1878.] 
Continuous Railway Breaks. 
5 
be adopted — a large proportion of the available break-power 
should be under the control of the driver, who is generally 
the first to become aware of apprehended danger. No 
matter how small the interval of time required for the 
driver to attract the attention of the guard, it may be of 
vital moment. 
On this subjedt Capt. Tyler observed, in a paper recently 
read by him before the Society of Arts, — “ When an accident 
occurs in which a carriage leaves the rails from failure in 
any portion of a train, it may be of great, and even vital, 
importance immediately to reduce the momentum of every 
part of it ; and every extra second expended before this 
ahtion is commenced may be a question of life and death.” 
It will readily be understood how the safety of a train is 
increased by having the break-power under the control of 
the engine-driver as well as of the guard. In the case of a 
signal failing to work and to show . sign of danger, the 
engine-driver will naturally, if an obstruction exists on the 
line, be the first to discover it ; and, supposing the break 
not to be under his control, he must intimate danger to the 
guard by whistle, in the ordinary manner; but all this takes 
time, and between the interval of the driver’s signal and the 
application of the break by the guard two or three seconds 
must inevitably elapse, during which interval the train has 
probably approached not less than 100 yards nearer to the 
impending danger, or nearer to fatal results. An instance 
in point has been given by Capt. Tyler, who, in the paper 
above referred to, cited an accident which occurred last 
November, near Wincanton, on the Somerset and Dorset 
Railway. In that case an up-passenger train for Bath was 
travelling at a speed of 35 miles an hour, when the leading 
wheels of the engine left the rails, from a defedb in the per- 
manent way. The engine ran thus for 200 yards before the 
driving wheels left the rails, but it then turned over on its 
side, 240 yards from the point of first disturbance. The 
engine-driver was killed, and the fireman and guard, who 
narrowly escaped with their lives, were severely injured. 
If, says Capt. Tyler, the engine-driver had been able at once 
to apply a continuous break throughout this train, on finding 
his leading wheels off the rails, it might have been pulled 
up with scarcely any damage to the rolling stock, and no 
injury to himself or any one else. 
The same officer remarked, in his Report for 1872, refer- 
ring to the great Railway Companies,— It is mainly because 
sufficient attention has not been paid in past years to the 
various means of safety that the greatest Railway Companies 
