The life of George Stephenson, railway engineer - Lighthouse ...

220 LIFE OF GEORGE STEPHENSON. [chap. xix.
at the rate of twelve miles an hour. My learned friend, Mr.
Adam, contemplated— possibly alluding to Ireland—that some
of the Irish members would arrive in the wagons to a division.
My learned friend says that they would go at the rate of twelve
miles an hour with the aid of the devil in the form of a loco-
motive, sitting as postilion on the fore hor.se, and an honourable
member sitting behind him to stir up the fire, and keep it at full
speed. But the speed at which these locomotive engines are to
go has slackened: Mr. Adam does not go faster now than five
miles an hour. The learned serjeant (Spankie) says he should
like to have seven, but he would be content to go six. I will
show he cannot go six ; and probably, for any practical pur-
poses, I may be able to show that I can keep up with him hy the
canal. . . . Locomotive engines are liable to be operated upon
by the weather. You are told they are affected by rain, and an
attempt has been made to cover them ; but the wind will affect
them ; and any gale of wind which would affect the traffic on
the Mersey would render it impossible to set off a locomotive
engine, either by poking of the fire, or keeping up the pressure
of the steam till the boiler is ready to burst." * How amusing
it now is to read these extraordinaiy views as to the formation
of a railway over Chat Moss, and the impossibility of starting a
locomotive engine in the face of a gale of wind ! The men who
then laughed at Stephenson's " mad projects " had but to live
a few years longer to find that the laugh was all on the other
side.
Evidence was called to show that the house property passed
by the proposed railway would be greatly deteriorated—in some
places almost destroyed ; that the locomotive engines would be
terrible nuisances, in consequence of the fire and smoke vomited
forth by them ; and that the value of land in the neighbourhood
of Manchester alone would be deteriorated by no less than
20,000Z. ! t But the opposition mainly relied upon the evidence
of the leading engineers—not, like Mr. Stephenson, self-taught
men, but regular professionals. Mr. Francis Giles, C. E., was
their great card. He had been twenty-two years an engineer,
and could speak with some authority. His testimony was
* Keport and Evidence, p. S54. f Evidence, p. 379.