extensive series of experiments to be performed in their presence upon
a portion of the Midland Company's system near Newark, in order to test
the various methods which have been invented for applying continuous
brake-power to trains. Before, however, the trials of the various
continuous 'brakes' were made, trials of the amount of brake-power
_usually_ supplied to the trains of some of the chief railway companies
in Great Britain were made. From these experiments it appeared that
with the amount of hand brake-power usually supplied, a train going
at between forty-five and fifty miles an hour could not as a rule
be brought to a full stop in much less than half a mile. During the
trials at Newark, the merits of eight different kinds of 'continuous
brakes' were tried; and 'amply proved the necessity for some greater
control over fast passenger-trains than that hitherto provided in this
country.' Speaking approximately indeed, it was shewn conclusively at
these trials that a good continuous brake will reduce the stopping
distances of fast trains to one-third of the distance within which they
can be stopped by the present ordinary means. With regard to the effect
upon passengers of any sudden stoppages by means of these continuous
brakes, it is satisfactory to know that 'by none of the systems used in
the trials could the brakes be applied too powerfully or too suddenly
for the safety of the passengers.'
As the result of these Newark trials, the Royal Commissioners recommend
that it should be made obligatory upon railway companies to provide
every train with sufficient brake-power to bring it, at the highest
speed at which it may be travelling and upon any gradients, to an
absolute stop within five hundred yards. They also advise that a
large proportion of the brake-power should be in the hands of the
engine-driver. He is usually the man who first espies danger; and as
when a train is travelling at the rate of sixty miles an hour, it
passes over eighty-eight feet per second, it will easily be seen, that
however slight may be the interval necessary for the driver to attract
the attention of the guard, and for that official to apply his brakes,
it may be sufficiently long to cause a serious accident.
Every newspaper reader must have remarked the frequent accidents
which occur through passengers (whilst entering or leaving railway
carriages) falling between the steps and the platform. This being so,
it is satisfactory to remark that the Royal Commissioners have resolved
to recommend that the adoption by railway companies of continuous
foot-boards of sufficient width should be made compulsory wherever, in
the opinion of the officials of the Board of Trade, 'the circumstances
of the traffic are such as to render them necessary for the safety of
passengers.'
As regards the important subject of the compensation which the
railway companies are at present obliged to make whenever a passenger
is--through no fault of his own--killed or injured whilst travelling
upon their lines, the Royal Commissioners have not thought it necessary
to make any special recommendations. They appear indeed to think that
the principle of self-interest will be sufficient to make the companies
introduce all reasonable improvements and take all possible means to
secure the safety of their passengers. Mr Galt, however, one of the
Royal Commissioners, dissents from this view of his colleagues, and
we think with reason. He asks in connection with this subject the
following very pertinent question: 'Does the sum paid in compensation
by the companies exceed the expenditure that would necessarily be
incurred for the avoidance of preventable accidents?' This question Mr
Galt proceeds to regard from two points of view. First, the effect of
accidents on the market value of railway shares; and second, the cost
which the companies would have to incur in order to introduce various
well-known means for the prevention of accidents, which have often been
pressed upon their attention by Captain Tyler and other officials of
the Board of Trade. The effect of an accident upon the market value of
railway shares, even when it is one of exceptional severity, Mr Galt
shews is only temporarily and never permanently to lower the value
of the shares in the particular railway company upon whose system it
occurred. The first cost, moreover, of introducing improvements upon
their lines, Mr Galt points out, is felt very severely by railway
companies; whereas the compensation which they pay for personal
injuries does not at present amount to one per cent. of their total
expenditure. Mr Galt indeed asserts that the saving which the companies
would effect by the use of every available means for the prevention of
accidents would 'scarcely amount to a shilling in the hundred pounds.'
Hence he arrives at the very disagreeable conclusion, that so far as
the _pecuniary_ principle--apart from all higher considerations--is
concerned, the railway companies' interests and those of the general
public are diametrically opposed to each other!
