THE MONT CENIS—THE FELL RAILWAY
Guide-books say that the pass of the Mont Cenis is dull. It is long,
certainly, but it has a fair proportion of picturesque points, and it
is not easy to see how it can be dull to those who have eyes. In the
days when it was a rude mountain track, crossed by trains of mules, and
when it was better known to smugglers than to tourists, it may have
been dull; but when Napoleon’s road changed the rough path into one of
the finest highways in Europe, mounting in grand curves and by uniform
grades, and rendered the trot possible throughout its entire distance,
the Mont Cenis became one of the most interesting passes in the Alps.
The diligence service which was established was excellent, and there
was little or nothing to be gained by traveling in a more expensive
manner. The horses were changed as rapidly as on the best lines in the
best period of coaching in England, and the diligences themselves were
as comfortable as a “milord” could desire. The most exciting portion of
the route was undoubtedly that between Lanslebourg and Susa. When the
zigzags began teams of mules were hooked on, and the driver and his
helpers marched by their side with long whips, which they handled
skillfully. Passengers dismounted and stretched their legs by cutting
the curves. The pace was slow but steady, and scarcely a halt was made
during the rise of two thousand feet. Crack! crack! went the whips as
the corners of the zigzags were turned. Great commotion among the
mules! They scrambled and went round with a rush, tossing their heads
and making music with their bells. The summit was gained, the mules
were detached and trotted back merrily, while we, with fresh horses,
were dragged at the gallop over the plain to the other side. The little
postilion seated on the leader smacked his whip lustily as he swept
round the corners cut through the rock, and threw his head back as the
echoes returned, expectant of smiles and of future centimes.
[Illustration]
The air was keen and often chilly, but the summit was soon passed, and
one quickly descended to warmth again. Once more there was a change.
The horses, reduced in number to three, or perhaps two, were the
sturdiest and most sure of foot, and they raced down with the precision
of old stagers. Woe to the diligence if they stumbled! So thought the
conductor, who screwed down the brakes as the corners were approached.
The horses, held well in hand, leant inward as the top-heavy vehicle,
so suddenly checked, heeled almost over; but in another moment the
brake was released, and again they swept down, urged onward by the
whip, “hoi” and “ha” of the driver.
All this is changed. The Victor Emmanuel railway superseded a
considerable portion of Napoleon’s road, and the “Fell” railway the
rest, while the great tunnel of the Alps will soon bring about another
change.
The Fell railway, which has been open about eighteen months, is a line
that well deserves attention. Thirty-eight years ago, Mr. Charles
Vignolles, the eminent engineer, and Mr. Ericsson, patented the idea
which is now an accomplished fact on the Mont Cenis. Nothing was done
with it until Mr. Fell, the projector of the railway which bears his
name, took it up, and to him much credit is due for bringing an
admirable principle into operation.
The Fell railway follows the great Cenis road very closely, and
diverges from it only to avoid villages or houses, or, as at the summit
of the pass on the Italian side, to ease the gradients. The line runs
from St. Michel to Susa. The distance between these two places is, as
the crow flies, almost exactly equivalent to the distance from London
to Chatham (30 miles), but by reason of the numerous curves and detours
the length of the line is nearly brought up to the distance of London
from Brighton (47 miles). From St. Michel to the summit of the pass it
rises 4460 feet, or 900 feet more than the highest point of Snowdon is
above the level of the sea; and from the summit of the pass to Susa, a
distance less than that from London to Kew, it descends no less than
5211 feet!
The railway itself is a marvel. For fifteen miles and three-quarters it
has steeper gradients than one in fifteen. In some places it is one in
twelve and a half! A straight piece of railway constructed on such a
gradient seems to go up a steep hill. One in eighty, or even one in a
hundred, produces a very sensible diminution in the pace of a light
train drawn by an ordinary locomotive: how, then, is a train to be
taken up an incline that is six times as steep? It is accomplished by
means of a third rail placed midway between the two ordinary ones, and
elevated above them.[2] The engines are provided with two pairs of
horizontal driving-wheels, as well as with the ordinary coupled
vertical ones, and the power of the machine is thus enormously
increased, the horizontal wheels gripping the centre rail with great
tenacity by being brought together, and being almost incapable of
slipping like the ordinary wheels when on even a moderate gradient.
[2] This third rail, or, as it is termed, “the centre rail,” is laid
on all the steep portions of the line, and round all except the
mildest curves. Thirty miles, in all, of the road have the centre
rail.
