EAILWAYS FOE FARMS AND ESTATE IMPROVEMENTS. 143 



rails on to another, or what is termed a siding. It would be necessary 

 to have this in some places on a large farm or estate, so as to allow one 

 truck to pass another. A A J>I G j 7 



shows the main line, and B B 

 the siding : a is what is termed 

 the fixed switch, and b the 

 movable switch. In the posi- 

 tion the movable switch is 

 shown, the trucks would run 

 along the main line A ; but on its being moved towards the other side, 

 the siding would then be open to allow trucks to run into it. 



The following is a description of a new traction-engine as made by 

 Mr R W. Thomson of Edinburgh, and as described in the ' Scotsman ' 

 newspaper of August 10, 1868 : 



On Saturday afternoon a very remarkable sight was seen in this city. A train of 

 heavily-laden coal - waggons, looking exactly like a luggage-train, was observed 

 coming steadily up the steep incline leading into Edinburgh from Dalkeith. It was 

 one of Mr R. W. Thomson's patent road-steamers, with india-rubber wheel-tires, 

 having four huge loaded waggons in tow. Each waggon weighed, when empty, two 

 and three quarter tons, and carried a load of five and a quarter tons of coals, making 

 the gross weight of the waggons thirty-two tons. The road-steamer weighs eight 

 tons. Thus a total of forty tons was in motion. The road-steamer had drawn the 

 train from Newbattle Collieries, eight miles from Edinburgh, over a very hilly road, 

 with rising gradients of 1 in 16. 



The interest excited by this remarkable spectacle was so great that the crowd 

 could not be kept back. A halt was therefore ordered, and application was made 

 at the central police-office for the aid of a few constables to keep the over-curious 

 from pushing each other into the way of the advancing train. A sergeant and six 

 men were at once despatched to the outskirts of the city, where the halt had been 

 called, and progress was immediately resumed. The hill from the Pow Burn up to 

 Minto Street is both long and steep, but the road-steamer drew its train to the top 

 with the most perfect ease. It was very curious to watch the behaviour of the 

 patent india-rubber tires of the road-steamer as they passed over the various descrip- 

 tions of road-surface. In the outskirts of the city, where the roads are macadamised, 

 there were many places where broken stones had just been spread on the surface. 

 Over these sharp loose stones the indiarubber tires of the road-steamer passed 

 without crushing or in fact disturbing them in the least. The roughest and sharp- 

 est bed of broken stones sank gently into the elastic cushion of india-rubber, which 

 rose from the contact with the most jagged fragments of stone without any trace or 

 mark of injury. The perfect command which the conductors of the train had over 

 its movements enabled them to control botli its course and speed with the utmost 

 precision. The line of streets through which it passed viz., Minto Street, Clerk 

 Street, Nicolson Street, South Bridge, North Bridge,* Princes Street, Leith Street, 

 and Leith Walk are always the most crowded streets in the city ; but at the time 

 the train passed through these thoroughfares there happened to be an unusually 

 great current of traffic passing in a contrary direction towards the South-side 