We shall conclude this article by giving a brief epitome of the
principal points upon which the Royal Commissioners have made formal
'recommendations' either for the consideration of parliament or of the
railway companies. 1. They have recommended that discretionary powers
should be conferred upon the Board of Trade to enforce the extension
of stations and sidings wherever the accommodation provided for the
traffic is so inadequate as to endanger safety. 2. To enforce the
adoption of the block and interlocking systems on all lines or portions
of lines where the introduction of these improvements is necessary for
the safety of the traffic. 3. To restrict the speed of trains upon any
line or section of a line which is in a condition to render a high rate
of speed unsafe. 4. To require companies to provide their passenger
carriages with continuous foot-boards. 5. To impose conditions upon
companies in certain cases in sanctioning the opening of new lines. 6.
To require companies to provide foot-bridges or subways at stations
where the absence of such accommodation is proved to be a source of
danger. 7. To require a lodge to be maintained at public crossings for
foot-passengers wherever circumstances render it necessary for safety.
8. That railway companies shall be required by law, under adequate
penalties, to supply all trains with sufficient brake-power to stop
them within five hundred yards under all circumstances. 9. That in
order to produce greater punctuality in the conduct of the traffic on
railways, additional facilities be afforded to the public for obtaining
compensation when trains are late. 10. That the 31st and 32d Vict. c.
119, s. 22, relating to intercommunication in trains, be amended in the
manner which we have indicated above. 11. That the civil liability of
railway companies for accidents to their servants, and of the criminal
liability of persons in railway employment for acts of negligence
endangering life, be extended.
Some at least of these proposals of the Royal Commissioners will
doubtless be adopted by Her Majesty's government, and will be proposed
to parliament, with all the weight of their authority, during the next
(1878) session of parliament. That the government measure which will
embody these 'selected' recommendations of the Royal Commissioners will
satisfy all parties--directors of railways, railway servants, and the
general public alike--would of course be too much to hope. But this may
at least be confidently predicted--that if the chief recommendations
of the Royal Commissioners be adopted by parliament, and be loyally
carried out in practice by the railway companies, they will tend in no
inconsiderable degree to render railway travelling in Great Britain in
the future both much safer and much pleasanter than it has been in the
past.
DROLLERIES OF THE AMERICAN BENCH.
Droll things are reported of the bench and bar in the United States.
Perhaps all that is said of them in the newspapers may have a tinge
of exaggeration; but we do not doubt that there is a considerable
substructure of truth. What, indeed, but odd sayings and doings can be
expected from judges who are appointed by universal suffrage, and may
in many cases be little better than the boon-companions of the culprits
who are apt to come judicially before them. We cull a few drolleries of
the American bench for the amusement of our readers.
Wearied beyond endurance by the tediousness of a long-winded pleader,
a Kentuckian judge put himself out of his misery and his tormentor out
of countenance by suddenly exclaiming: 'If the court is right, and she
thinks she air, why then you are wrong, and she knows you is. Shut
up!' Almost as rude in speech was Judge Dowling, who after serving as
fireman and police-officer, became by election one of the magistrates
of the Empire City. 'What are you reading from, sir?' asked he of a
counsel.
'From the statute of 1876, your Honour,' was the reply.
'Well,' said Dowling, 'you needn't read any more; I'm judge in this
court, and my statutes are good enough law for anybody!'
This worshipful gentleman plumed himself upon deciding 'according
to the equities of the case,' law and precedent to the contrary
notwithstanding; they went for nothing with him.
They did not go for much more with the western administrator of the
law, Judge Alec Smith. A divorce case being called on, he, addressing
the plaintiff's representative, said: 'I don't think people ought to be
compelled to live together when they don't want to do so. I will decree
a divorce in this case;' and the parties concerned were thereupon
declared to be no longer man and wife. Presently the defendant's lawyer
appeared, and was not a little surprised to find all was settled,
that the judge had decided without hearing one side, much less both.
He protested against such over-hasty proceedings, and appealed to
the court to redress the wrong it had committed. The court not being
inclined to own itself in fault, he was informed it was too late to
raise objections; the decree had been pronounced; but if he wanted to
argue the case 'right bad,' the court would marry the parties again,
and let him have a crack for it.
