Part 8 (1/2)
The centre towel rises 35 feet higher than the abutments, thus giving to the tube a very slight arch, which, however, is barely perceptible.
The tubes were rectangular, with double top and bottom made of plates of wrought-iron, from three-eighths to three-quarters of an inch thick, and varying in length according to their position--the whole when put together forming a single tube about 500 yards long. The two centre ones were the largest and most difficult to manage, each having to be built on sh.o.r.e, floated off on barges, and lifted by hydraulic power a height of about 100 feet. Some idea of what this implied may be gathered from the following fact. Each tube weighed 1800 tons--the weight of a goodly-sized ocean steamer! A perfect army of men worked at the building of the tubes; cutting, punching, fitting, riveting, etcetera, and as the place became the temporary abode of so many artificers and labourers, with their wives and children, a village sprang up around them, with shops, a school, and a surgery. Two fire-engines and large tanks of water were kept in constant readiness in case of fire, and for many months rivet-making machines, punching machines, shearing machines, etcetera, were in full work. There were two million rivets used altogether, and the quant.i.ty of three-quarter-inch iron rod used in making them measured 126 miles. The total weight of iron used was nearly 12,000 tons. The bridge was strengthened by eighty-three miles of angle iron. For many months the outlay in wages alone was 6000 pounds a week, and the cost for the whole of the works more than 600,000 pounds. A curious fact connected with this enormous ma.s.s of iron is, that arrangements had to be made to permit of shrinkage and expansion. The tubes were placed on a series of rollers and iron b.a.l.l.s, and it was afterwards found that in the hottest part of summer they were twelve inches longer than in winter--a difference which, if not provided for, would have caused the destruction of the towers by a constant and irresistible pull and thrust! The Menai Bridge was begun in 1846 and opened for traffic in March 1850.
s.p.a.ce would fail us were we to attempt even a slight sketch of the great engineering works that railways have called into being. We can merely point to such achievements as the high-level bridges at Newcastle-on-Tyne, Berwick-on-Tweed, and at Saltash, over the Tamar.
There are viaducts of great height, length, and beauty in all parts of the kingdom; there are terminal stations so vast and magnificent as to remind one of the structures of Eastern splendour described in the _Arabian Nights Entertainments_; and there are hundreds of miles of tunnelling at the present time in the United Kingdom.
The Metropolitan Railway is the most important and singular of these tunnels--for it is ent.i.tled to be regarded as a gigantic tunnel--which burrows under the streets of London.
This stupendous work was undertaken in order to relieve the traffic in the streets of London. The frequent blocks that used to occur not many years ago in the main thoroughfares of the Metropolis, had rendered relief absolutely necessary. When the increase of railways began to pour human beings and goods from all parts of the kingdom into London in a continuous and ever-increasing stream, it became obvious that some new mode of conveyance must be opened up. After much deliberation as to the best method, it was finally resolved that an underground railway should be made, encircling the Metropolis, so that travellers arriving from all points of the compa.s.s might find a ready and sufficient means of conveyance into the central parts of the city. There was opposition to the scheme, of course; but, through the persevering energy of the solicitor to the undertaking and others, the work was at length begun, and the line opened for traffic in January 1863. Its extraordinary success soon proved the wisdom of its promoters.
At first it was thought that the chief revenues would be derived from the conveyance of goods from the west to the eastern districts of London, but its enormous pa.s.senger traffic eventually became the chief cause of its great prosperity. In the very first year of its opening the number of pa.s.sengers who travelled by it between Farringdon Street and Bishop's Road, Paddington, amounted to nearly nine and a half millions of individuals, which is more than three times the entire population of London--also, let us add, more than three times the entire population of Scotland!
The number of trains which are constantly following each other in quick succession (at times every two or three minutes) on this magnificent railway has rendered a most perfect system of signalling necessary, as well as a working staff of superior intelligence and activity. The drivers are all picked men, and indeed it is obvious to every one who travels by it that the porters, and guards, and all employed on the line are unusually smart men. The engineering difficulties connected with the Metropolitan railway were very great as may easily be believed, seeing that it had to be formed under streets whose foundations were unavoidably shaken, and amongst an infinite ramification of gas and water-pipes and sewers whose separate action had to be maintained intact while the process of construction was going on. Some of the stations are most ingeniously lighted from the streets above by bright reflecting tile-work, while others, too deep for such a method, or too much overtopped with buildings to admit of it, are lit perpetually with gas.
The whole of the works are a singular instance of engineering skill, reflecting great credit on Mr Fowler, the engineer-in-chief. Despite its great length of tunnelling the line is perfectly dry throughout.
