586 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



wlieelways without grooves, and the wheels without flanges ; tlie system of 

 the Commercial Road in London, and the stone tracks around Milan and 

 c*arma. 



Mr. Tillman and Mr. Montgomery have explained to this club their plans 

 of iron pavings, designed to keep the wheels on a continuous plane, while 

 there are indentations sufficient to give foothold for the horses. 



On either of the foregoing systems of ironway, a man can do as much 

 as two horses on good stone pavings, if the weight be suited to the road, 

 and the road be kept clean. But the dirt usual in streets increases the 

 resistance, probabl}'' more than doubles it. To avoid the dirt we must get 

 ri-d of the horses. The key to improvement is the wheel borne power. 



Steam is the best power I know of Some believe that hot air will be 

 better, and some speculate about compressed air, electricity, and other 

 powers or agents ; they may be right, but I am not convinced of it. 



Steam is objected to on several grounds. I think it but fair that objec- 

 tions should be proved and not merely asserted, that the evidence to main- 

 tain them should be as good as the evidence in favor of steam; bat while 

 we have evidence given under oath before parliamentary committees by 

 such engineers as Telford, Macadam, Macneil, Farey, Field, Cubitt and 

 others in favor of steam carriages which they had seen, men who never saw 

 them are allowed to say that steam carriages will smoke, their wheels will 

 slip, they cannot ascend hills, they cannot be stopped or steered with pre- 

 cision, they will frighten horses and run over people, etc. To such teachers 

 it is sufficient to say, that it is impossible for coke or charcoal to smoke ; 

 that steam carriages have been up hills of one foot in six ; that they can 

 stop quicker and steer better than horses ; that they seldom frighten horses 

 and are never themselves frightened, and that the charge of their being 

 dangerous is not proved. 



But steam will have to begin upon the road made for horses and under- 

 work them before it will have a road of its own, and a fair opportunity to 

 show its advantages, and this it is able to do. On soft roads, which are 

 the most difficult for it, it can work with advantage. Boydell's traction 

 engine drew a siege-gun across a marsh where horses could not go at all, 

 and Fawkes' engine draws plows cheaper than horses can draw them. 



Mr. Latson said it was a principle his father taught him, when he did a 

 thing to first count the cost, and when he leaped a fence to see further was 

 there a ditch on the other side. The bane of the lower part of New York 

 was that it was level, it would not answer. It was destructive to health, 

 and the result of the dead level would be death. Men might live fast 

 enough to live out their years in ten years, but he preferred not to be that 

 man. The city could not be ventilated if level. No man going into the 

 country for his health seeks a level country, if he knows what he is about. 

 He seeks a lull country, gets by it two things, pure air and pure water. 

 He thought an advantage might be derived by placing the East river 

 steamers on the East river side above Grand street, and the North river 

 steamers above Canal street. 



