ments, to enable the signalmen to communicate with each other, | and to have a constant record on the faces of the instruments to show what is being done. METROPOLITAN RAILWAYS. Railways designed for the local service of large cities are necessarily either sunk below or raised above the level of_the_streets. The late Mr Charles Pearson, solicitor to the City of London, was the originator of the system of intra-metropolitan railways. He worked at the subject from the year 1837. The Metropolitan and the Metropolitan District Railways in and around London are examples of the underground system. In 1854 the first Act of Parliament was passed; the works were commenced in 1860; the first section of the line-Paddington to Farringdon Street-was opened in January 1863, Mr John Fowler being the engineer. Several consecutive extensions into the City and towards Westminster and the London Mansion House were made at different times, until the "inner circle" was completed in October 1884, thirty years after the passing of the first Act, and twenty-four years after the commencement of the work of construction. The inner circle of railways as constructed is the direct outcome of the recommendation of the Lords' Committee of 1863, that they should abut upon, if they did not actually join, nearly all the principal railway termini in the metropolis, completing the circle by a line on the north side of the Thames. The total length of the inner circle is 13 miles and 176 yards. About 2 miles of this length are laid with four lines of rails, and there are twenty-seven stations on the circle at an average distance of half a mile apart. The combined length of the two systems, including the extensions beyond the inner circle, amounted in December 1883 to 40 miles. inner circle. The cost of the Metropolitan Railway system, 22 miles in length, in December 1883 has already been stated as £500,000 per mile, and that of the Metropolitan District Railway system, 18 miles in length, as £374,000 per mile. In 1871, when the works had been completed and opened from Moorgate Street to Mansion House station, the capital expenditure by the District Railway Company for works and equipment of 7 miles of double-line railway was officially stated to be £5,147,000; and by the Metropolitan Railway Company £5,856,000 on 10 miles, subject to deduction in respect of surplus lands. The combined cost for 17 miles was at the rate of £630,000 per mile-the greater cost per mile being, no doubt, due to the greater proportion of underground work. The cost of the 1 miles recently opened between Mansion House and Aldgate stations was about £450,000, or about £400,000 per mile. The longer axis of the inner circle is about 5 miles in length, east and west, and the shorter about 2 miles long at the widest part, north and south. The line runs at very various levels, traversing the sloping ground that stretches from the river Thames towards the heights of Hampstead and Highgate. Several natural sewers, formerly clear brooks or tidal channels, now covered, are traversed by the railway. They occasioned many difficulties and great outlay, as they required to be conveyed across the line in specially constructed conduits. The Ranelagh sewer, for instance, is carried under the Metropolitan Railway at Gloucester Terrace in a brickbuilt channel 9 feet wide by 8 high; and over the District Railway at Sloane Square station in a cast-iron tube 9 feet in diameter, supported on wrought-iron girders of 70 feet span. The Fleet Ditch had to be crossed five times. The average level of the rails of the District Railway, which traverses the old bed of the river and the swamps of Pimlico and Bridge Creek, is 13 feet below Thames highwater mark; whilst that of the northern part, on the Metropolitan Railway, is 60 feet above that datum, making 73 feet of difference of level, and giving rise to heavy works and steep gradients at the west and east ends of the circle. Cuttings 42 feet deep and a tunnel 421 yards in length are found at Campden Hill on the west; and cuttings 33 feet deep and a tunnel 728 yards in length at Clerkenwell on the cast, on gradients of 1 in 75 and 1 in 100 respectively. The works of construction consist of covered ways, tunnels, and open cuttings with retaining walls. The cost of property precluded tannels, the use of ordinary open cuttings with slopes. The covered ways were formed by making open cuttings in the first place and then building "open" or artificial tunnels, and covering them in, so as to restore the surface. The sides of the cuttings were made vertical or nearly vertical, and they were supported by timber framing or poling boards till the masonry of the