Diss. VI. 
of the responsibility of the engineer-in-chief. As 
neither Mr Fairbairn nor Mr Hodgkinson could have 
incurred any just blame had the vast structure when 
on the eve of completion doubled up under its own 
weight, and blocked up, perhaps for ever, the navi- 
gation of half the Menai Strait, so neither can they 
possibly claim more than a subordinate share in the 
success of the undertaking. 
(364.) T shall here only refer to the work of Mr Edwin 
Sparen Clark, the resident engineer of the Britannia Bridge, 
railway for farther details of its principles and construction, 
bridges. and to the report of a royal commission (published 
in 1849) on the application of iron to railway struc- 
tures, for many curious researches connected with the 
subject of this section. In particular, we find a theo- 
retical and practical solution of the very delicate pro- 
blem of the influence of the speed of passing loads on 
the deflection of bridges, to which Professors Willis 
and Stokes, and Colonel James, R.E., are contributors. 
(365.) Mr Robert Stephenson is the son of Mr George 
Stephenson, who will be mentioned in a succeeding 
section. He was born in 1803; educated (in part) at Other 
the University of Edinburgh, under Leslie, Hope, and agit 
Jameson ; he long occupied the chief position in the phenson. 
locomotive factory established by his father at New- 
castle, having in the first place constructed under 
his direction the celebrated “ Rocket” engine which 
gained the prize at the opening of the Liverpool 
and Manchester railway. To his own exertions, 
both before and after that period, the locomotive 
owes much of its present perfection. He surveyed 
and principally carried through the London and Bir- 
mingham railway, the second great line in the king- 
dom ; and he has been engaged in a large proportion 
of the most remarkable engineering works connected 
with railways, both in this country and abroad, He 
has personally superintended the construction of 
railways amidst the blowing sands of Egypt, and in 
Norway with its heavy winter snows and deeply frozen 
soil. His high personal character, both for skill and 
integrity, has everywhere procured him the respect 
and confidence of his profession and of the public. 
§ 4. BruNEL.—Selj-acting Machinery —The Thames Tunnel.—Mr BaBBace’s Calculating 
Engines. 
(366.) Sir Marc Isampart Brunet, born at Hacqueville career as a civil engineer, his boyish tastes having 
Marc Isam- jn Normandy on the 25th April 1769, was one of the already indicated this as his natural calling. He exe- 
abe y P : y ’ 
nel, Most inventive mechanicians and engineers of his day. cuted some considerable works, and planned many 
As his genius gave a strong impression to contem- 
porary art, we associate his name with the progress 
of civil engineering in the earlier part of the pre- 
sent century, particularly in connection with me- 
chanism, Like most of his eminent coevals in the 
same profession, he had not the benefit of a scien- 
tific education ; but he more than most of them sup- 
plied its defects by a singular capacity for correct 
induction and by great mechanical ingenuity. Though 
a native of France, it was in Great Britain that his 
talents were to find their full scope, and it became his 
thoroughly adopted country. 
_(367.) Disgusted by the horrors of the first revolution, 
ae he quitted France in 1793 in the capacity of a com- 
"Y* mon sailor, a position far below that which either his 
birth or his intellect entitled him to hold, yet in 
which he made himself remarked by his excellent 
disposition and mental superiority. His destination 
was New York, where in 1794 he commenced his 
more; it is stated that he there devised the essential 
parts of his block machinery. About 1799 he decided 
on settling in England. 
It is probable that his talents and ingenuity alone 
recommended him to a government employment at a 
(368.) 
Employed 
by the Eng- 
time when the mere fact of his being a Frenchman lish go- 
must have acted as a powerful obstacle to his suc- vernment. 
cess. Those who recollect the vivacity and bright 
intelligence of even his later years, will understand 
that in his more active days it must have been diffi- 
cult to refuse Brunel at least a hearing. And it is 
to the eredit of Lord Spencer, then one of the Lords 
of the Admiralty, and of General Sir Samuel Ben- 
tham, inspector of naval works, that Brunel was en- 
gaged in 1802 to superintend the erection of his cele- 
brated block machinery. 
The invention of self-acting machinery to super- 
sede the work of artisans was of course not new. 
The saw-mill and the spinning-jenny were already in 
1 It has been alleged that Mr Stephenson’s original proposal to allow the suspension chains (which were primarily intended to 
be used in putting together the tubes in their final positions) to remain in aid of the rigidity of the structure, manifested a 
ideration of his evidence before the committee of the 
want of confidence in his own great idea, But a di 
House of Commons would alone clearly show (independent of Mr Stephenson’s declarations on the subject) that he was 
forced into the admission that the chains might give an ulterior guarantee against miscarriage of the whole plan, simply to save 
the bill from being thrown out by the not unnatural incredulity of those to whom a proposal so new, 8o gigantic, and affecting the 
lives of so many persons, as well as so great pecuniary and other interests, was for the first time and suddenly proposed. Be- 
sides this, even his own coadjutors did not all entirely support him. Mr Hodgkinson, whose character for scientific know- 
ledge carried great weight with the committee, recommended in his report the ultimate additional security of chains, 
(369.) 
Self-acting 
machinery. 
— oe 
