BREAKAGE OF EGGS IN TRANSIT. 11 
tracks are used for inbound and outbound traffic. A car delivered at 
the station is unloaded by employees of the railroad, in gangs of such 
number that they may work rapidly without interference in going 
in and out of the car. In nearly every instance, as soon as the doors 
are opened, the cars are examined by an inspector, who notes and 
reports the condition of the load. The method ordinarily pursued in 
unloading egg cases is to use a 2-wheeled truck with 3 or 4 cases to 
the truck load. Three cases to the load were seen more often than 4. 
The cases were trucked to a designated section of the house, where 
the consignment was placed in stacks, usually 5 cases high. At the 
freight houses of one prominent railroad all cases of eggs have been 
handled by hand for a number of years, each case being carried out 
from the car to the stack by a man. All freight gangs are managed 
by a general foreman and numerous subforemen. 
In a freight yard, where freight is delivered, the car tracks are 
usually arranged in pairs with driveways between to allow delivery 
from either track direct to wagons or trucks. The handling in fregiht 
yards is usually done by employees of the consignee. 
A station pier is a water-front terminal, and contains no railroad 
tracks. It is usually a long pier, 600 or more feet, extending out into 
the harbor, with doors along both sides to facilitate delivery from 
the cars, which are on a boat, barge, or float tied up to the pier. 
Cars intended for such a station are loaded on huge floats (Pl. V, 
fig. 1), formerly made of wood, but now usually all steel. The floats 
hold from 12 to 24 cars, with an equal number on either side. When 
the float is to receive cars it is fastened to a transfer slip, an adjust- 
able bridge capable of being raised or lowered. This operation, which 
requires most careful handling, is accomplished without any notice- 
able jolt or jar, so that damage at this point is rare. The floats are 
conveyed by a tug from the slip to the pier, to the side of which they 
are fastened securely, to await unloading (PI. V, fig. 2). The han- 
dling on the station pier is similar to that at freight houses. In a 
tide-water port, such as New York City, the gangway from the float 
to the pier has varying inclines, depending upon the tide at the time 
of delivery (Pl. VI, fig. 1). When the incline is fairly steep, a buffer 
of sand is used at the end of the plank on the pier to retard the speed 
of the truck. While the incline is a hazard, loss on this account is 
unusual. At high tide, egg cases may be delivered from the car on 
the float to the pier by means of a sliding chute (PI. VI, fig. 2). The 
goods are stacked along both sides of the station pier, leaving a drive- 
way down the center. 
The private sidings at which the investigators worked were numer- 
ous and varied. Sometimes the cases were delivered at the side- 
walk in front of a commission house, and conveyed on 4-wheeled 
trucks to the house. At other places the cases were conveyed from 