[Illustration: THE CENTRE RAIL ON A CURVE]
The third rail is the ordinary double-headed rail, and is laid
horizontally: it is bolted down to wrought-iron chairs three feet
apart, which are fixed by common coach-screws to a longitudinal sleeper
laid upon the usual transverse ones: the sleepers are attached to each
other by fang-bolts. The dimensions of the different parts will be seen
by reference to the annexed cross section:
[Illustration]
Let us now take a run on the railway, starting from St. Michel. For
some distance from that place the gradients are not of an extraordinary
character, and a good pace is maintained. The first severe piece is
about two miles up, where there is an incline of one in eighteen for
more than half a mile; that is to say, the line rises at one step one
hundred and sixty-four feet. From thence to Modane the gradients are
again moderate (for the Fell railway), and the distance—about ten miles
and a half from St. Michel—is accomplished without difficulty in an
hour. Modane station is 1128 feet above St. Michel, so that on this
_easy_ portion of the line there is an average rise of 110 feet per
mile, which is equal to a gradient of one in forty-eight—an inclination
sufficiently steep to bring an ordinary locomotive very nearly to a
halt.
Just after passing Modane station there is one of the steepest inclines
on the line, and it seems preposterous to suppose that any train could
ascend it. A stoppage of ten minutes is made at Modane, and on leaving
that station the train goes off at the hill with a rush. In a few yards
its pace is reduced, and it comes down and down to about four miles an
hour, which speed is usually maintained until the incline is passed,
without a diminution of the steam-pressure. I say usually, because, if
it should happen that there is not sufficient steam, or should the
driver happen to make a slip, the train would most likely come back to
Modane; for, although the brake-power on the train is much more than
sufficient to prevent it running back, the driver could hardly start
with the brakes on, and the train would inevitably run back if they
were off.
After this incline is passed, the line mounts by comparatively easy
gradients toward Fort Lesseillon: it is then at a great height above
the Arc, and as one winds round the faces of the cliff out of which the
Napoleon road was cut, looking down upon the foaming stream below,
without a suspicion of a parapet between the railway and the edge of
the precipice, one naturally thinks about what would happen if the
engine should leave the rails. The speed, however, that is kept up at
this part is very gentle, and there is probably much less risk of an
accident than there was in the days of diligences.
The next remarkable point on this line is at Termignon. The valley
turns somewhat abruptly to the east, and the course of the railway is
not at first perceived. It makes a great bend to the left, then doubles
back, and rises in a little more than a mile no less than three hundred
and thirty-four feet. This is, perhaps, the most striking piece of the
whole line.
Lanslebourg station, 25½ miles from, and 2220 feet above, St. Michel,
is arrived at in two hours and a quarter from the latter place. The
engines are now changed. Thus far we have been traversing the easy
portion of the route, but here the heavy section begins. From
Lanslebourg the line rises continuously to the summit of the Mont Cenis
pass, and accomplishes an ascent of 2240 feet in six miles and a third
of distance.
It is curious and interesting to watch the ascent of the trains from
Lanslebourg. The puffs of steam are seen rising above the trees,
sometimes going in one direction, and sometimes directly the contrary,
occasionally concealed by the covered ways—for over two miles out of
the six the line is enclosed by planked sides and a corrugated iron
roof, to keep out the snow—and then coming out again into daylight. A
halt for water has to be made about halfway up; but the engines are
able to start again, and to resume their rate of seven miles an hour,
although the gradient is no less than one in fourteen and a half.
The zigzags of the old Cenis road are well known as one of the most
remarkable pieces of road-engineering in the Alps. The railway follows
them, and runs parallel to the road on the outside throughout its
entire distance, with the exception of the turns at the corners, where
it is carried a little farther out, to render the curves less sharp.
Nevertheless, they are sufficiently sharp (135 feet radius), and would
be impracticable without the centre rail.
The run across the top of the pass, from the Summit station to the
Grande Croix station—a distance of about five miles—is soon
accomplished, and then the tremendous descent to Susa is commenced.
