tween thirty and forty pounds are yearly granted out of the rate as prizes for the best cottage garden vegetables; the competition for which is held three times a year in the Public Hall.

Such is the admirable institution now existing at Clay Cross. The number of persons employed on the works is about fifteen hundred; and the amount of good daily effected by agencies of the character thus briefly stated can be better imagined than described. Schools, with a fine public hall, and a handsome church, have been erected, at a cost of many thousand pounds, towards the expenses of which the Clay Cross Company have munificently contributed; but the main element of success in the Institution unquestionably consists in the truly philanthropic action of the manager, Mr. Binns, who was for so many years the private secretary of George Stephenson, and in whom his spirit strongly lives and nobly works.

"The good men do, lives after them," happily holds true quite as often as the converse maxim embodied in Shakespere's well-known couplet.* The example and influence exercised by a good man upon his fellows, as by George Stephenson at Clay Cross during his life, is never lost; but goes on fructifying into good, long after his body has mouldered into dust.

"The evil that men do, lives after them;
The good is oft interrèd with their bones."

Julius Cæsar.

CHAP. XXXV.

CLOSING YEARS.

WHILE thus occupied in his country house at Tapton, many persons continued to seek Mr. Stephenson's advice on subjects connected with mechanical engineering. Inventors sent their plans to him, and his approval was regarded as a passport to success. He was always ready to consider the plans thus submitted. Sometimes it was a paddle-boat for canals, or a new brake for railway trains, or a steam-gauge, or a patent axle. If his reply proved favourable, the inventor occasionally seized the opportunity of circulating or advertising it, often without asking his permission.

One gentleman requested his opinion respecting his "antifriction wheeled carriages," to which a very civil letter was sent in reply, containing some useful hints, and offering to subscribe towards having a carriage properly constructed after a carefully prepared model, but cautioning the inventor against being over-sanguine. "If I can be the means of helping you," said he, “I shall be glad to do so; but I should not be justified in leading you or any other person to spend money without any chance of getting it back again." This letter was immediately published in the railway papers by the happy inventor, with a quantity of doggrel appended; but if the proposed wheel ran no smoother than the rhymes, it could not have been worth much.*

* Take the following specimen:

"I saw your son Robert, oh fie! oh fie!

He looked upon me with disdain;

Another inventor induced a mutual friend to write requesting his opinion respecting an improved steam-boat for the working of canals. He wrote in reply, commending the plan of the boat, but at the same time expressing his belief that "no boat can be made now to work against the locomotive." When Beale's Rotatory Engine came out, although entertaining a strong opinion against it, he nevertheless subscribed a sum of money for the purpose of having it fairly tried. A boat was fitted up with the engine, and the trial came off at Yarmouth. After describing the experiment at a meeting of the Mechanical Engineers, he said, "When the engine was put to work, we could not get the boat to move forward, and the experiment failed. We managed, indeed, to get the boat to sea, but it cost me and the party 407. to bring her back again.”

While Mr. Stephenson was in the full tide of railway business in London, these frequent applications of inventors to submit their plans for his consideration had not always been so favourably received. They broke in upon him at a time when every moment was precious, pre-engaged by railway companies with large interests at stake. Absorbed by work, and his mind full of the business in hand, it was scarcely to be expected that he should listen with patience to plans fifty times before proposed and rejected, to crude and wild theories believed in only by their projectors. But when he

His father could see, with half an eye,

Far more than I could explain.

"He would n't allow me to leave him my models,

Or a drawing, nor yet read my rhyme;
For many came to him with crack'd noddles,
Which occupied half of his time."

The last two lines state a fact beyond dispute. The number of inventions in connection with railways thrust upon the Messrs. Stephenson for their opinion during the railway mania, was almost beyond computation.

had secured leisure, and could call his time his own, he was always ready to give an ear to those who consulted him upon such subjects. Thus, when Mr. Smith of Nottingham, an ingenious person in humble life, waited upon him with his invention, of a steam-gauge, for the purpose of obtaining his patronage and assistance, Mr. Stephenson at once saw its uses, and said, "Oh! I understand it altogether; it will do very well." Overjoyed with this approval, and with the practical suggestions with which it was accompanied, the inventor said, "Before I leave, will you be pleased to tell me what is your charge?" "Charge!" replied Mr. Stephenson, "oh, nonsense, I make no charge; but I'll tell you what you must do. Send your instrument down to my works, and I'll attach it to one of my boilers and prove it. I will do more; I will put it in the papers for you, and invite the public to come and examine it at work, and afterwards purchase it myself, if it answers as I expect it will do.” He was as good as his word; for he shortly after published the following letter in the daily papers, dated Tapton House, Chesterfield, Oct. 15th, 1847: "A most important invention has been submitted to me for my approval, patented by a Mr. Smith of Nottingham, and intended to indicate the strength of steam in steam-engine boilers. It is particularly adapted for steam-boats, and can be placed in the cabin, on deck, or on any other part of the vessel, where it may be seen by every passenger on board. It may also be fixed in the office of every manufactory where a steam-engine is used, at a considerable distance from the boiler. I am so much pleased with it that I have put one up at one of my own collieries; it is some distance from the boiler, in another house, and works most beautifully, showing the rise and fall of the steam in the most delicate manner. The indicator is like the face of a clock, with a pointer, making one revolution in measuring from 1lb. to 100lbs. upon the square inch

of the pressure of steam; it is quite from under the control of the engineer, or any other person, so that its indications may be relied upon; and the construction is so simple, that it is scarcely possible for it to get out of order. I might give a full explanation of the machine, but I think it best to leave that to the inventor himself. The numerous and appalling accidents which have occurred from the bursting of steam-boat boilers have induced me to give you these observations, which I think desirable to be laid before the public. I may state that I have no pecuniary interest in the scheme; but being the first person to whom it has been shown, and the first to make use of it, I feel it a duty I owe to the inventor, as well as the public, to make it as universally known as possible. The indicator is put up at Tapton colliery, near Chesterfield, and may be seen any day, by any respectable person."

Mr. Stephenson also occupied some of his spare time, while at Tapton, in devising improvements in locomotive engines and railway carriages, still aiming at perfecting the great system which he had originated. Thus, in 1846, he brought out his design of a three-cylinder locomotive, — the two outside cylinders acting together in the same plane, the third cylinder, with a crank in the middle of the axle, acting at right angles to the plane and crank pins of the two other cylinders. The middle cylinder was double the diameter of the others; and its compensating action neutralised the tendency to oscillate, which was a defect in the long-boiler outside-cylinder engines as originally constructed. Although this new engine was very ingenious, and acted with great power, it has not come into general use, in consequence of the somewhat greater expense of its construction and working. The oscillation, also, of the outside-cylinder engines, which this invention was designed to correct, has since been obviated by an improvement in their design and structure.