tunnel was completed. The line from Paddington to Moorgate was made in this way with a mixed gauge-that is, the 7 feet gange and the 4 feet 8 inch gauge in combination-to take the traffic of the Great Western Railway as well as that of national gange lines. The covered way was therefore made 28 feet wide and 17 high for the mixed gauge, and the arch is elliptical, built of seven "rings" or courses of brick, with side walls three bricks or 27 inches thick, on footings 4 feet wide. At the junction of a branch with the main line a "bellmouth" or expanding arch was constructed in which the span was gradually enlarged to 60 feet. The covered way on the extension, where the national gauge alone was laid, was 25 feet wide. The normal or standard type of arched covered way is 15 feet 9 inches Covered ways ness. high above the level of the rails. The side walls are three bricks or 27 inches in thickness, and the backs of the walls are carried down vertically to the foundation. The arch was ordinarily built with five rings of bricks, making 223 inches of thickness; but the number of rings was increased occasionally to eight, nine, or ten rings. The haunches of the arch are backed with concrete. The footings of the walls rest on concrete foundations 30 inches in thickA drain-pipe 18 inches in diameter is laid longitudinally along the middle of the tunnel. The whole of the tunnelling of the District Railway, of which Mr Fowler was the engineer, was put in with open cuttings. Two trenches 6 feet wide were sunk to receive the side walls, which were built up to a level 4 feet above the springing of the arch. As the construction of the walls proceeded the timbering was removed and replaced by concrete backing behind the walls. The earth in the middle, called the "dumpling or core, was excavated to such a level as to admit of the centering being put into position for the turning of the arch. When the arch was built and the centering removed, the dumpling, which had been utilized for transport, was excavated down to the floor-level from the ends, whence the stuff was conveyed away. By this economical method of procedure the only earth and gravel that required to be lifted was that which was excavated in forming the trenches for the side walls. It was raised by means of steamcranes travelling on temporary rails laid by the sides of the excavations. Again, the centering for the arch was supported on the core, and was simple and less costly than ordinary centering. The complete arch is shown in section in fig. 23. Inverts, or inverted arches, were laid in across the bottom, between the footings of the walls, where, from the nature of the soil or from excessive D arch. ཀྱི་ Fia. 23.-Metropolitan District Railway. Type section of covered way; brick FIG. 24.-Metropolitan District Railway. Type section of covered way. lateral pressure, the floor was thought likely to rise. When there was not sufficient depth for a brick arched way the side walls were made, as shown in fig. 24, of brick and concrete, in bays 8 feet wide, of piers and recesses, spanned by cast-iron girders from 18 to 30 inches in depth, carrying jack-arches between them. average cost of the arch-covered ways, 25 feet wide, was about £40 per lineal yard, as against £52 per yard for the girder-covered way. The On the inner circle there are three tunnels,-the Clerkenwell Inner tunnel, 728 yards long, of which the level of the rails was from circle. 29 to 59 feet below the surface of the ground; the "widening' tunnel, 733 yards long, parallel to the Clerkenwell tunnel; and the tunnel under Campden Hill, 421 yards in length. Even when the utmost precautions are taken, tunnelling through a town is a risky operation. Settlements may occur years after the completion of the works; water mains may be broken in the streets and in the houses; stone staircases may fall down; and other unpleasant symptoms of instability may show themselves. The cost of the tunnel of 25 feet in width was at the rate of £63 per lineal yard. Open cuttings are 281 feet in clear width on the original line of mixed gauge and 25 feet wide on the extensions. The 25.