This, as seen from the engine, is little less than terrific. A large
part of this section is covered in, and the curves succeed one another
in a manner unknown on any other line. From the outside the line looks
more like a monstrous serpent than a railway. Inside, one can see but a
few yards ahead, the curves are so sharp, and the rails are nearly
invisible. The engine vibrates, oscillates and bounds: it is a matter
of difficulty to hold on. Then, on emerging into the open air, one
looks down some three or four thousand feet of precipice and steep
mountain-side. The next moment the engine turns suddenly to the left,
and driver and stoker have to grip firmly to avoid being left behind;
the next, it turns as suddenly to the right; the next, there is an
accession or diminution of speed from a change in the gradient. An
ordinary engine, moving at fifty miles an hour, with a train behind it,
is not usually very steady, but its motion is a trifle compared with
that of a Fell engine when running down hill.
[Illustration: THE COVERED WAYS ON THE “FELL” RAILWAY (ITALIAN SIDE OF
THE MONT CENIS)]
It may be supposed from this that traveling over the Fell railway is
disagreeable rather than pleasant. It is not so: the train is steady
enough, and the carriages have remarkably little motion. Outside, they
resemble the cars on the Swiss and American lines: they are entered at
the end, and the seats are arranged omnibus-fashion, down the length of
the carriage. Each carriage has a guard and two brakes—an ordinary one
and a centre-rail brake: the handles of these come close together at
the platform on one end, and are easily worked by one man. The
steadiness of the train is chiefly due to these centre-rail brakes. The
flat face A and the corresppnding one on the opposite side are brought
together against the two sides of the centre rail by the shaft B being
turned, and they hold it as in a vice. This greatly diminishes the
up-and-down motion, and renders oscillation almost impossible. The
steadiness of the train is still further maintained by pairs of flanged
guide-wheels under each of the carriages, which, on a straight piece of
line, barely touch the centre rail, but press upon it directly there is
the least deviation toward either side.[3] There is no occasion to use
the other brakes when the centre-rail brakes are on: the wheels of the
carriages are not stopped, but revolve freely, and consequently do not
suffer the deterioration which would otherwise result.
[3] The carriages are not coupled in the ordinary way, and although
there are no buffers, properly speaking, and in spite the speed of the
train being changed incessantly, there is a freedom from the jarring
which is so common on other lines. The reason is simply that the
carriages are coupled up tightly.
[Illustration: THE MONT CENIS ROAD AND THE FELL RAILWAY NEAR THE SUMMIT
OF THE PASS, ON THE ITALIAN SIDE.]
The steam is shut off and the brakes are applied a very few minutes
after beginning the descent to Susa. The train might then run down for
the entire distance by its own weight. In practice, it is difficult to
apply the proper amount of retardation: the brakes have frequently to
be whistled off, and sometimes it is necessary to steam down against
them. Theoretically, this ought not of course to occur: it only happens
occasionally, and ordinarily the train goes down with the steam shut
off, and with the centre-rail brakes screwed up moderately. When an
average train—that is, two or three carriages and a luggage-van—is
running down at the maximum speed allowed (fifteen miles an hour), the
brakes can pull it up dead within seventy yards. The pace is properly
kept down to a low point in descending, and doing so, combined with the
knowledge that the brake-power can easily lessen it, will tend to make
the public look favorably on what might otherwise be considered a
dangerous innovation. The engines also are provided with the
centre-rail brake, on a pattern somewhat different from those on the
carriages, and the flat sides which press against the rails are renewed
_every journey._ It is highly desirable that they should be, for a
single run from Lanslebourg to Susa grinds a groove into them about
three-eighths of an inch in depth.
[Illustration: CENTRE RAIL BRAKE]
Driving the trains over the summit section requires the most constant
attention and no small amount of nerve, and the drivers, who are all
English, have well earned their money at the end of their run. Their
opinion of the line was concisely and forcibly expressed to me by one
of them in last August: “Yes, mister, they told us as how the line was
very steep, but they didn’t say that the engine would be on one curve,
when the fourgon was on another, and the carriages was on a third. Them
gradients, too, mister, they says they are one in twelve, but I think
they are one in _ten, at the least_, and they didn’t say as how we was
to come down them in that snakewise fashion. It’s worse than the G. I.
P.[4], mister: there a fellow could jump off, but here, in them covered
ways, there ain’t no place to jump to.”
[4] The Great Indian Peninsula Railway, the line with the celebrated
Bhore Ghaut incline, sixteen miles long, on an average gradient of one
in forty-eight, which is said to have cost £800,000, or about double
the entire cost of the Mount Cenis Railway, and six times its cost
mile for mile. The Fell Railway cost £8000 per mile.
[Illustration: THE MATTERHORN FROM NEAR THE SUMMIT OF THE THEODULE
PASS.]