ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. 33 
sleepers nine feet by ten inches by five inches ; the bottom ballast 
is sandstone four inches gauge nine inches thick, and the top 
ballast is bluestone two and a half inches gauge laid to a depth 
of six inches under the sleepers and brought up to two inches 
above. 
An outsider is unaware of the great economy in what is termed 
“cutting out” a grade; but as the strength of a chain is measured 
by its weakest link, so in like manner the economical working of 
a length of railway is determined by its steepest grades. For 
instance, taking the line from Singleton to Murrurundi, on 
account of the existence of grades of one in thirty-three and one 
in forty-four the load of an ordinary engine was formerly limited 
to twenty-one waggons, but since the grades have been reduced 
to one in seventy the load has, I am informed, risen to thirty- 
eight waggons. I have been favoured with the statement of a 
week’s working between these points, which shows an estimated 
saving in the train miles run at the rate of twenty-seven thousand 
four hundred and four miles per annum between the points 
mentioned, as a practical result of the improvement of the 
grades. | 
Considerable attention has been paid to the improvement of 
grades and curves in other places. Those that have been carried 
out on the Southern line, between Granville and Picton, have 
been reduced from one in sixty-six to one in one hundred; on 
the Western line, between Dubbo and Minore, the grades have 
been reduced from one in fifty-five to one in seventy. Between 
Lawson and Wentworth Falls, about half-a-mile of one in thirty- 
three has been cut out and a grade of one in seventy-three 
substituted. In many places where eight chain reverse curves 
occurred on the Blue Mountains, these have been improved by 
making extensive deviations with transition curves. To enable 
the traffic to be worked economically and expeditiously, the Lap- 
stone Hill Zig-Zag has also been cut out by a deviation which 
admits of heavier train loads, and also saves the time which 
formerly was required by the stops on the Zig-Zag. The most. 
C—May 3, 1893. 