-Metropolitan District Railway. Type section of open cutting. retaining walls are of FIG. brick and concrete, in 11 feet bays, consisting of piers 3 feet wide on the face, and recesses between the piers 8 feet wide. They are inclined backwards with a batter of 1 inches to 1 foot. The foundations are 5 feet below the level of the rails, and the thickness of the walls at the base is 40 per cent., or two-fifths of the height. Occasionally, where the depth is considerable, the thickness is less, and one or two rows of cast-iron struts, according to the depth, are placed between the walls at the upper part to take the thrust. A section of open cutting with two rows of struts is shown in fig. 25. The cost of open cuttings 25 feet wide and 25 deep was, say, £67 per lineal yard, or with one row of cast-iron struts £55 per yard. With two rows of struts for a depth of 42 feet, the cost was £108 per lineal yard. It was the intention originally to make the stations as well as the railway strictly "underground," and those at Baker Street, Portland Road, and Gower Street were so constructed. At Baker Street a segmental arch of 45 feet span and 10 feet 4 inches of rise extends over the entire length of 300 feet of platform. The cost of such a station, including booking-offices, restorations, and other contingencies, amounted to £18,000. On the extensions the stations were, when the conditions admitted it, placed in open cuttings, roofed over, 300 feet long, with platforms 15 feet wide. The average cost exceeded that of the same length of ordinary covered way by from £14,000 to £22,000. Not only sewers but gas mains and water mains occasionally demanded very expensive diversions. In passing Broad Sanctuary 2000 feet of gas mains, ranging from 14 to 30 inches in diameter, were diverted; and in simply crossing High Street, Kensington, 600 feet of pipes of from 3 to 30 inches bore were diverted. In passing a sound building on a good foundation the work was executed in short lengths, with carefully timbered trenches quickly followed up by the concrete and brickwork of the retaining walls or covered way. Under the houses of Pembridge Square the side walls of the railway were constructed in short lengths, and to form the roof of the covered way main girders of 25 feet span were slipped between the walls of the houses at convenient places, between which jack-arches were built. At Park Crescent only a floor of old ship timber separates the kitchens from the railway. The permanent way originally consisted of wrought-iron flange rails with longitudinal sleepers and then of steel flange rails; but these have been gradually re amount to about 63 per cent. of the gross earnings. On the New York Elevated Railroad the railway is supported on square wroughtiron lattice-work columns let into cast-iron base blocks founded on brickwork and concrete, at distances of from 37 to 44 feet apart. Where the street traffic is crowded a single row of columns is planted in the line of each curb, on the upper ends of which a pair of longitudinal girders are fixed to carry a line of way, 22 feet high above the street level, as shown in fig. 27, at each side of the street. In other situations the two lines of way are supported at a height of 21 feet on longitudinal girders in the middle of the street, fixed to transverse girders, which span the street and are carried on columns at the curbs. A third arrangement is adopted where the columns are planted in the street at a distance transversely of 23 feet, as in fig. 28, each carrying a line of rails at a height of 18 feet, and connected at intervals by arched bracing to steady the structure. In this illustration the street is occupied by a double line of tramway. The rails are of the Vignoles pattern, of Bessemer steel, weighing 50 lb per yard, spiked to cross timber sleepers, and guarded by two longitudinal timbers, one on each side of each rail. The sharpest curve on the main line has 90 feet of radius. The gradients con- FIG. 27.-New York Elevated Railroad. Square lattice-work column. form, for the most part, to those of the streets, and the steepest gradient is 1 in 50 for a length of 800 yards. The traffic is worked with outside cylinder, fourcoupled wheel, bogie-truck locomotives, weighing in working order 191 tons. The driving-wheels are 3 feet in diameter, and the Fig. 26. placed by double-headed rails in chairs. Fig. 26 shows a section of the covered way under Queen Victoria Street, with the main sewer underneath and the galleries for pipes, &c., at the sides. Glasgow The Glasgow City and District Railway will supply important City and links of communication between the railways on the north side of District the river Clyde. The line extends from College station, High Railway. Street, by George Street and Regent Street, crossing Dumbarton Road to the existing Stobcross line, over a length of nearly 21 miles, almost wholly underground. Of this length 1700 yards, or nearly 1 mile, are tunnelled and 1000 yards are covered way. The tunnels are arched with four rings of brick in cement, to a clear height of 18 feet at the crown and 27 feet in width, for two lines of way. The covered way is arched over with brick. The New We may take the "elevated