PERMANENT WAY.
"Will you listen to me for a few minutes?"
"Yes. I notice you have something pent up in your head."
"Well, this was rather an amusing bit I am going to tell you, but was a
near shave for real squalls, as you will agree when you hear about it.
"I got the guv'nor to let me do a bit of linking in at so much per
chain. Of course, he supplied the rails--they were flange
rails--sleepers and fastenings, and they were all right. I linked in
the road. We had a mixed up permanent way, nine by four and a half
half-rounds, and ten by five rectangular sleepers. Check pattern, an
odd and even road. Between you and me, I think mixing them up betwixt
the joint sleepers is a mistake. It makes the road stiff one place and
loose at another, and a train cannot run steadily, and I would rather
have all rectangulars, and put them wider apart, and give the rail
flange a bit of bearing, for half-rounds are mere sticks, although they
are lighter to handle, and in that respect nicer. You see they have
only about three-fifths of the bulk of rectangulars, and when they are
adzed less than that, and not more than half the bearing for the rail
flange. If I had to do the maintenance, no half-rounds for me, still
they do for light traffic and for cheap agricultural lines."
"I agree, they are temporary goods."
"Well, it was funny, but here we had too much and too little of a good
thing, and were as near in hot squalls as could be. I expect they made
a mistake in loading them; anyhow, young Jack, my ganger, found he had
no half-rounds, but a lot of rectangulars. He is a bit impetuous, and
would not wait, it's not in him, so he put in all rectangulars that
day, and, of course, with the result that they had not enough
rectangulars left for the other road all through, so about six or seven
chains were nearly all half-rounds, and he actually placed one
rectangular one side of a rail joint, and a half-round on its back,
flat end upwards, on the other, and so a lot of the half-rounds did
duty for rectangulars.
"It was a bit of a scurry, and as soon as the road was in the spikers,
ballasters and packers were on us, and no time for thinking. Well,
neither me nor Jack gained much by the fun, except our men would have
been stopped, and they were not, and things would have been put out a
bit for the day. My guv'nor did not know, or would have made us pull it
all up and put it in right. Now, they knew the number of sleepers, &c.,
that had been served out, and had sufficient confidence in me to be
sure I never scamped the materials, except a bit of ballast here and
there, and that is soon made up.
"Of course, there was no mistake six or seven chains of road were weak,
and I told Jack to put in a little extra good ballast and pack the
sleepers well there, and what he did extra at that place was to come
out of the part where all the rectangulars were, for I never throw away
or lose anything on purpose."
"Quite right, we agree. Shake, for I'm hearty to you."
"He understood how I wanted the wind to blow, and it would have gone on
all serene, but you know, just when you think you are out of a scrape,
you sometimes find you are in it, or as near to it as wants 'an old
parliamentary hand' to explain and fog away. I was down at the
junction, when I saw the engineer, and some swells with him. The
resident engineer was away that day. After a bit of jaw among them,
they beckoned to me, and said they wanted to go to the end of the line,
the very place where some of the sleepers were lying turned on their
round faces. There was a bit of luck. I felt dead wrong. However, they
had to walk about a couple of miles, and then wait till the engine had
returned with the empties; so I said to the engineer, 'Please excuse
me, sir, but I will arrange that the engine is at the ballast hole at
four o'clock, as you wish, and I will be back to attend upon you as
quickly as I can.'
"I scampered up the slope of the cutting and out with an envelope. I
always keep one or two about me handy. I tore out a leaf of my
note-book, and called young Snipper, the brake boy, and said to him,
'Jump on old Leather's nag. Take this to young Jack, and I'll make it
all right for you when I see you next time; but go quickly, and give
this letter to no one else but young Jack. If he is away for more than
a few minutes bring the letter back to me. No--wait till he comes up,
and send someone to fetch him to you. You understand.' 'Yes, sir, I
know what you mean.' 'Now do a bit of the Johnny Gilpin business.' Off
he went, and was busy.
