so familiar would, sooner or later, be attained, and that there was no limit to the speed of such an engine, provided the works could be made to stand; but nobody would believe me at that time. The engines could not perform the high velocities now reached, when they were first invented; but, by their superior construction, an immense speed is now capable of being obtained. In what has been done under my management, the merit is only in part my own. Throughout, I have been most ably seconded and assisted by my son. In the early period of my career, and when he was a little boy, I felt how deficient I was in education, and made up my mind that I would put him to a good school. I determined that he should have as liberal a training as I could afford to give him. I was, however, a poor man; and how do you think I managed? I betook myself to mending my neighbours' clocks and watches at night, after my daily labour was done. By this means I saved money, which I put by; and, in course of time, I was thus enabled to give my son a good education. While quite a boy he assisted me, and became a companion to me. He got an appointment as under-viewer at Killingworth; and at nights, when we came home, we worked together at our engineering. I got leave from my employers to go from Killingworth to lay down a railway at Hetton, and next to Darlington for a like purpose; and I finished both railways. After that, I went to Liverpool to plan a line to Manchester. The directors of that undertaking thought ten miles an hour would be a maximum speed for the locomotive engine; and I pledged myself to attain that speed. I said I had no doubt the locomotive might be made to go much faster, but we had better be moderate at the beginning. The directors said I was quite right; for if, when they went to Parliament, I talked of going at a greater rate than ten miles an hour, I should put a cross on the concern! It was not an easy task for me to keep the engine down to ten miles an hour; but it must be done, and I did my best. I had to place myself in the most unpleasant of all positions-the witness-box of a parliamentary committee. I was not long in it, I assure you, before I began to wish for a hole to creep out at. I could not find words to satisfy either the committee or myself; or even to make them understand my meaning. Some said, 'He's a foreigner.' 'No,' others replied; 'he's mad.' But I put up with every rebuff, and went on with my plans, deter

mined not to be put down. Assistance gradually increased; great improvements were made in the locomotive; until today, a train which started from London in the morning, has brought me in the afternoon to my native soil, and enabled me to meet again many faces with which I am familiar, and which I am exceedingly pleased to see once more."

After the opening of this railway, the completion of the East Coast line, by effecting a connection between Newcastle and Berwick, was again revived; and Mr. Stephenson, who had already identified himself with the question, and was intimately acquainted with every foot of the ground, was called upon to assist the promoters with his judgment and experi

ence.

By this time a strong popular opinion had arisen in favour of atmospheric railways. Many engineers avowedly supported them in preference to locomotive lines, and Mr. Brunel had considerable influence in determining the views of many Members of Parliament on the subject. Amongst others, Lord Howick took up the question of atmospheric as opposed to locomotive railways, and, possessing great local influence, he succeeded, in 1844, in forming a powerful combination of the landed gentry of Northumberland in favour of an atmospheric line through that county. Mr. Stephenson could not brook the idea of seeing the locomotive, for which he had fought so many stout battles, pushed to one side by the atmospheric system, and that in the very county in which its great powers had been first developed. Nor did he relish the appearance of Mr. Brunel as the engineer of Lord Howick's atmospheric railway, in opposition to the line which had occupied his thoughts and been the object of his strenuous advocacy for so many years. When Mr. Stephenson first met Mr. Brunel in Newcastle he good-naturedly shook him by the collar, and asked "what business he had north of the Tyne 2" Mr. Stephenson gave him to understand that they were to have a fair stand-up fight for the ground, and shaking hands before the battle like Englishmen, they parted in good humour. A public meeting was held at Newcastle in the following December, when, after a full discussion of the merits of the respective plans, Mr. Stephenson's line was almost unanimously adopted as the best.

The rival projects went before Parliament in 1845, and a severe contest ensued. The display of ability and tactics on

both sides was great. Mr. Hudson and the Messrs. Stephenson were the soul of the movement in support of the locomotive, and Lord Howick and Mr. Brunel in behalf of the atmospheric system. The locomotive again triumphed: Mr. Stephenson's coast line secured the approval of Parliament, and the shareholders in the atmospheric company were happily saved from expending their capital in the perpetration of an egregious blunder; for, only a few years later, the atmospheric system was everywhere abandoned.

This was one of the very few projects in which Mr. Stephenson was professionally concerned in the mad railway session of 1845; and it was the last great parliamentary contest in which he took a prominent part. So closely was Mr. Stephenson identified with this measure, and so great was the personal interest which he was known to take in its success, that on the news of the triumph of the bill reaching Newcastle, a sort of general holiday took place, and the workmen belonging to the Stephenson Locomotive Factory, upwards of 800 in number, walked in procession through the principal streets of the town accompanied by music and banners.

There was still another great work connected with Newcastle and the East Coast route which Mr. Stephenson projected, but which he did not live to see completed,—the High Level Bridge over the Tyne, of which his son Robert was the principal engineer. Mr. R. W. Brandling-to the public spirit and enterprise of whose family the prosperity of Newcastle has been in no small degree indebted, and who first brought to light the strong original genius of George Stephenson in connection with the safety lamp-is entitled to the merit of originating the idea of the High Level Bridge as it was eventually carried out, with a central terminus for the northern railways in the Castle Garth at Newcastle. He first promulgated the plan in 1841; and in the following year it was resolved that Mr. George Stephenson should be consulted as to the most advisable site for the proposed bridge. A prospectus of a High Level Bridge Company was issued in 1843, the names of George Stephenson and George Hudson appearing on the committee of management, Mr. Robert Stephenson being the consulting engineer. The project was eventually taken up by the Newcastle and Darlington Railway Company, and an act for the construction of the bridge was obtained in the session of

1845. The designs of the bridge were Mr. Robert Stephenson's; and the works were executed under the superintendence of Mr. Thomas Harrison, one of Mr. Stephenson's many able assistants. The High Level Bridge is certainly the most magnificent and striking of all the erections to which railways have given birth,-more picturesque as an object than the tubular bridge over the Menai Straits, and even more important as a great public work. It has been worthily styled "the King of Railway Structures."

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE RAILWAY MANIA.

THE extension of railways had, up to the year 1844, been effected principally by men of the commercial classes, interested in opening up improved communications between particular towns and districts. The first lines had been bold experiments many thought them exceedingly rash and unwarranted; they had been reluctantly conceded by the legislature, and were carried out in the face of great opposition and difficulties. At length the locomotive vindicated its power; railways were recognized, by men of all classes, as works of great utility; and their vast social as well as commercial advantages forced themselves on the public recognition. What had been regarded as but doubtful speculations, and by many as certain failures, were now ascertained to be beneficial investments, the most successful of them paying from eight to ten per cent. on the share capital expended.

The first railways were, on the whole, well managed. The best men that could be got were appointed to work them. It is true, mistakes were made, and accidents happened; but men did not become perfect because railways had been invented. The men who constructed, and the men who worked the lines, were selected from the general community, consisting of its usual proportion of honest, practical, and tolerably stupid persons. Had it been possible to create a class of perfect men, a sort of railway guardian-angels, directors would only have been too glad to appoint them at good salaries. For with all the mistakes that may have been committed by directors, the jobbing of railway appointments, or the misuse of patronage in selecting the persons to work their lines, has not been charged against them. We have never yet seen a Railway Living advertised for sale; nor have railway situations of an important character been