railroads" of New York as an instance York of metropolitan railways for local service above ground. In 1867 elevated the first attempt was made to improve existing means of transit railroad. between the residential and the business quarters of the city by the construction of an elevated railroad worked by a wire rope and a stationary engine. The railroad passed into other hands in 1872, and the New York Elevated Railroad Company was formed. lines of this and of the Metropolitan Elevated Railroad Company are now worked together by the Manhattan Railway Company. From the southern terminus of the former railway at South Ferry diverge the lines by which the eastern and western sides of the city are traversed. Junctions are made with the Grand Central Depôt of the New York Central and other railroads, and with the New York City and Northern Railroad. In the beginning of 1880 the elevated system was worked over 34 miles of line; 165,000 passengers on an average were carried per day, the largest number carried in one day being 274,000. The trains run every two minutes in the morning and evening, when the fares are 5 cents or 24d. for any distance; and in the quieter hours of the day every four or five minutes for a general fare of 10 cents or 5d. The working charges FIG. 28.- New York Elevated Railroad. Section. cylinders 12 inches in diameter with a stroke of 16 inches. The cars are of the usual American type, entered from each end, 45 feet long and 8 wide, with seats for forty-two passengers. They are placed on two bogie trucks, and weigh 12 tons. The trains are provided with continuous air-brakes. The stations are about onethird of a mile apart; the platforms are 200 feet long and 13 wide. The cost per mile of double way is given by Mr R. E. Johnston as follows: Foundations, columns, girders, superstructure, and permanent way..£57,696 Stations... Five locomotives. Twelve cars Total per mile... 12,000 4,000 7,680 £81,376 No payment has been made for way-leave along the streets, nor for compensation to frontagers, though it is known that in the residential quarters traversed by the railroads rents have in many instances, at least, been depreciated to the extent of 50 per cent. Gauge. any clay or other material in it that might interfere with the Gauge.-The measure of the standard or British national gauge " "" narrow Miles. Yards. 183 924 243 1034 .1789 594 84 946. 2300 1738 The name of "narrow gauge" has now ceased to be applicable to the standard gauge, and is reserved for gauges of much less width,the metre gauge and others of from 2 to 3 or 34 feet wide. Why a fractional measure of gauge should have been selected is a question which has puzzled many people. The fact seems to be that the track of the original carts or trains-5 feet wide outside the wheelswas taken as a standard for the gauge of rails, which was measured outside also. The width of the single rail at the top being originally 1 inches, the width for the two rails together is 34 inches, which leaves 4 feet 8 inches for the inside measure or true gauge. There are in the United Kingdom a few railways of gauge narrower than the standard gauge, of which instances occur in the following lines:-Festiniog, 1 foot 11 inches; Talyllyn, 2 feet 6 inches; Dinas and Snowdon, Southwold, Isle of Man, Manx Northern, Ravenglass and Eskdale, Ballymena and Larne, cach 3 feet. following statement (Table XXVII.) comprises the gauges of the principal railway systems in the world: Great Britain standard gauge The .... ft. in. 14 8 14 9 6 0 5 Central Europe, prevailing (4 8 3 0 2 0 5 6 Ireland, standard gauge gauge.. Russia, standard gauge Norway. 13 6 Spain and Portugal, standard gauge.. Antwerp and Ghent Chili 2 3 4 2 India, prevailing gauge 5 6 metre gauge. " Arconum and Confe Brazil veram Railway 3 6 5 6 Japan.... South Australia 8 6 (3 6 Egypt.. 3 6 Canada Mexico The relative advantages of broad gauges and narrow gauges were exhaustively discussed at the Institution of Civil Engineers (in 1873), on the reading of Mr W. T. Thornton's paper on "The Relative Advantages of the 5 feet 6 inch Gauge and of the Metre Gauge for the State Railways of India." The fallacy pervading the arguments for narrow gauges is that they take the width between the rails as the basic unit of the system; whereas that is really little more than an incident, and the dimensions of the railway must in point of fact be governed by the size and weight of the vehicles which the traffic requires. Speaking generally, the national gauge of 4 feet 8 inches is at least as good as any other for the purposes of general traffic. If the width of gauge were still an open question, it might be maintained