THE TRAINS--EUSTON.
_The Down Train._
On arriving in a cab at the Euston Station, the old-fashioned
traveller is at first disposed to be exceedingly pleased at the
newborn civility with which, the instant the vehicle stops, a porter,
opening its door with surprising alacrity, most obligingly takes
out every article of his luggage; but so soon as he suddenly finds
out that the officious green straight-buttoned-up official’s object
has been solely to get the cab off the premises, in order to allow
the string of variegated carriages that are slowly following to
advance--in short, that, while he has been paying to the driver, say
only two shining shillings, his favourite great-coat, his umbrella,
portmanteau, carpet-bag, Russia leather writing-case, secured by
Chubb’s patent lock, have all vanished--he poignantly feels, like
poor Johnson, that his “patron has encumbered him with help;” and
it having been the golden maxim of his life never to lose sight
of his luggage, it gravels and dyspepsias him beyond description
to be civilly told that on no account can he be allowed to follow
it, but that “_he will find it on the platform_;” and truly enough
the prophecy is fulfilled; for there he does find it on a barrow
in charge of the very harlequin who whipped away, and who, as its
guardian angel, hastily muttering the words “_Now then, Sir!_” stands
beckoning him to advance.
The picture of the departure of one of the large trains from the
Station at Euston Square, however often it may have been witnessed,
is worthy of a few moments’ contemplation.
On that great covered platform, which, with others adjoining it, is
lighted from above by 8797 square yards (upwards of an acre and
three-quarters) of plate-glass, are to be seen congregated and moving
to and fro in all directions, in a sort of Babel confusion, persons
of all countries, of all religions, and of all languages. People of
high character, of low character, of no character at all. Infants
just beginning life--old people just ending it. Many desirous to be
noticed--many, from innumerable reasons, good, bad, and indifferent,
anxious to escape notice. Some are looking for their friends--some,
suddenly turning upon their heels, are evidently avoiding their
acquaintance.
Contrasted with that variety of free and easy well-worn costumes in
which quiet-minded people usually travel, are occasionally to be seen
a young couple--each, like a new-born baby, dressed from head to foot
in everything perfectly new--hurrying towards a coupé, on whose door
there negligently hangs a black board--upon which there is printed,
not unappropriately, in white bridal letters, the word “ENGAGED.”
Across this mass of human beings a number of porters are to be seen
carrying and tortuously wheeling, in contrary directions, baggage
and property of all shapes and sizes. One is carrying over his right
shoulder a matted parcel, 12 or 15 feet long, of young trees, which
the owner, who has just purchased them for his garden, is following
with almost parental solicitude. Another porter, leaning as well as
walking backwards, is attempting with his whole strength to drag
towards the luggage-van a leash of pointer-dogs, whose tails, like
certain other “tails” that we know of, are obstinately radiating
from the couples that bind together their heads: while a number of
newspaper-vendors, “fleet-footed Mercuries,” are worming their way
through the crowd.
Within the long and apparently endless straight line of railway
carriages which bound the platform, are soon seen the faces and caps
of various travellers, especially old ones, who with due precaution
have taken possession of their seats; and while most of these, each
of them with their newspapers unfolded on their knees, are slowly
wiping their spectacles, several of the younger inmates are either
talking to other idlers leaning on their carriage-windows, or, half
kissing and half waving their hands, are bidding “farewell” to the
kind friends who had accompanied them to the station.
Some months ago, at a crisis similar to that just mentioned, we
happened to be ensconced in the far corner of a railway carriage,
when we heard a well-known clergyman from Brighton suddenly
observe to his next neighbour who sat between us, “_There must
surely be something very remarkable in that scene!_” His friend,
who was busily cutting open his _Record_, made no reply, but, as
we chanced to witness the trifling occurrence alluded to, we will
very briefly describe it. A young man of about twenty-two, of very
ordinary height, dress, and appearance, was standing opposite to a
first-class carriage just as the driver’s whistle shrilly announced
the immediate departure of the train. At this signal, without any
theatrical movement, or affectation of any sort, he quietly reeled
backwards upon a baggage-truck, which happened to be immediately
behind him. Two elderly ladies beside him instantly set to work,
first of all, most vigorously to rub with their lean fingers the
palms of his hands--they might just as well have scrubbed the soles
of his boots;--then they untied his neckcloth; but their affectionate
kindness was of no avail. The train was probably separating him
from something, or from some one. The movement however he had not
witnessed, for the mere whistle of the engine had caused him to
swoon! What corresponding effect of fainting or sobbing it may have
produced on any inmate in that carriage before which he had long been
standing, and which had just left him, we have no power to divine.