When Miss Amelia Donnerschley claimed two hundred dollars from
faithless Augustus Berker for breach of promise, the gentleman
justified his conduct on the plea that after dwelling under the same
roof with the young lady and her mamma for eight months, he found it
so impossible to live comfortably with the one, that he was compelled
to cry off with the other. The judge inquired if the mother purposed
living with her daughter after marriage, and receiving an affirmative
answer, asked the defendant whether he would rather live with his
mother-in-law or pay two hundred dollars.
'Pay two hundred dollars,' was the prompt reply.
Said the judge: 'Young man, let me shake hands with you. There was a
time in my life when I was in the same situation as you are in now. Had
I possessed your firmness, I should have been spared twenty-five years
of trouble. I had the alternative of marrying or paying a hundred and
twenty-five dollars. Being poor, I married; and for twenty-five years
have I regretted it. I am happy to meet with a man of your stamp. The
plaintiff must pay ten dollars and costs for having thought of putting
a gentleman under the dominion of a mother-in-law.'
The much-married dignitary was not so susceptible to the charms of the
sex as his brother of Iowa, who refused to fine a man for kissing a
girl against her will, because the complainant was so temptingly pretty
that nothing but an overwhelming sense of its dignity prevented the
court kissing her itself.
It is lucky for an offender when his judge puts himself in his place;
justice is sure then to be tempered with mercy, as in the case of the
snatcher of spoons brought before a Georgian court many years ago. Bela
Brown, who then went the circuit as judge, was an able man, in equal
repute as a lawyer and as a boon-companion. The night before the court
was to open at Dayton, his Honour went to a tavern kept by Sterrit,
and had such a good time of it with his legal friends that by midnight
he was not quite so sober as a judge should be. Somebody cleared the
table of all its spoons, and put them into the unconscious gentleman's
pocket. He was greatly perturbed at finding them there next morning.
They were Sterrit's spoons without doubt, for they bore the landlord's
initials.
'Polly,' said the judge to his wife, 'was I tipsy when I came home?'
'Yes,' said she. 'You know your habits when you get among those
lawyers.'
Much relieved in his mind, the judge declared he could understand how
the spoons came into his possession. 'That fellow keeps the meanest
liquor in the States; but I never supposed it would make a man steal.'
A day or two afterwards, a man was arraigned for larceny; he pleaded
guilty, but urged he was intoxicated when he committed the offence.
'What's the nature of the charge?' inquired Judge Brown.
'Stealing money from the till at Sterrit's tavern,' replied the clerk.
'Young man,' said the judge solemnly, 'are you sure you were tipsy when
you took this money?'
'Yes, your Honour; when I went outdoors the ground kept coming up and
hitting me on the head.'
'That will do. Did you get all your liquor at Sterrit's?'
'Every drop, sir.'
Turning to the prosecuting attorney, the judge said: 'You will do me
the favour of entering a _nolle prosequi_; that liquor of Sterrit's
I have reason to know is enough to make a man do anything dirty. I
got tipsy on it myself the other night, and stole all his spoons.
If Sterrit will sell such abominable stuff he ought not to have the
protection of this court.--Mr Sheriff, you may release the prisoner.'
Like the sailor who objected to his captain preaching and flogging too,
offenders generally do not appreciate being suitably admonished as well
as punished; and no doubt the Californian felt annoyed when, through
incautiously demurring to the magistrate reproaching him with having
no ambition, he found himself put to the question with: 'Where is it,
sir? Where is it? Did you ever hear of Cicero taking free lunches? Did
you ever hear that Plato gamboled through the alleys of Athens? Did you
ever hear Demosthenes accused of sleeping under a coal-shed? If you
would be a Plato, there would be a fire in your eye; your hair would
have an intellectual cut; you'd step into a clean shirt; and you'd hire
a mowing-machine to pare those finger-nails. You have got to go up for
four months!'
The Honourable Kiah Rodgers, commonly called Old Kye, presiding in a
Louisiana court, thus spoke his mind to a delinquent named Kettles:
'Prisoner, stand up! Mr Kettles, this court is under the painful
necessity of passing sentence of the law upon you. This court has no
doubt, Mr Kettles, but what you were brought into this scrape by the
use of intoxicating liquors. The friends of this court all know that
if there is any vice this court abhors it is intoxication. When this
court was a young man, Mr Kettles, it was considerably inclined to
drink, and the friends of this court know that this court has naterally
a very high temper; and if this court had not stopped short off, I
have no doubt, sir, but what this court, sir, would have been in the
Penitentiary or in its grave.'