that a gauge of 5 feet would be rather more convenient in view of the increasing size of the more powerful locomotives. | Rails."The experience of the last twenty-five years," said Mr George Parker Bidder, speaking in 1861, has shown that one system has been adopted almost universally--the double-headed rails, upon chairs with cross sleepers, a plan which has been materially improved by fishing the joints." On the continent of Europe and in America, however, engineers have almost universally laid the flat-foot or flange rail; and in France double-headed rails, keved in chairs, have been replaced by flange rails. On the Metropolitan and Metropolitan District Railways, on the contrary, the flange rails have been taken up and replaced by double-headed rails in chairs. The case may be briefly stated in the following terms. The double-headed rail system with chairs is the best where supplies of material and labour for maintenance and repair are always ready and available. The single-headed flange rail system is the best when the main thing to attain is simplicity in construction. Steel rails are now very generally used instead of iron; and indeed Steel it may be affirmed that but for the introduction of that material rails. for rails and also for the wheel tires of locomotives the railway system would have broken down under the enormous growth of traffic. Rails of wrought-iron on the early railways lasted about twenty-five years; those of later date have been worn out in from five to ten years and in certain situations in twelve months, mainly owing to increased traffic, heavier loads on the engine-wheels, increased speed, quicker stopping and quicker starting. Steel has come to the rescue both in the engine-wheels and in the rails. Loads of from 15 to 18 tons are now placed with impunity on the single wheels of engines as well as on coupled wheels, while it appears from the investigations of Mr R. Price Williams, a leading authority on permanent way, that a fully proportioned bull-headed rail of steel outlasts fifteen or eighteen iron rails. Steel rails are not merely stronger or harder but, owing to their texture, are worn away only by simple abrasion, whereas iron rails separate out into strands as soon as the outer coating that binds them together is worn off. Mr Alfred A. Langley laid down in 1874 samples of permanent way near Stepney station on the London and Blackwall Railway, where upwards of 300 trains a day passed over a single line of way. The weight of each train was on an average about 150 tons, making a total of about 45,000 tons daily over one line of rails. The rails are both of steel and of iron, weighing 80 tb per lineal yard and keyed in cast-iron chairs on cross rectangular sleepers. The greater number of the wrought-iron rails had to be turned after one year and three-quarters, during which period they had worn down about one-eighth of an inch; but the necessity for reversing did not arise from the wear itself, but because they gave way in places, either bulging or splitting. The steel rails had worn about one-sixteenth of an inch in the same period. About 27,000,000 tons had passed over the line. The rails generally, indeed almost universally, used for the way Kinds of of railways are the double-headed, the bull-headed, and the flange rails. or Vignoles rails (in the United States, Germany, Canada, and Mexico), the double-headed and the bull-headed rails being keyed into cast-iron chairs spiked to sleepers, the flanged being laid upon and fastened direct to the sleepers. The principal advantage of the flange rail is the facility with which it can be attached to the sleeper with fastenings of a simple description. The disadvantages are that it cannot be turned or reversed when the head is worn, as the double-headed rail may be, and that the rigid attachment of the rail to the sleeper causes a greater degree of disturbance of the way and involves more labour for maintenance than in the case of the double-headed rail. The double-headed rail is made heavier for the same class of traffic than the flange rail; but it is also stronger and is easily bent to curves, although owing to the mode of attachment to the chairs by wooden keys there is a liability to a slight longitudinal movement of the rails, known as creeping." The bull-headed rail possesses the advantages of the doubleheaded rail, except that, like the flange rail, it is not reversible. The bull-headed rail is laid on most of the railway lines of England and Scotland; the double-headed rail is also in use, In Ireland the bull-headed and the flange rails are used. Double-headed and bull-headed rails in English practice are rolled to a weight