The history of the first locomotives in America. From original ...

FIRST STEAM-CARRUGE. 35
wHcli excited mucli interest. An accident, however,
put an end to his experiments. Turning the comer of
the street one day, near the Madeleine, when the ma-
chine was running at a speed of about three miles an
hour, it upset with a crash, and, being considered danger-
ous, was locked up in the Arsenal. Cugnot's locomo-
tive is stUl to be seen in the Museum of the Conserva-
toire des Arts et Metiers, at Paris, and is a most interr
esting relic of early locomotion."
Fig. 1.
OUGNOT's locomotive, 1769.
In 1784 William Symington conceived the idea of
steam being applied to propelling carriages, and in
1786 made a working model, but soon gave it up, and
nothing was ever after heard of the project.
The first English model of a steam-carriage was
made in 1784, by William Murdoch; this model was
upon the principle of the high pressure, and ran on
three wheels (for common roads, of course). It worked
to admiration, but nothing further was ever done to
bring the idea into a more practical form.
A few years after, Thomas Allen, of Londons, pub-
lished the plan of a newly invented machine for carry-
ing goods, without the use of horses, and by the use
of steam alone for the motive power.- His, plan was
to have cogged wheels to run upon cogged raUs. The
plan was all that was ever brought out.
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