At first fears were entertained that human beings could not with safety travel through such tunnels as were here formed, but experience has proved those fears, like many others, to have been groundless, and a very thorough a.n.a.lysis of the atmosphere of the line in all circ.u.mstances, and by the most competent men of the day, has demonstrated that the air of the Metropolitan railway is not injurious to health. The excellent general health of the employes also affords additional and conclusive testimony to this fact even although it is unquestionably true that there is at times a somewhat sulphurous smell there.
This thorough ventilation, of course, could only have been achieved by ingenious arrangements and a peculiar construction of the engines, whereby the waste steam and fumes of the furnaces should be prevented from emitting their foul and sulphurous odours. The carriages are brilliantly lighted with gas, contained in long india-rubber bags on their roofs, and the motion of the trains is much gentler than that of ordinary railways, although they travel at the rate of from fifteen to twenty miles an hour, including stoppages,--a rate, be it observed, which could not have been ventured on at all but for the thorough and effective system of telegraphic and semaph.o.r.e signalling employed, to indicate from station to station the exact state of the line--as to trains--at all times. On the whole the Metropolitan Railway has proved one of the most useful and successful undertakings of modern times. See Note 3 at the end of the chapter.
In reference to foreign railways, we have only s.p.a.ce to say that there are works as grand, and as worthy of note, as any of which we can boast; and it is with much regret that we feel constrained to do no more than point to such magnificent undertakings as the _Mont Cenis_ Railway, which ascends and tunnels through the Alps; and that stupendous line, the Union Pacific Railroad, 3000 miles in length, formed by the daring and enterprising Americans, by means of which the prairies and the Rocky Mountains are made of no account and New York is brought within seven days of San Francisco! The engineering works on the Sommering Railway, between Vienna and Trieste; the mighty Victoria Tubular Bridge at Montreal; the railway bridge over Niagara; the difficulties encountered and overcome in India; the bold achievements of railway engineers amid the dizzy heights and solitudes of the Andes--all these subjects must be pa.s.sed over in silence, else our readers will, we fear, come to the conclusion that we have lost command of the Iron Horse altogether, allowed him to take the bit in his teeth and fairly run away.
Note 1. Many readers may find it difficult to form an adequate conception of such a vast number as 307 millions. It may help one to some idea of it to know that, if a man were to devote himself to count it, one by one,--sitting down after breakfast counting at the rate of one every moment, and working without intermission for eight hours every day, excepting Sundays,--he would not conclude his task until the thirty-fifth year.
Note 2. We would refer them particularly to Messrs. W. and R. Chambers'
comprehensive and popularly written work on ”Railways, Steamer, and Telegraphs;” Money's ”Rambles on Railways,” which bristles with figures and swarms with anecdote; ”Stokers and Pokers,” by Sir Francis Head, a capital and very full work, though somewhat old; W.B. Adams' ”Roads and Rails,” and Bremrer's ”Industries of Scotland.”
Note 3. We had intended to devote much larger s.p.a.ce to this most interesting line, but the nature of our book forbids it. We quit the subject regretfully; referring the reader, who may desire to know more, to an able notice of the Metropolitan Railway in ”The Shops and Companies of London,” edited by Henry Mayhew.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
LITTLE GERTIE COMES OUT IN A NEW LIGHT, AND BOB RECEIVES GOOD NEWS.
Poor little earnest curly-haired Gertie had been so thoroughly reared in the midst of cras.h.i.+ng sounds and dire alarms without any mischance resulting, that she had come to feel at last as if the idea of danger or disaster were a mere fiction. It was therefore a new and terrible shock which she received, when she saw her father carried to his cottage by four railway porters and tenderly laid in his bed; and it went to her heart with an unaccountable thrill when she heard her father's usually loud hearty voice say, in soft, womanly tones, ”Thank 'ee, lads; thank 'ee. I'll be all right soon, please G.o.d. Good-night and thank 'ee kindly.”
”Good-night--good-night, Jack,” they replied in various tones of cheeriness; for these hard-muscled men had soft hearts, and although they entertained fears for their friend, they were anxious, by the hearty tones of their voices, to keep up his spirits.
”You mustn't take on like that, Missis,” whispered one of them as they were leaving the cottage door; ”the doctor said for sartin that there warn't no bones broken, and 'e didn't think there was nothink internal.”
”It ain't that I'm afear'd of,” whimpered poor Mrs Marrot, ”but it does go to my 'art so, to 'ear my John speak in that voice. I never 'ear'd him do it except once before, when he was very low with fever, an'
thought himself a-dyin'.”
”But 'e ain't agoin' to die _this_ time,” returned the kindly porter; ”so cheer up, Missis. Good-night.”
Mrs Marrot returned to the room where her husband lay, evidently suffering severe pain, for he was very pale and his lips were compressed. He was anxious not to alarm Gertie and Loo who stood at the bedside. The former could not speak, and the blood had so completely fled from her face and her small tightly-clasped hands that she resembled a creature of wax.