of from 82 to 86 fb per yard; the heads are made from 2 to 2 inches wide; the webs are from five-eighths to thirteen-sixteenths of an inch in thickness; and the height of the rail varies from 5 to 5 inches. The rails are now made of steel, in bars for the most part 30 feet in length, with the advantage in comparison with shorter lengths of a more solid road, fewer joints, and less cost for maintenance. They are fixed into massive cast-iron chairs, weigh- Chairs. ing from 31 to 55 lb each, by means of hard wood keys-oak. They are canted inwards in their seats at an angle usually of 1 in 20, the better to resist lateral blows from wheels. The chairs are made of considerable width on the more heavily worked linesfrom 7 to 8 inches, against a minimum of 4 inches on other lines. On some lines the seats of the chairs on which the rails rest are slightly rounded in the direction of the rail; this forms a compensation for slight deviations from the level in the sleepers, but is mainly useful in preventing indentation of the rails by the concussions to which they are subject-a matter of importance with double-headed rails which are by and by to be reversed. cases Mr T. E. Harrison places cushions of hard wood in the chair to support the rails, which are thus effectually protected from indentation; and, in addition, the trains run more smoothly. The oak keys by which the rails are fastened in the chairs are Keys generally applied at the outer side of the rail, as the jar caused by the lateral percussion of the flanges of wheels is then less than when the key is placed inside; but on the Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway the key is put at the inner side of the rail, and there is this to be said in favour of the practice, that the rails are kept firmly to gauge and the key is less likely to shift. On some railways contrivances are employed to prevent the keys from shifting or creeping out of their proper position in the chair; these will be noticed in their places. The rails are laid end to end, one-eighth or three-sixteenths of an inch apart at ordinary Fishplates. temperatures, to allow for expansion in hot weather. The joints of the rails are united or fished with parallel steel plates lodged within the side channels of the rails and fastened with four bolts and nuts passed through the web of the rails, and, in order that the fish-plates may take a solid and steady bearing, the entering faces of the upper and lower members of the rails are in most instances formed straight and steep,-at an angle of about 2 to 1. For the same purpose the fish-plates are hollow at their inner faces, so as not to be in contact with the vertical members or web of the rails, and are slightly elastic in consequence. Vertical stiffness, also, is of prime importance in fish-plates, which act as beams fixed at the ends and uniformly loaded, being required to sustain the loads of trains passing over the joints. On some lines, accordingly, the fish-plates are made of greater depth, extending downwards along the lower table of the rail, and are even turned under it, Sleepers. whence they are called clip fish-plates. The chairs are laid on transverse timber sleepers, ordinarily cut from Baltic redwood to a scantling of 10 inches wide and 5 deep, and 9 feet in length,speaking precisely, only 8 feet 11 inches in length, to secure the timber from import duty. They are most commonly submitted to a preserving process by the injection of about 2 gallons of creasote into each sleeper. The chairs are fixed to the sleepers by iron spikes or oak trenails, or both, varying in number from two on the lines of lighter traffic to three or four on lines of heavier traffic. On the London and South-Western Railway and on the South-Eastern Railway a compound fastener is used, spike driven into a hollow trenail, after the latter is driven into the sleeper. There are usually eleven cross sleepers to each length of rails of 30 feet, making the average distance between the sleepers about 2 feet 9 inches from centre to centre. It is usual to space them apart more widely in the middle portion of the rail-bars (up to 3 feet) and more closely about the joints, with a view to equalizing the vertical resistance of the rails to rolling loads, by supplying a greater degree of support from the sleepers near the joints. Double rails. - -a The standard models of permanent way on the double-headed headed rail and chair system adopted by Mr John Fowler for the New South Wales railways have been already noticed. The rails are shown in section in figs. 29 and 35. The sleepers are of colonial hard woods, chiefly iron-bark timber. They are laid 2 feet 6 inches apart