"This is what I wrote to young Jack, my ganger:--'Bosses has come, and
will be up to you in about an hour. X.... them. Cover up the ends of
the half-rounds, and sprinkle them pretty with fine ballast if you can
do it in an hour. Then shunt the empties or the full wagons over where
the half-rounds are, and look innocent, as if you had never moved above
a foot all day, and be busy, or I'll pull your throat out, much as I
love you. Smooth it right, and leave rest to me. Pull all your gumption
out ready. Keep this, and hand it back to me. Show no one, or I'll have
you hung. If I find all right, there are two pints, and something
else.' That's what I call a business letter. No double meaning about
it.
"Young Snipper got there in double quick time, and young Jack was there
as well. I saw he had carried out my letter of instructions. Still, I
knew the engineer would be likely to twig, as he was near to being
hawk-eyed. Now, I felt sure they would be hanging about for an hour,
perhaps two, as most of them had never been up there before, and they
thought of carrying the line on further to somewhere or other, but they
did not on account of the expense, for several tunnels, viaducts, high
retaining walls, and other heavy work would be required. Here was the
very place for a rack railway on some system like Abt's, it seemed to
me. I saw one at work in Germany, and know they are safely used in
Austria, Switzerland, Italy, and in North and South America. As you
know, you cannot nicely work a railway by adhesion only much above a
gradient of one in fifty with sharp curves upon it, or one in forty on
a straight line, consequently the rack is the thing to use then, I
fancy, for on the Abt rack railway the pinions on the engine can be
easily put in and out of gear on the rack, and the journey be continued
by simple adhesion, as by an ordinary locomotive, and the rack system
works all right round moderate curves.
"I should think, in hilly parts of the country there are many places
where 4 feet 8-1/2 inch gauge railways could be laid out almost on the
surface of the ground, and at such gradients as about one in fourteen,
and there should be no difficulty in working them safely, because
similar lines have been worked for many years. There must be many
little feeder lines that end nowhere almost now, that could be so
continued over the hills to a main line, and thus join two large
traffic trunk lines, and raise the feeder from obscurity to some
importance, and from the state of a mere agricultural 5l. to 10l. per
mile per week line of railway to one earning more than double. However,
that's by the way. Now, my best game was to draw the swells away as
quickly as I could, and yet not show them my hand. I started badly,
though, for I said, 'Gentlemen, I think a shower is coming up over the
hills, and if you command me, I will tell the engine driver to run you
down quickly by himself, and come back for these empties. It won't
delay the work in any way, gentlemen all.' They said, 'Never mind; if
there was a shower they could stand upon the sleepers by the wagons and
get sufficient shelter.'
"That meant on the sleepers I was trying to hide. Just fancy, the very
half-rounds that troubled me. I felt I could sink through the earth, as
I saw the engineer's eyes were doing full time as lighthouse revolving
lights. I thought, he will have me chucked from this job, sure as
half-rounds are not rectangulars, for he would not have bad work.
"Now the wagons did not quite reach all over the half round road, the
swells took to walking between the roads. Why, I never knew, but they
did. I felt certain, if any of them took to walking upon the
half-rounds, they would find it all out. I got to young Jack, and on
the quiet he returned to me my letter to him, which I burnt afterwards.
By luck, one of the directors--that's what they were--drew the
attention of the engineer to something on the station road close by;
and all except two of them passed on, but two directors kept behind
with me, and one started walking on the half-rounds, and on those too
that were on their tops, as should have been uppermost, and one nearly
got upset before he travelled five yards. So I went for him there and
then, and said, 'Please, sir, the road is not packed yet, and has only
just been put in to take these few empties. It will be as firm as a
rock in two days, sir.' I left the rest to him. He looked at me and
said, 'I hope it will be, or passengers will think they are travelling
over the Rocky Mountains.'
