Part 5 (1/2)
This was in March, 1831 About six months before, however, there had actually been a trial of speed between a horse and one of the pioneer locomotives, which had not resulted in favour of the locomotive It took place on the present Baltiine in this case was contrived by no other than Mr Peter Cooper And it affords a striking illustration of how recent those events which now seem so remote really were, that here is a st the eneration, as a contemporary of Stephenson, and hi then nearly forty years of age The Cooper engine, however, was scarcelymodel Its active-weighed only a ton, and was of one horse power; in fact it was not larger than those handcars now in common use with railroad section-men The boiler, about the size of a ht and was fitted above the furnace-which occupied the lower section-with vertical tubes The cylinder was but three-and-a-half inches in dia In order to secure the requisite pressure of steam in so small a boiler, a sort of belloas provided which was kept in action by means of a drum attached to one of the car-wheels over which passed a cord which worked a pulley, which in turn worked the bellows Thus, of Stephenson's two great devices, without either of which his success at Rainhill would have been impossible-the waste steaot hold of the last He owed his defeat in the race between his engine and a horse to the fact that he had not got hold of the first It happened in this wise Several experiine on the Baltimore and Ohio road, the first sections of which had recently been completed and were then operated upon by means of horses The success of these trips was such that at last, just seventeen days before the for of the Manchester and Liverpool road on the other side of the Atlantic, a sine-the name of which, by the as _Tom Thumb_-and upon this a party of directors and their friends were carried from Baltimore to Ellicott's Mills and back, a distance of some twenty-six miles
The trip out was made in an hour, and was very successful The return was less so, and for the following reason:-
”The great stage proprietors of the day were Stockton and Stokes; and on that occasion a gallant grey, of great beauty and poas driven by them from town, attached to another car on the second track-for the co two tracks to the Mills-and ine at the Relay House on its way back From this point it was deter even, aent horse and engine, the snort of the one and the puff of the other keeping tune and tirey had the best of it, for his _steae on the instant, while the engine had to wait until the rotation of the wheels set the blower to work The horse was perhaps a quarter of a ine lifted, and the thin blue vapour issuing from it showed an excess of steam The blohistled, the steam blew off in vapoury clouds, the pace increased, the passengers shouted, the engine gained on the horse, soon it lapped him-the silk was plied-the race was neck and neck, nose and nose-then the engine passed the horse, and a great hurrah hailed the victory But it was not repeated, for, just at this ti up, the band which draws the pulley which moved the blower slipped froine-for want of breath-began to wheeze and pant In vain Mr Cooper, as his own engineer and fire to replace the band upon the wheel; the horse gained upon the h the band was presently replaced, and the steaain did its best, the horse was too far ahead to be overtaken, and came in the winner of the race”
ENGLISH AND AMERICAN OPPOSITION
What wonder that such an innovation as railas strenuously opposed, threatening, as it did, the coaching interest, and the posting interest, the canal interest, and the sporting interest, and private interests of every variety ”Gentle MP for Cheltenhaether; I wish the concoctors of the Cheltenham and Oxford, and the concoctors of every other scheineers, were at rest in Paradise Gentle is more distasteful towith the noise of hissing railroad engines, running through the heart of our hunting country, and destroying that noble sport to which I have been accustomed from my childhood” And at Tewkesbury, one speaker contended that ”any railould be injurious;” coines to ”war-horses and fiery meteors;” and affirmed that ”the evils contained in Pandora's box were but trifles compared with those that would be consequent on railways”
Even in go-aheadative A opponents raised their voices against the nascent system; one of whom (a canal stockholder, by the way) chronicled the following objective arguments
”He saould be the effect of it; that it would set the whole world a-gadding Twenty miles an hour, sir! Why you will not be able to keep an apprentice-boy at his work; every Saturday evening he must take a trip to Ohio, to spend the Sabbath with his sweetheart Grave plodding citizens will be flying about like comets All local attachhtiness of intellect Veracious people will turn into the erated by their nificent notions of distance 'Only a hundredyour fan!'
'Pray, sir, will you dine with hany?'
'Why, indeed, I don't know I shall be in town until twelve Well, I shall be there; but you must let me off in time for the theatre' And then, sir, there will be barrels of pork, and cargoes of flour, and chaldrons of coals, and even lead and whiskey, and such-like sober things that have always been used to sober travelling, whisking away like a set of sky-rockets It will upset all the gravity of the nation If two gentlemen have an affair of honour, they have only to steal off to the Rocky Mountains, and there no jurisdiction can touch the for debt! A set of bailiffs, mounted on boive him a fair start Upon the whole, sir, it is a pestilential, topsy-turvy, haruhtforward, regular Dutch canal-three miles an hour for expresses, and two for ordinary journeys, with a yoke of oxen for a heavy load! I go for beasts of burthen: it is ious people better None of your hop-skip-and-jump whimsies for me”
-_Sharpe's London Journal_
AN UNPLEASANT TRIAL TRIP
Mr O F Adaine was that ust, 1831, on the new line from Albany to Schenectady over the Mohawk Valley road The train was made up of a locomotive, the _De Witt Clinton_, its tender, and five or six passenger coaches-which were, indeed, nothing but the bodies of stage coaches placed upon trucks The first two of these coaches were set aside for distinguished visitors; the others were surmounted with seats of plank to acco of persons ere anxious to participate in the trip Inside and out the coaches were crowded; every seat was full What followed the starting of the train has thus been described by one who took part in the affair:-
”'The trucks were coupled together with chains or chain-links, leaving from two to three feet slack, and when the locomotive started it took up the slack by jerks, with sufficient force to jerk the passengers who sat on seats across the tops of the coaches, out froether with such force as to send the from their seats
”They used dry pitch-pine for fuel, and, there being no smoke or spark-catcher to the chinated with sparks, coal, and cinders, cath of the train Each of the outside passengers who had an uainst the smoke and fire They were found to be but a momentary protection, for I think in the firsttheir covers burnt off fro the deck passengers, each whipping his neighbour to put out the fire They presented a veryat the first station” Here, ”a short stop was made, and a successful experiment tried to remedy the unpleasant jerks
A plan was soon hit upon and put into execution The three links in the couplings of the cars were stretched to their uthbourhood was placed between each pair of cars andyarn fros, and it was found to answer the purpose when the signal was again given and the engine started'”
PROGNOSTICATIONS OF FAILURE
In the year 1831, the writer of a paator_, essayed the task of ”proving by facts and arguham would be a ”burden upon the trade of the country and would never pay” The difficulties and dangers of the enterprise he thus sets forth:-
”The causes of greater danger on the railway are several A velocity of fifteen er, as the sht produce the ine or any forward part of the train should suddenly stop, the whole would be cracked by the collision like nutshells At all turnings there is a danger that the latter part of the trainoff the rails; and, if that takes place, the most serious consequences must ensue before the whole train can be stopped The line, too, upon which the train must be steered ade coach has a choice of the whole roadway Independently of the velocity, which in coaches is the chief source of danger, there are many perils on the railway, the rails stand up like soon theht chance of his life