in giving greater stability to the sleepers and chairs which sustain the rails. It would be also extremely desirable to keep an exact register of the breakages of rails in different parts of the road,specifying in every case the part of the rail where the fracture takes place. By this means we should be enabled to trace, with some degree of certainty, the causes of this source of wear. For example, it is at present doubtful on what part of the road fractures most frequently take place; it is said to be on the descending planes; but we apprehend that this statement depends more on conjecture than on ascertained facts. It would be also useful to ascertain whether the fractures take place more frequently over the chairs or between them; also, whether they happen oftener at the extremities of the rails, or in some intermediate part. The surface of the fractures should also, in every case, be carefully examined, to determine whether any accidental flaw has existed in the structure of the metal. Such a body of facts as it is in the power of the Directors to collect, at no cost to the Company, but by giving the necessary directions to their subordinate agents, would form an invaluable storehouse of knowledge for the guidance of their future operations, and those of other railroad companies.

We believe that one source of extraordinary expense, to which the Company have been subjected, may be traced to the adoption of fish-bellied instead of parallel rails, and to the insufficient weight of metal in them. The theory of the fish-bellied rail is doubtless seductive; and if the sleepers and blocks were absolutely immovable, they would, with a given weight of metal, have the advantage over the parallel rail; but in a rail of this form, on the slightest subsidence of the sleeper, or shifting of the chair, the rail being deserted by its support, its weakest point is immediately exposed to the incumbent weight of the waggons under the most disadvantageous mechanical conditions. In a word, the very circumstances which constitute the advantage of the fish-bellied rail are here reversed, and produce a proportionate liability to fracture. Independently of this, the weight of the rails (35 lbs. per yard) was quite insufficient; and we believe that where fractures take place, the Company have deemed it advisable to replace them by rails at 50lbs. to the yard.

The Leeds and Selby Railroad Company have profited by this experience, and have rejected the fish-bellied rail; laying down a durable road of parallel rails at 50 lbs. per yard.

The advantages of railroads have of late years become so apparent, that their construction has been undertaken to a certain extent on the Continent. In France, a double line of railroad

has been constructed, extending from St Etienne to Lyons, a distance of thirty-four miles. This road is not adapted for very heavy transport, the rails weighing only 26 lbs. per yard. To obtain a sufficient level, fourteen tunnels were constructed; one of these is a mile in length; another, more than half a mile, is carried under the river Gier. The road is carried by a viaduct over the Soane. In the cost of this road we have a notable example of the commercial wisdom of our neighbours, who paid for the iron used on it four times the price at which they could have obtained it from us! A part of this road is a self-acting plane, on which the loads are moved by their own weight; on the other parts of it locomotive engines have been used.

A continuation of this road has been constructed from St Etienne to Roanne, extending about fifty-five miles. It consists of a single track; the first thirteen miles being formed of cast-iron rails of 43 lbs. to the yard, and the last forty-two miles of rolled iron, 26 lbs. to the yard.

Among the enterprises of this kind undertaken in Germany, the railroad from Budweis to Lintz merits notice. The extent of this line is about eighty English miles; it was commenced under the direction of Gerstner in 1825, and is composed of wooden beams, bearing flat rails of iron, six yards in length, two inches in width, and one-third of an inch in thickness. It is intended for the purposes of general commerce, but more especially for the transport of salt.

But the country, which surpasses all others in the spirit and rapidity by which its means of inland transport have been improved, is the United States. The number and extent of railroads completed, in progress, or projected throughout the union, must surprise all who have not attended to the advances made by this country in the arts of life. We extract from a tabular view, published under the direction of Congress in 1833, the following list of railroads then executed and projected in different States :

From the above statement, it will be seen that the State of Pennsylvania takes the lead in the construction of inland communications. The earliest and most extensive railroad constructed in this State was undertaken by the Government, and forms a continuation of the Union Canal; stretching from the eastern to the western extremity of the State, and connecting the city of Philadelphia with the banks of the Alleghany and the Ohio. This great line of communication consists of three divisions; the first extending from Philadelphia to Columbia, which consists of a railroad constructed in a manner nearly similar to, and in some respects with a greater degree of stability than the Liverpool and Manchester road. Nearly the whole of it is formed of what is called the edge rail of rolled iron, similar to that used on the Wigan road; the weight of iron being 41 lbs. per yard, which is 61 lbs. more than the weight of the Manchester rails. The line is conducted very nearly level; the slopes being such that the effect of the power of traction upon the line is 71 per cent of what it would be on a dead level of equal length. The road is conducted over several rivers, which it intersects nearly at right angles; the valleys, where embankments could not conveniently be constructed, are crossed by thirty-one viaducts, the aggregate length of which is about a mile and a half. There are seventythree stone culverts, from 3 to 25 feet span; five hundred stone drains, 2 feet wide, and 3 feet high; eighteen road and farm bridges, eight of which have stone arches of 25 feet span, and the remainder stone abutments, with wooden superstructures of 31 to 54 feet span. The excavations are frequently deep, and the embankments lofty; in one place the road is elevated 80 perpendicular feet above the bottom of the ravine, and, in other places, cuttings of 40 feet deep occur.

* Continuation of the Tabular and Statistical Views of the United States. By G. Watterston and N. B. Van Lant, p. 206: Washington, 1833.

From the extremity of this road at Columbia to Hollidaysburg, on the Juniata, extends the Union Canal, by which the communication is continued. From Hollidaysburg to Johnstown, on the Conemaugh river, the railroad is resumed for a distance of thirtysix and a half miles. This line of road crosses the Alleghany mountains by a series of slopes, and by a tunnel 900 feet long, 19 feet high, and 22 feet wide. There are 400 askew viaducts, besides seventy-two culverts and other structures of masonry; the rails are similar to those on the Manchester railway, but are 4 lbs. heavier, weighing 39 lbs. per yard: the rails are constructed upon stone sleepers in the same manner as on the Manchester line, except on embankments, where wooden string pieces are used.

One of the principal branches of this line of communication connects it with the town of West Chester, and is about nine miles in length.

Another railroad is in process of construction to connect Philadelphia with Germantown and Norristown, extending, first in a northern, and then in a north-western direction from that city. The length of this road will be about nineteen miles; the rails similar to those used on our best railways.

The little Schuylkill railroad extends from Port Clinton to the town of Tamaqua, a distance of about twenty-three miles. It is formed, like many other railroads in the States intended for light traffic, of wooden rails, shod with iron bars. Although the chief design was the transport of coals, it has been executed with a view to general trade, and stage-coaches worked by horses, already ply on it.

One of the most important of the Pennsylvania railroads is that which extends from Carbondale to Honesdale, connecting the whole country, watered by the great branch of the Susquehanna, with the Hudson, and by that river with the city of New York. A canal commences on the Roundont, near its junction with the Hudson, and terminates at Honesdale, 106 miles from the town of Eddyville, on the Roundont, and ninety miles from New York. The railroad continues the line from thence to the coal mines near Carbondale, on the Lackawanna. An act, authorizing a railroad from the Lackawanna to the Susquehanna, has passed the Legislature of Pennsylvania; and if that line be executed, an immense amount of merchandise will be conveyed along the Carbondale and Honesdale line.

The railroads of Pennsylvania are chiefly constructed in those districts which produce anthracite and bituminous coal. The greater number of these being adapted for low velocities, and light transport, are formed of wooden string pieces, which are some

times shod with iron bars. In many cases the road follows the natural surface of the ground, and their construction is therefore attended with but small expense, especially in a country where the expense even of the best timber scarcely exceeds the labour of cutting it.

Another important railroad is that by which the cities of Philadelphia and New York are connected. This road commences at Camden, a town on the bank of the Delaware, opposite Philadelphia, and from thence it is carried nearly in a straight line to Amboy, at the mouth of the Hudson. The length of this road is about sixty miles; the rails are of rolled iron, similar to our best railroads, and 41 lbs. heavier than the Manchester rails, being 391 lbs. per yard: they are attached to stone sleepers, by pins at the sides, without chairs.

The Newcastle and Frenchtown railroad connects the Delaware with the Chesapeake, and forms the great line of communication between Philadelphia and Baltimore. This road is formed of wooden rails, shod with iron bars; the former are of Georgian pitch pine, 6 inches square in the section, and the latter 2 inches and a quarter wide, and five-eighths of an inch thick, attached to the timber by iron nails. The entire length of this line is sixteen miles.

A line of road, one part of which is called the Hudson and Mohawk, and the other the Schenectady and Saratoga railroad, continues the line of transport from New York by the Hudson, in a direction northward from Albany. A prodigious intercourse by steam-boats takes place between New York and Albany, on the Hudson. The line of railroad from Albany to Schenectady, a distance of sixteen miles, has been constructed to connect this line of communication with the grand canal at Shenectady, by which it is carried from thence in a westward direction, a distance of about 250 miles, to the town of Buffalo on Lake Erie. From Schenectady the second branch of the railroad continues the line of communication in a northern direction, a distance of about twenty miles, to the shores of Lake George; from which, by Lake Champlain, there is a continuous water communication with the river St Lawrence.

One of the most magnificent American railroad projects is that which has been entitled the Baltimore and Ohio railroad. This splendid line of communication will commence at the city of Baltimore and cross the state of Maryland in a westerly direction, passing south of Frederick Town and the city of Washington, to each of which, branches have been constructed. It will thence proceed to some point on the Ohio river, between Pittsburg and the mouth of the little Kennoway river.