Still more communicative was Judge Kye respecting his young days when
summing up in an action brought by an overseer for wrongful dismissal
from his situation.
'The jury,' said his Honour, 'will take notice that this court is well
acquainted with the nature of the case. When this court first started
in the world it followed the business of overseering, and if there
is any business which this court understands, it's hosses, mules,
and niggers; though this court never overseed in its life for less
than eight hundred dollars. And this court in hoss-racing was always
naterally gifted; and this court in running a quarter race whar the
hosses was turned, could allers turn a hoss so as to gain fifteen feet
in a race; and on a certain occasion it was one of the conditions of
the race that Kye Rodgers shouldn't turn narry of the hosses.' Surely
it must have been Old Kye who upon taking his official seat for the
first time, said: 'If this court know her duty, and she thinks she do,
Justice will walk over this track with her head and tail up.'
Prone as he might be to discursiveness, we fancy the Louisiana judge
would have laid down the law a little more lucidly than the worthy to
whom a Minnesota juryman appealed for aid, when his ideas as to what
constituted murder had been confused by the arguments of counsel.
'Gentlemen of the jury,' said this legal luminary, 'murder is where a
man is murderously killed. The killer in such a case is a murderer. Now
murder by poison is just as much murder as murder with a gun, pistol,
or knife. It is the simple act of murdering that constitutes murder
in the eye of the law. Don't let the ideas of murder and manslaughter
confound you. Murder is one thing, manslaughter is quite another.
Consequently, if there has been a murder, and it is not manslaughter,
then it must be murder. Don't let this point escape you. Self-murder
has nothing to do with this case. According to Blackstone and all the
best living writers, one man cannot commit _felo de se_ upon another;
and that is clearly my view. Gentlemen, murder is murder. The murder
of a brother is called fratricide; the murder of a father is called
parricide, but that don't enter into this case. This case is murder,
and as I said before, murder is most emphatically murder. You will take
the case, gentlemen, and make up your minds according to the law and
the evidence, not forgetting the explanation I have given you.'
When an English judge has passed sentence upon a criminal, he has done
with him. It would never enter his head to visit a man he had condemned
to death. Judge Smith of Cincinnati had different notions of judicial
etiquette. One Samuel Covert, about to be executed at Lebanon, had just
taken his last meal, when the judge looked in, inquired how he felt,
and asked for his autograph. Having obtained the autograph, and learned
that Covert was pretty well, considering circumstances, the judge shook
his hand warmly, saying: 'Good-bye, Mr Covert; I shall not see you
again.'
'Good-bye, Mr Smith,' was the reply. 'Remember my last words to you:
you have passed sentence of death upon an innocent man.'
'That is so, is it, Sam?' queried the visitor.
'Yes, sir.'
'If that be true, you've nothing against me; have you, Sam?'
'No, sir; you did your duty under the evidence.'
'Well, Sam, if you are an innocent man, it is a great calamity.'
'I am innocent,' repeated Covert.
The judge then departed, and Covert was marched to the scaffold.
Judge Smith hardly felt so easy in his mind as a Californian sheriff
did after being interviewed by a self-confessed murderer, who desired
to be sent to New York to answer for the crime he had committed in that
city.
'So your conscience ain't easy, and you want to be hanged?' said the
sheriff. 'Well, my friend, the county treasury ain't well fixed at
present, and I don't want to take any risks, in case you're not the
man, and are just fishing for a free ride. Besides, those New York
courts can't be trusted to hang a man. As you say, you deserve to be
killed, and your conscience won't be easy till you are killed, and
as it can't make any difference to you or to society _how_ you are
killed, I guess I'll do the job myself!' and his hand moved to his
pocket; but before he could pull out the revolver and level it at the
murderer, that conscience-stricken individual was down the road and out
of killing distance.
