656 REPORT— 1882. 



the constantly varying condition of wind and weather in this climate, a run of 

 400 miles can, on a properly laid-out railway, and with suitably designed rolling- 

 stock, he accomplished with certainty to the minute, if the management is not at 

 fault. On the Great Northern Railway, for instance, of which I am consulting 

 engineer, the 400 miles between London and Edinburgh is traversed in nine hours, 

 or deducting the half-hour allowed at York for dining, at the mean rate of no less 

 than 47 miles per hour including stoppages. A few months ago the Duke of 

 Edinburgh was taken on the same line of railway from Leeds to London, a 

 distance of 186f miles, in exactly three hours, or at a mean rate, including a stop 

 at Grantham, or over 62 miles an hour. I Iniow of no railway in the world where 

 this performance has been eclipsed, and it will be perhaps both instructive and 

 amusing to contrast with it tbe performance of the engines at the opening cere- 

 mony of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, on September 15, 1830. A 

 newspaper correspondent of the time, after describing many eventful incidents of 

 his journey, proceeds as follows :— ' The twenty-four vehicles left behind were now 

 formed into one continuous line, with the three remaining engines at their head ; 

 and at twenty minutes past five o'clock we set out on our return to Liverpool. 

 The engines not having the power, however, to drag along the double load that 

 had devolved upon them at a faster rate than from 5 to 10 miles an hour (once or 

 twice only, and that but for a few minutes, did it reach the rate of 12 miles an 

 hour), it was past eight o'clock before we reached Parkside. Proceeding 

 onwards, we were met on the Kenyon Embankment by two of the missing engines, 

 which were immediately attached to the three which had drawn us from Man- 

 chester. We went still slower than before, stopping continually to take in water 

 (query to take breath), and creeping along at a snail's pace till we reached Sutton 

 inclined plane, to pet up which the greater part of tbe company were under the 

 necessity of alighting and making use of their own legs. On reaching the top of 

 the plane we once more took our seats, and at ten o'clock we found ourselves again 

 at the company's station in Crown Street, having accomplished the distance of 33 

 miles in four hours and forty minutes.' 



The incident of the passengers descending from a train headed by five engines 

 to walk up an insignificant incline is, 1 thiuk, worthy of being recalled to the re- 

 membrance of the travelling public who are accustomed to see without astonish- 

 ment a single engine rushing along ^^ ith a train of a dozen heavy carriages at as 

 high a speed as if it were running alone. We must do our immediate fore- 

 fathers, however, the justice to remember that even they effected some considerable 

 improvements in the speed of locomotion. For example, in 1763 the only public 

 conveyance for passengers between London and Edinburgh was a single coach, 

 which completed its journey in fourteen days, or at the average rate of 1^ mile per 

 hour. Strange as it may appear, there are at the present time many large fertile 

 districts in Hungary where, owing to the absence both of road and water commu- 

 nications, a higher rate of speed cannot be attained in a journey of several days' 

 duration. 



An essential condition of the attainment of high speed on the railway is that 

 the stopping places be few and far between. The Great Northern express previously 

 referred to makes its first halt at Grantham, a distance of 105 miles from London, 

 and consequently but little power and time are lost in accelerating and retarding 

 the speed of the train. In the instance of the Metropolitan Railway, nn the other 

 hand, the stations average but half a mile apart, and although the engines are as 

 powerful as those on the Great Northern Railway, whilst the trains are far lighter, 

 the average speed attainable is only some twelve miles an hour. No sooner has a 

 train acquired a reasonable speed than the brakes have to be sharply applied to pull 

 it up again. As a result of experiment and calculation, I have found that 60 per 

 cent, of the whole power exerted by the engine is absorbed by the brakes. Tn other 

 words, with a consumption of 30 lbs. of coal per train mile, no less than 18 lbs. are 

 expended in grinding away the brake-blocks, and only the remaining 12 lbs. in 

 doing the useful work of overcoming frictional and atmospheric resistance. 



Comparatively high speed and economy of working might be attained on a rail- 

 way with stations at half-mile intervals if it were possible to arrange the gradients 