"I smiled, and looked as pleasant and truthful as I knew how, but
thought, hope with you, as with me, is grand goods, but fact is better
business. They were a smart lot, and no one was going to move them on
till they had seen just about all they felt inclined to, but I had a
bit of luck then, and ever after have liked birds."
"What was it?"
"Well, a cocktail rose almost at our feet. The line passed between two
coppices. From that moment I was safe, as both the directors talked of
nothing but shooting. I kept the game alive for all I knew and more
than I did, that's certain, and before I had done had made out it was
the finest part of the whole country for game, although they ran a bit
wild, and wanted stopping. It is convenient to always ease down a
strong sentence, then you can alter its meaning a bit when what you
have said don't agree with what you are saying; so I warned them the
birds wanted stopping. They all got talking and pointing about till
they had no time to spare to get back so as to catch the train at the
junction. I tell you it was a near squeak, and shook my constitution
more than a trifle, and no fault of mine, but it ended all serene."
"Your escape reminds me of one I had. It was a long while ago, must be
about forty years back, when railways in many parts were a sort of
novelty, and the natives used to turn out, swells and all, to see what
was going on, and made a line a free show. One day about seven or eight
swells came bearing down on me. One I knew had put a lot of money in
the line, although he was not a director, and I have no doubt got it
well back in a few years by the good the railway did his estate, for
houses began to spring up all round soon after we had finished. I
remember, and you will, that old Jack Slurry used to say married folks
were nothing to a new railway for increasing the population in certain
parts. It brings people together as never could come before, and so up
goes the number of mouths, and no sooner do houses rise than shops
follow, then churches and chapels and clubs and halls and so on like a
procession, till the old folks almost wonder where they are. I'm
talking a bit astray of my subject, and will now to it again.
"These swells came straight to me and asked me to show them through a
few of the cuttings, and I did. I met my ganger in one, and managed to
get in front of them and ask on the quiet who they were. He said, 'Them
is nobs. They be hanteaquariums. They are searching for as old goods as
can be found!' I knew what he meant, so I broke a small boulder or two
and showed them the impressions of shells, and I called to my young
Snipper and he got them a specimen each, and they were pleased. One
gave me a quid when they left. They were real gentlemen, at least one
was; and it is only charitable to suppose the others were in company,
and this one was banker!"
"I agree with you."
"After looking at a few of the cuttings, and my putting in some
pleasant words which seemed to be food to them, one of them opened a
gate and they commenced to walk back along the fields and through the
wood, near to where a culvert is, and close to a bit of marsh. They did
not seem to mind the dirt or brushwood, and they asked me to come with
them, and point out and say anything I thought they would like to hear,
and I did. Perhaps they would have liked to have known what the prices
were I was paid, but I had not the heart to distract their minds from
their own true-love study to such a plain thing as L _s._ _d._ I ought
to have told you our engineer we used to call 'Old Fangbolts.' They
were his hobby, and it is my opinion that if he has as long fangs to
his teeth as the bolts he would have put down, when they get decayed he
will know what pain is, and wish they were short spikes. He had his
way, of course, although there was a great waste of metal. Now
fangbolts are good things for getting a through grip of the sleepers
when the fangs are screwed on tight, but still they don't keep the
rails from spreading much more, if any, and I rather think less, than
flat-faced spikes of fair length. At least, that is my experience."
"And so it is mine."
"Between you and me the chap that first had the stern end of a bolt put
uppermost in the rail, so that he could be sure the nut was on, knew
what he was about, because fangs are nasty goods to screw on, and,
bless you, tricks are sometimes played that way. I have known them just
turned round once and then wedged by a piece of ballast, and they
appeared to be tight; and when a bit of the road had to be taken up and
the fang had got loose it was on the premises--perhaps, it is truer to
say, just outside and at the door--and then you could always say the
threads were wrong and blame the maker, or wriggle out and wrestle with
the subject in the direction that looked the most serene."