When lawyers behave in such a free-and-easy way, it is not surprising
that a prisoner presumes to enter into familiar conversation with
the bench. 'An old tippler,' asked by a Nevadan court whether he was
rightly or wrongly charged with being intoxicated, pleaded, 'Not
guilty, your Honour. Sunstroke!'
'Sunstroke?' queried Judge Cox.
'Yes, sir; the regular New York variety.'
'You've had sunstroke a good deal in your time, I believe?'
'Yes, your Honour; but this last attack was most severe.'
'Does sunstroke make you rush through the streets offering to fight the
town?'
'That's the effect precisely.'
'And makes you throw brickbats at people?'
'That's it, judge. I see you understand the symptoms; and agree with
the best recognised authorities, who hold it inflames the organs of
combativeness and destructiveness. When a man of my temperament gets a
good square sunstroke he's liable to do almost anything.'
'Yes; you are quite right--liable to go to jail for fifteen days.
You'll go down with the policeman at once.' With that observation the
conversation naturally closed, and the victim of so-called sunstroke
'went down.'
The bench does not always come off so victoriously. A prisoner before
the court of Keatingville, Montana, neglecting to remove his hat, the
sheriff was directed to do it for him, and obeyed instructions by
knocking the offending head-gear off with his rifle. The owner picked
it up, and as he clapped it on his head again shouted: 'I am bald,
judge!' A repetition of the performance followed; at which, waxing
indignant, his Honour rose and said: 'I fine you five dollars for
contempt of court--to be committed until the fine is paid!'
The offender walked up to the judge, and laying down half a dollar,
remarked: 'Your sentence, judge, is most ungentlemanly; but the law is
imperative, and I will have to stand it; so here is half a dollar; and
the four dollars and a half you owed me when we stopped playing poker
this morning, makes us square!'
The card-playing administrator of justice must have felt as small
as his brother-judge when he priced the cow. Being at Little Rock,
Arkansas, on business, that judge strolled into the market, and seeing
a farmer with a cow, stepped up to him and asked what he wanted for
her. 'Thirty dollars,' said the farmer. 'She'll give you five quarts of
milk if you feed her well.'
'Why,' quoth the judge, 'I have cows on my farm, not much more than
half as big as yours, which give twenty quarts a day.'
The cow-owner eyed his new acquaintance very hard, as if trying to
remember if he had seen him before, and then inquired where he lived.
'My home is in Iowa,' was the reply.
'Yes, stranger,' said the farmer, 'I don't dispute it. There were heaps
of soldiers from Iowa down here during the war, and they were the worst
liars in the whole Yankee army. Maybe you may have been an officer in
some of them regiments?'
Without satisfying his interlocutor's curiosity on that point, the
judge, we are told, 'slid for the court-house.'
THE FAIRIES.
Where are the wonderful elves, and the fairy creatures bright?
Where are the tiny things that danced in the pale moonlight?
Danced in a magic ring, and fluttered in robes of white,
Like motes in the sunbeam whirled, like leaves in the forest hoar.
_Hark to the sound of the sea, and the cry of the waves on the shore._
Where are the dusky gnomes who toiled in the golden ground?
So that the miners trembled hearing their hammers' sound,
Hearing them tapping, tapping, delving in darkness bound,
A thousand tapping hammers, beneath them hammering.
_Hark to the muttered thunder, the voice of the hidden spring._
Where are the forest fairies, the elves in Lincoln green,
Deep in the forest hidden, and never in cities seen,
Sought for by timid maidens, on sainted Hallowe'en,
The joy of all true lovers, a merry band were they!
_Hark to the hum of the bee, in the scented blooms of May._
Where are the household fairies, who loved the embers' glow,
Who played at games with the shadows flickering to and fro,
But left no track on the sanded floor, no trace on the fallen snow,
And filled up the little slippers the children left behind,
_Hark to the howl of the tempest, the moan of the stormy wind._
The elves are waiting, waiting, for the golden days to come,
When grief shall be known no longer, nor faithful love be dumb;
Till the figures all are added up, and finished the mighty sum.
Ah yes, they are waiting, waiting, till grief shall be no more.
_Hark to the rustle of raindrops, that kiss the deserted shore._
* * * * *
The Conductors of CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL beg to direct the attention of
CONTRIBUTORS to the following notice: