The Railway
“Depend upon it, whenever this new mode of travelling comes into operation, we shall become altogether a faster people,” was the vaticination of a common-sense observer some thirty years since; and experience has proved the soundness of the opinion. Increased facility of moving from place to place must, more or less, affect every one except the recluse shut up in his chamber from choice, or the less fortunate one prostrated on the bed of suffering, or age—
“Lies he not bedrid? And again does nothing
But what he did, being childish.”
—Shakspeare.
This quickening of locomotion has multiplied our desires by adding to the means of gratifying them; a greater number of incidents and opportunities of observation is thus gained; but, being crowded into the same length of existence, the wear and tear becomes greater; the knife wears out the sheath; and men grow old before they reach mid-age; or rather, the finer portions of existence are lost, and the residue approaches a caput mortuum.
Meanwhile, the Railway is yet an incomplete invention; and it is contended that our passenger-trains are deficient in the requisite accommodation for the comfort and even health of the passengers, who are still exposed to an unnecessary vibration which, in the course of continual travelling, produces nervous diseases. Mr. Bridges Adams, the engineer, and therefore a practical authority upon the subject, maintains that the railway companies are so fettered in their operations as to be unable to make feasible improvements: were these restrictions removed, Mr. Adams contends the public would receive the advantage in many forms, in easier and cheaper transit, and in reciprocal relations of town and country, such as involve a revolution in our national economies. The same acute writer anticipates the time when our towns shall have their railway-streets, which may become a fact at no very distant future. London has already its subterranean railway; above, the air is grilled with the electric-wire railway; and the street-system is being commenced upon the banks of the Thames, and the stream is already bridged with viaducts.