"You mean work your lay according to circumstances."
"Precisely. Besides I have had two fang bolts with triangular fangs to
fix in the flange of a rail almost in line, one each side of the web,
and they could not be both screwed tightly, for the points of the fangs
under the sleeper met when you turned them. This time, of course, none
of these nobs knew what a fangbolt was, and if I had told them I dare
say at first they might have believed it was a Roman tooth, or a piece
of chain armour, or part of an early Briton's war paint. Well, we were
walking through a wood--it belonged to one of them--and clearing our
way, for the brushwood was rather thick, when we came to a small mound,
and I own I did not know what it was. One of the swells smiled, and
said, 'How very interesting. This is a tumulus.' I said, 'Excuse me,
gentlemen, but I am always glad to learn anything, and you don't mean
to say some earth has tumours and, swells a bit, because if you will
tell me how to work it it would save me and others money and a lot of
work forming embankments, if it does not cost too much to start the
swelling.'
"They smiled, and one said 'A tu-mu-lus was not a tumour, but an
artificial mound raised over those who were buried in ancient times.' I
touched my hat and said 'I thought there was something wrong,
gentlemen;' and told them I knew there were a good many women round
these parts that had wens and they swell up as big as marrows, but I
did not know the ground had tumours, and was eager to learn it had, as
I thought I saw a useful application of them, and they might be a new
form of wonder produced by inoculation. One of them then said, 'No
doubt the women have their whims and playful humours, but he trusted
they were free from wens or other tumours.' Then they all laughed, and
one of them hazarded a remark and said, 'This is the ... formation.' It
sounded to me like upper railroadian formation. I forgot myself, and
turned round sharp to him and said, 'It is nothing of the kind,
gentlemen. There is no such thing as a upper railroadian formation.'
They did stare. I went straight on, and said straight out, 'There is no
formation here at all, besides upper railroadian formation is utterly
unknown on railways. The formation is at the bottom of the cuttings or
the tops of the banks and nowhere else."
"They stared just as if I was going to shoot them, and one of them
laughed and said, 'I am afraid there is a slight misunderstanding
somewhere.' Then the others smiled. I thought it was time to stop my
tongue. The same one turned to me and said, 'My friend was alluding to
the geological character of the locality. It undoubtedly is Upper
Si-lu-rian.' So I touched my hat, and said, 'I hoped they would excuse
me, and would they kindly remember I was a bit rough.' They all said,
'Oh! certainly!' and they seemed to like the business that had just
passed, and were enjoying themselves, I could see that.
"Well, all this passed when we pulled up at the mound, which was about
fifty feet away from the line, and in the thick of the brushwood. One
of them began poking about with a stick, and bless me, I saw about
half-a-dozen fangs here and there. I thought to myself it is lucky Old
Fangbolts is not here. He would have shot me, and killed himself right
off, or gone loose. I twigged what the mound was made of. It was only a
small one, but the gentleman was at first mistaken, and no wonder,
because there are a lot of real ancient mounds round and about the
wood. However, this mound was a mixture of fangs that should have been
screwed on the bolts and were not, that's certain, and earth and turf,
and had been artfully covered up, for it was quite green except one
little streak. I expect some vermin had tried it, and found it no good,
and scratched away a bit, and bared it. Anyhow, it might have been
awkward for me, for one of the party picked up a rusty old fang, and
turned to the other nobs, and said, 'I don't think that is very
ancient; at least, if it be so, it is a Birmingham-made ancient relic,
and has been deposited upon the wrong battlefield.'
"I believe that was only a sly hint to me that he meant the battlefield
to be the permanent way; but, of course, I took no notice. He threw
down the fang, and then we all walked on. No patter is sometimes the
best game to play, and look as if you were learning a lot. However, on
being asked about the mound, I said, 'It's only an old earth mound that
has grown over green. It may have been there fifty years, not more,
perhaps less.'