between centres at the joints of the rails, and 3 feet 1 inch apart elsewhere. The upper and lower tables of the rails are curved or rounded in section to a radius of 5 inches, the height of the rail. The entering or overhanging faces of the rail are inclined at fifteen-sixteenths, with hemispherical or cup-heads forged from the solid bar. The above-described way, as laid in New South Wales, is bedded in ballast consisting of broken stone 12 inches in depth below the sleepers, broken to a gauge of 3 inches, boxed up with broken stone of a smaller size to a gauge of 2 inches for a depth of 8 inches. The total depth of the ballast from the crown of the formation is 22 inches. The surface of the formation below the ballast is rounded in cross-section, in order to drain off such water as penetrates through the ballast. Grips or furrows are cut and drains laid in where necessary, so that no water is allowed to remain on the line or under the ballast. The South-Eastern double-headed rail (fig. 31) is keyed into chairs 4 inches wide and 13 long at the sole. They are fixed to the sleeper by two spikes driven into two hollow oak trenails. The sleepers at the joints are laid 2 feet 4 inches apart between centres. The following are the quantities of material Railway. for 1 mile of way, single line :tons. cwt. qr. Steel rails, 82 lb per yard.. Fish bolts and nuts Chair spikes Keys Sleepers, creasoted Trenails FIG. 31.-Double-headed rail; South-Eastern .3521 yards 128 17 3 14 505 pairs 2020 1203 These quantities are considerably less than those of the Midland Railway (which are stated below), as may naturally be the case for a line chiefly of passenger traffic in comparison with one of heavy goods and mineral traffic. The double-headed rails of the NorthEastern Railway, 82 fb per yard, are bedded on blocks or cushions of oak placed in the bottom of the chairs, the advantages of which have already been noticed. The type section of way of the Midland Railway is shown in fig. Bull32. The formation is inclined each way from the centre, making headed two straight slopes for drainage. The ballast is of strong gravel rails. a slope of about 1 in 2, forming straight and equally inclined bearings to receive the fish-plates. The rails, while in course of manufacture, are tested by selecting a few rails of each day's make, from which a portion 4 feet in length is cut off and placed on iron supports 3 feet apart, and is subjected to three blows from a weight of 1 ton falling 12 feet each time. The rails are to deflect not less than 6 inches and not more than 73 under this test without showing any signs of fracture. The fish-bolts, as well as the spikes for fastening the chairs to the sleepers, are made of the finest quality of close fibrous iron. Fifty per cent. of the rails were ordered 24 feet in length, 40 per cent. 21, and 10 per cent. 18. The chairs (fig. 30) are 13 inches long at the sole, 41 wide, and 1 thick at the seat of the rail. Test bars of the metal used for the chairs are cast to a scantling of 2 inches by 1 inch and 3 feet long. They are placed on edge, on supports 3 feet apart, and are required to sustain a dead load of 30 cwt. suspended from the centre of the bar without fracture. The spikes are seven-eighths of an inch in diameter, tapered at the head to FIG. 32.-Type section of way of Midland Railway. broken stone, and ashes or clinker,-chiefly gravel. It covers a width of 26 feet for two lines of way. It is laid to a depth of 16 inches at the middle of the six-foot, and is formed level with the upper sides of the sleepers between the rails in the four-foot, with a medium depth of 16 inches, or 11 inches beneath the sleepers. At the outer sides of the rails the ballast is heaped level with the tops of the chairs, or, more precisely, the tops of the keys, and is sloped down to the formation at each outer side. The upper and lower surfaces of the rail (see fig. 33) are curved to a radius equal to the height of it, and the planks are flat,—adapted for taking w up lateral blows and mitigating wear. The chairs are remarkable for large dimensions, being 7 inches wide and 15 long at the sole, which is 17 inches thick under the rail, and for their weight, 50 lb each. The cost of relaying 1 mile. of single way on the Midland system just described, based on contract prices in 1884, amounts to £1572, 8s. 5d. Deduct Cost to relay 1 mile of Single Line with 30-feet Bull-headed Steel C Not included in the above :-Ballast for 1 mile of single line, 4000 cubic yards, at 28.£400; ballast for 1 mile of double line, 7000 cubic yards, at 2s.= £700; ballast for a lift of about 3 inches, in relaying 1 mile of single line, 520 cubic yards, at 2s.