It is impossible, however, to help reflecting what a variety of
emotions must every day be excited within the train as well as on the
platform at Euston Station by the scream or parting whistle which
we have just described. From the murderer flying from the terrors
of justice down to the poor brokenhearted creditor absconding from
his misfortunes;--from our careworn Prime Minister down to the most
indolent member of either House of Parliament--each simultaneously
escaping after a long-protracted session;--from people of all
classes going from or to laborious occupation, down to the schoolboy
reluctantly returning to, or joyfully leaving, his school;--from
our Governor-General proceeding to embark for India, down to the
poor emigrant about to sail from the same port to Australia--the
railway-whistle, however unheeded by the multitude, must oftentimes
have excited a variety of feelings which it would be utterly
impossible to describe.
While the travellers of a train are peacefully taking their seats,
artillery-men, horses, and cannon, on a contiguous set of rails, are
occasionally as quietly embarking in carriages, horse-boxes, and
trucks, which are subsequently hooked on to a mass of passengers
perfectly unconscious of the elements of war which are accompanying
them.
As a departing railway-train, like a vessel sailing out of harbour,
proceeds on its course, its rate rapidly increases, until, in a very
short time, it has attained its full speed, and men of business
are then intently reading the “City news,” and men of pleasure the
leading article of their respective newspapers, when this runaway
street of passengers--men, women, and children--unexpectedly find
themselves in sudden darkness, visible only by a feeble and hitherto
unappreciated lamp, which, like the pale moon after a fiery sunset,
modestly shines over their head. By this time the boarded platform
at Euston Station, but a few minutes ago so densely thronged with
passengers, is completely deserted. The lonely guard on duty, every
footstep resounding as he walks, paces along it like a sentinel.
The newspaper-vendors, sick unto death of the news they had been
vaunting, are indolently reclining at their stalls; even the boy
who sells ‘Punch’ is half asleep; and there is nothing to break the
sober dulness of the scene but a few clerks and messengers, who,
like rabbits popping from one hole of their warren into another,
enter upon the platform from the door of one office to hurry into
that of the next. In a few minutes, however, the loud puffing of an
engine announces the approach towards the platform of a string of
empty carriages, which are scarcely formed into the next departure
train, when vehicles of all descriptions are again to be seen in our
most public thoroughfares concentrating upon the focus of Euston
Square; and thus, with a certain alleviation on Sundays, this strange
feverish admixture of confusion and quietness, of society and
solitude, continues intermittently from ¼ past 6 A.M. to 10 P.M.
during every day in the week, every week in the month, and every
month in the year.
_The Up Train._
The out-train having been despatched, we must now beg our readers to
be so good as to walk, or rather to scramble, with us from the scene
of its departure across five sets of rails, on which are lying, like
vessels at anchor in a harbour, crowds of railway-carriages preparing
to depart, to the opposite platform, in order to witness the arrival
of an incoming train. This platform, for reasons which will shortly
appear, is infinitely longer than that for the departure trains.
It is a curve 900 feet in length, lighted by day from above with
plate-glass, and at night by 67 large gas-lamps suspended from above,
or affixed to the iron pillars that support the metallic net-worked
roof. Upon this extensive platform scarcely a human being is now to
be seen; nevertheless along its whole length it is bounded on the
off-side by an interminable line of cabs, intermixed with private
carriages of all shapes, gigs, dog-carts, and omnibuses, the latter
standing opposite to little ugly black-faced projecting boards,
which by night as well as by day are always monotonously exclaiming,
“_Holborn--Fleet Street--and Cheapside!_”--“_Oxford Street--Regent
Street--and Charing Cross!_” _&c._
In this motley range of vehicles, smart coachmen, tall pale powdered
footmen, and splendid horses are strangely contrasted with the
humble but infinitely faster conveyance--the common cab. Most of the
drivers of these useful machines, strange to say, are absent; the
remainder are either lolling on benches, or, in various attitudes,
dozing on their boxes. Their horses, which are generally well-bred,
and whose bent knees and fired hocks proclaim the good services
they have performed, stand ruminating with a piece of sacking
across their loins, or with nose-bags, often empty--until for some
reason a carriage before them leaves their line: in which case,
notwithstanding the absence of their drivers and regardless of all
noises, they quietly advance along the edge of the little precipice
which bounds the rails. They there know quite well what they are
waiting for, and have no desire to move. Indeed, it is a Pickwickian
fact, well known to cab-drivers, that their horses travel unwillingly
from the station, but always pull hard coming back, simply because it
is during the waiting-time at Euston Station that their nose-bags are
put on--or, in other words, that they are fed.
We may here observe that there are sixty-five selected cabmen
who have the _entrée_ to the platform, and who, _quamdiù se bene
gesserint_, are allowed exclusively to work for the Company, whose
name is painted on their cabs. If more than these are required, a
porter calls them from a line of supplicant cabs standing in the
adjacent street. Close to each departure-gate there is stationed a
person whose duty it is to write down in a book the number of each
cabman carrying away a passenger, as well as the place to which he is
conveying him, which two facts each driver is required to exclaim as
he trots by; and thus any traveller desirous to complain of a cabman,
or who may have left any property in a carriage from Euston Station,
has only to state on what day and by what train he arrived, also
whither he was conveyed, and from these data the driver’s name can at
any lapse of time be readily ascertained.
But our attention is suddenly claimed by something of infinitely more
importance than a passenger’s luggage: for that low unearthly whine
within the small signal-office behind the line of cabs and carriages
requires immediate explanation.
The variety of unforeseen accidents that might occur by the unwelcome
arrival of an unexpected or even of an expected passenger-train at
the great terminus of the London and North-Western Railway are so
obvious that it has been deemed necessary to take the following
precautions.
As soon as the reeking engine-funnel of an up-train is seen darting
out of the tunnel at Primrose Hill, one of the Company’s servants
stationed there, who deals solely in compressed air--or rather, who
has an hydraulic machine for condensing it--allows a portion to rush
through an inch iron pipe; and he thus instantaneously produces in
the little signal-office on the up-platform of Euston Station, where
there is always a signal-man watching by night as well as by day,
that loud melancholy whine which has just arrested our attention, and
which will continue to moan uninterruptedly for five minutes:--
“Hic vasto rex Æolus antro
Luctantes ventos tempestatesque sonoras
Imperio premit, ac vinclis et carcere frenat.
Illi indignantes magno cum murmure fremunt.”
The moment this doleful intimation arrives, the signal-man, emerging
from his little office, touches the trigger of a bell outside his
door, which immediately in two loud hurried notes announces to all
whom it may concern the arrival at Camden Station of the expected
up-train; and at this moment it is interesting to watch the poor
cab-horses, who, by various small muscular movements, which any one
acquainted with horses can readily interpret, clearly indicate that
they are perfectly sensible of what has just occurred, and quite as
clearly foresee what will very shortly happen to them.
As soon as the green signal-man has created this sensation among
bipeds and quadrupeds, taking with him the three flags, of danger
(red), caution (green), and security (white), he proceeds down
the line a few yards to a point from which he can plainly see his
brother signal-man stationed at the mouth of the Euston tunnel. If
any obstruction exists in that direction, the waving of the red
flag informs him of it; and it is not until the white one from the
tunnel as well as that from the station-master on the platform have
reported to him that “all is clear” that he returns to his important
but humble office (12 feet in length by 9 in breadth) to announce,
by means of his compressed-air apparatus, this intelligence to the
ticket-collector at Camden Station, whose strict orders are, on no
account whatever to allow a train to leave his platform until he has
received through the air-pipes, from the signal-office at Euston
Station, the Company’s lugubrious authority to do so.
In the latter office there are also the dial and wires of an
electric telegraph, at present inoperative. The signal-man, however,
mentioned to us the following trifling anecdote, as illustrative
of the practical utility of that wonderful invention, which has
so justly immortalized the names of Cooke and Wheatstone. An
old general officer, who, from his residence some miles beyond
Manchester, had come up to Euston Station on an invitation from the
East-India Directors to be present at the dinner to be given by them
to Lord Hardinge, found on his arrival that it would be necessary
he should appear in regimentals: and the veteran, nothing daunted,
was proposing to return to Manchester, when the signal-man at
Euston advised him to apply for them by electric telegraph. He did
so. The application, at the ordinary rate of 280,000 miles (about
twelve times the circumference of the earth) _per second_, flew to
Manchester; in obedience to its commands a porter was instantly
despatched into the country for the clothes, which, being forwarded
by the express train, arrived in abundant time for the dinner. The
charge for telegraph and porter was 13_s._ 8_d._
About four minutes after the up-train has been authorised by the
air-pipe to leave Camden Station, the guard who stands listening
for it at the Euston tunnel, just as a deaf man puts his ear to a
trumpet, announces by his flag its immediate approach; on which the
signal-man at the little office on Euston platform again touches
his trigger, which violently convulsing his bell as before, the
cab-horses begin to move their feet, raise their jaded heads,
prick up their ears, and champ their bits; the servants in livery
turn their powdered heads round; the Company’s porters, emerging
from various points, quickly advance to their respective stations;
and this suspense continues until in a second or two there is
seen darting out of the tunnel, like a serpent from its hole, the
long dark-coloured dusty train, which, by a tortuous movement, is
apparently advancing at its full speed. But the bank-riders, by
applying their breaks--without which the engineless train merely by
its own gravity would have descended the incline from Camden Station
at the rate of forty miles an hour--soon slacken its speed, until the
Company’s porters at a brisk walk are preparing to unfasten one after
another the doors of all the carriages.
