Tramways

As Ciirly as the yeav 167G rails oí' onk other íiurd wood are shown by Mr. Clark tp havo beeu in use in thc collicry districte of England. Not loug after this time it became a common practico to uail down bars of wroughtiron on the top of the titttb'er sleepers. IL was found Ihat, whereas a horse rrpon the common road could draw 8 bolls, or 1,700 pounds of coal, lii.s power of dnuight upon the tramway amounted to 1 bolls, or 1,200 poundK.'The wroughtiron bars, not being rigid enough to prevent bonding or breaking at the ends under the weight of the trucks, the use of cast-iron was introdueed by the Coalbrook Dale Iron Company in 1767. The rails were eust in lengths of live f eet, four inehes wide and one and onc-fourth inch thick, with three holes whereby they were nailed down to the longitudinal wooden sleepers, the whole being kept truc to gauge by cross-sleepers of wood of about the length of the ordinary carriago or wagon axle. Herc was thc germ of thc development of the modern locomotivo system. On the introduction of steam it became needful that the traffic should be kept apart from that of the common roads, and that the now tracks should be subject to gradients and curves suited to the locomotive. The main line's of comiminieatiou wore thus rapidly occupied by a nct-work of railways. A reaction, however, set in on its 'being found that railways, besides their vast expense, were iacking in adaptability to the subordínate linos of traffic which followed roads and streots. The convenient and unpretentious tramway began to be again thought of, worked as of old by horsopower upon common roads. It was in the United States that the modern tram-road was earliest eniployed, èhjB first section of thc New York and Harlem line being laid down in 1852 to a gauge of four feet oight and a half inches. It proved, howcver, impopular, and was soon taken np. Twenty ycars later M. Loubat, a French engineer, obtained leave to lay down a lino of stroet tramways in New York, which rapidly expandoil and became tho distinguishing feature of traffic in most American cities and towns, in which the streets are laid out in a way better adaptod to this mode of locomotion than are the narrow and winding streets of our oidor country, while öie niuuber of other vehicles is tivcly lar loss