£52; engine hire, wages of ballast guards, use of waggons, &c., in relaying 1 mile of single line, £50. The lift of 3 inches signifles the wear and tear of ballast and the quantity required to be replaced. The The standard rail on the London and North-Western Railway is, like that of the Midland, bull-headed, but less high and wider at the head and the foot and thicker in the web. The chairs have the peculiarity of being ribbed horizontally on the inner face against which the oak key is driven, in order to grip the key. The sleepers at the joints are placed 2 feet 3 inches apart between centres. The Great Northern Company's standard rail contrasts with the two immediately preceding rails in being less high than either, and having a thinner web and a larger head than the others. There are peculiarities in the disposition of the way. The first is that the joints of the rails are supported in a chair directly under each joint, to which the fishes are bolted; the second is that the two rails forming a line of way break joint with each other, the joints alternating from side to side, and that, as a consequence, all the sleepers are placed equally apart. On this system, it is argued, the way is of as nearly uniform strength as it is possible to make it. keys for fixing the rails are of compressed fir. The Great Western, the Metropolitan, and the Lancashire and Yorkshire rails are the heaviest of the bull-headed rails noticed in Table XXVIII. (see below),- weighing 86 Ib per yard, having comparatively thin webs and great development of head (see fig. 34). In the Great Western chair the inner face of the jaw that holds the key is formed with an indentation, to aid in keeping the key in place,—the key being likely to expand into the vacancy. In the Metropolitan way the chairs are fastened to the sleepers by two through bolts and nuts to each chair. The rails of the Fio. Manchester, Sheffield, and Lincolnshire Railway are placed in chairs of great length, 161 inches; and, contrary to usual practice, the oak keys for securing the rails in the chairs are fixed on the inner side of the rail, the rail taking its bearing directly upon the jaw of the chair. Thus the lateral strokes of the wheels on the rails are resisted directly 34.-Bull-headed rail; Great Western Railway. by the jaw of the chair, and not through the medium of the key. There are twelve sleepers to each length of rail, averaging 2 feet 6 inches apart between centres, as against the usual number on other lines, eleven per rail-length of 30 feet. The sleepers, of Baltic redwood, are not creasoted nor preserved by any other process, except in one or two places where sand ballast is used. The leading particulars of standard double-headed and bullheaded rails, with chairs and sleepers, are given in Table XXVIII. (see below). Specimen standard flange rails are illustrated in figs. 35 and 36 Flange in cross section. Leading particulars of flange rails are given in rails. Table XXIX. below. In the case of the flange rail of the New South Wales Railway (fig. 35) the inward cant of the rails is provided for by planing out by machinery the beds of the rails at the upper sides of the sleepers to the angle 1 in 20; and that the rails may be kept in gauge the beds are notched into the surface by as much as the thickness of the flange of the rail. No holes of any kind, either punched or drilled, are made in the flanges of the rails; these are fastened to the sleepers by screws and spikes alternately, having projecting heads, by which the flange is clipped and held down. In order to check the tendency to creeping of the rails as well as of the fish-plates, it is intended to flange the fish-plates and to cut a notch at each end of them, in each of which a dog-spike is to be яя Fig. 35. R FIG. 35.-Flange rail; New South Wales Railway. driven into the sleepers. The Great Northern of Ireland rail is similar to Mr Fowler's on the New South Wales Railway, but heavier. The Midland Great Western rail (fig. 36) is peculiarly formed, with a web of taper section, being nine-sixteenths of an inch thick at the head, and thickened to 1 inch at the flange. The bridge rail of the Great Western Railway (fig. 37) is laid on the model originally adopted by Mr Brunel. The rails are only 3 inches high, and are aided in resisting vertical stress by the continuous longitudinal sleepers of large scantling, 14 inches wide and 7 deep, on which they are laid, with pine packing 8 inches wide and 1 thick. The rails are laid so as to break joint with the sleepers, which are in lengths of 25 feet, whilst the rails are from 18 to 32 feet in length. The rails are fastened down by fang-bolts, |