While they are performing this popular duty, numerous salutations,
and kissings of hands of all colours and sizes, are seen to pass
between several of the inmates of the passing train and those seated
in or on the motley line of conveyances standing stock still which
have been awaiting their arrival. A wife suddenly recognises her
husband, a mother her four children, a sister her two dear brothers;
Lord A. B. politely bows to Lady C. D.; John, from his remote
coach-box, grins with honest joy as faithful Susan glides by; while
Sally bashfully smiles at “a gentleman” in plush breeches reclining
in the rumble of the barouche behind it.
As soon as the train stops, a general “sauve qui peut” movement takes
place, and our readers have now an opportunity of observing that,
just as it is hard to _make_ money, easy to spend it, so, although
it consumes at least twenty minutes to fill and despatch a long
train, it scarcely requires as many seconds to empty one. Indeed, in
less than that short space of time the greater number of the railway
carriages are often empty!
When every person has succeeded in liberating himself or herself from
the train, it is amusing to observe how cleverly, from long practice,
the Company’s porters understood the apparent confusion which exists.
To people wishing to embrace their friends--to gentlemen and servants
darting in various directions straight across the platform to secure
a cab or in search of private carriages--they offer no assistance
whatever, well knowing that none is required. But to every passenger
whom they perceive to be either restlessly moving backwards and
forwards, or standing still, looking upwards in despair, they civilly
say “_This way, Sir!_” “_Here it is, Ma’am!_”--and thus, knowing
what they want before they ask, they conduct them either to the
particular carriage on whose roof their baggage has been placed, or
to the luggage-van in front of the train, from which it has already
been unloaded on to the platform; and thus, in a very few minutes
after the convulsive shaking of hands and the feverish distribution
of baggage have subdivided, all the cabs and carriages have radiated
away--the parti-coloured omnibuses have followed them--even the
horses, which in different clothing have been disembarked, have
been led or ridden away--and, the foot-passengers having also
disappeared, the long platform of the incoming train of the Euston
Station remains once more solely occupied by one or two servants of
the Company, hemmed in by a new line of expectant cabs and omnibuses.
Indeed, at various periods of the day, a very few minutes only
elapse before, at the instigation of compressed air, the faithful
signal-bell is again heard hysterically announcing the arrival of
another train at Camden Station.
In a clear winter’s night the arrival of an up-train at the platform
before us forms a very interesting picture.
No sound is heard in the cold air but the hissing of a pilot engine,
which, like a restless spirit advancing and retrograding, is
stealing along the intermediate rails, waiting to carry off the next
down-train; its course being marked by white steam meandering above
it and by red-hot coals of different sizes which are continually
falling from beneath it. In this obscure scene the Company’s
interminable lines of gaslights (there are 232 at the Euston
Station), economically screwed down to the minimum of existence,
are feebly illuminating the damp varnished panels of the line of
carriages in waiting, the brass doorhandles of the cabs, the shining
haims, brass browbands and other ornaments on the drooping heads and
motionless backs of the cab-horses; and while the blood-red signal
lamp is glaring near the tunnel to deter unauthorised intrusion, the
stars of heaven cast a faint silvery light through the long strips of
plate-glass in the roof above the platform. On a sudden is heard--the
stranger hardly knows whence--the mysterious moan of compressed
air, followed by the violent ringing of a bell. That instant every
gaslight on and above a curve of 900 feet suddenly bursts into full
power. The carriages, cabs, &c. appear, comparatively speaking, in
broad daylight, and the beautiful iron reticulation which sustains
the glazed roof appears like fairy work.