"Really, it was full of fangs that ought to have been screwed on the
bolts, a heap of them, too. So I gave the office in the right quarter,
and two of us went next morning very early, and soon dug a hole, and
buried the mound, and carefully cast the excavation as close by as
possible, and covered it up with a nice green top, so as to look quite
natural and pretty, and when we had done we considered we had improved
the scenery. It was a near squeak though, and it was lucky no engineer
was with them, or I should have been had.
"It is my opinion, from what I have noticed, that the engine does a
good deal to keep down the rails, and as long as the rails and sleepers
are right, and the ballast good, and the sleepers well packed, the
fastenings have more to prevent the rails spreading, and the road
bursting than keeping the rails down, although, of course, that is
necessary and should be done as well."
"I think you are quite right there."
"Old Fangbolts was all for the through grip, and did not seem to care
much about preventing spreading. Well, engineers work in all grooves.
Some have one way of thinking, some another, and all perhaps are partly
right, and if they would but balance accounts, instead of harping on
one string, it would be a smoother world."
"There we agree."
"Did you ever get a bit 'extra' out of rock ballast?"
"No; never had a chance."
"I did this way. Of course, rock ballast is not equal to shingle and
clean gravel, but there is more chance of 'extra' profit, for you can
pitch it in big, if you have a nice cover of small ballast, so as to
make it look pretty at the finish, and like a garden path, and as
occasion offers you can pare off the cess between the ballast wall and
the top of the slope in embankments and the foot of the slope in
cuttings, a couple of inches or so and sometimes get paid the specified
depth that way, although the real depth of ballast throughout is not
within 2 or 3 inches of it on the average. When the guv'nors are
walking over the line keep them on the outside rail on curves as much
as you can, as the cant makes the ballast wall look big. You have to be
careful with the packing under the rail, because, if you don't mind, it
may happen the centre of the sleeper is on a bit of rock, and then the
sleeper may split when doing the see-saw trick as the trains pass and
sway about.
"Just so. You must be careful not to pack them upon a middle pivot."
"I had two chaps who would almost have done for masons. They used to
pack the sleepers with a few lumps where the rails rested on them, just
to get the rail top nice and the rest was filled up anyhow, like nature
on the sea shore; and we can't do wrong in taking a hint there, you
know, for the cue is right, particularly when it runs towards 'extra'
profit. Still, I don't like to chance breaking a sleeper's back, so I
let them lie easy between the rails, or rather under the parts of the
sleepers where no rails rest."
"I understand. You pack the sleepers only where they are under the
rail-flange."
"Yes. One day the engineer said to the inspector who was a kind-hearted
man and bred right, 'Mind the sleepers are evenly packed and not with
large pieces of rock.' He called me up and repeated it extra treble to
me. 'Very well, sir; but some of the rock will soon weather, and don't
you think it better to keep it a bit large rather than small? The
quarry runs very uneven. Some of the rock is as hard as nails, sir, and
some soft, and it is not exactly the best ballast to handle or in the
world; and if you will excuse me, don't you think, sir, on these soft
banks another 3 inches under the sleeper would be advisable?'
"He did not seem to want to agree, but after a week, an order came from
my guv'nor for 3 inches extra depth upon all banks. That was a good
stroke, as it enabled me to do with larger stuff, and lessened the
breaking it up. He was right in what he did, and so was I. I like rock
ballast for 'extras,' although the walling is a nuisance. There is more
chance for expansion of profits than in gravel ballast, and that is a
great recommendation to us, anyhow, and is good enough apart from what
things really are. I gave the tip on the quiet in the quarry to send
half the rock down a trifle bigger, and it did not want so much getting
or handling in the quarry, so they liked the new order, and it saved
some breaking. Consequently I prefer rock ballast that weathers quickly
sometimes, although, of course, an engineer should avoid it for ballast
if he can, and the money allows."