This plan was never adopted, as it was found desirable upon the broad gauge to use still wider carriages overhanging the wheels; but advantage was taken of the broader base to use wheels of greater diameter. However, in the saloon carriages, where ease of travelling was the chief object aimed at, the bodies were placed within the wheels.
[50] In the course of constructing the earth-works of a railway, the contractors were accustomed to lay down temporary ways or lines of rail, for the earth waggons to travel upon. When these were done with, the proper road for the trains was laid down; and this, to distinguish it from the former one, was called the permanent way.
[51] See Wood On Railways, 3rd. edit. 1838, p. 151.
[52] A full description of the original road of the Great Western Railway, communicated by Mr. Brunel, will be found in Wood’s Treatise on Railroads, 3rd edit. 1838, p. 708.
[53] At this time Mr. Brunel was confined to the house by the effects of his accident on board the ‘Great Western’ steam-ship (see p. [242]). Had he been on the spot, he would have been able to give the work careful consideration during its progress, and to judge of the expediency of proceeding with the plan.
[54] The continuity of the timbers diminishes the risk of trains leaving the line from small imperfections in the permanent way. And, should a train leave the rails, the injury to the carriages and to the road is generally less serious than it is when the wheels of a carriage off the rails come into repeated and violent contact with the cross sleepers. Instances have frequently occurred where carriages which have left the rails have run considerable distances on the longitudinal timbers without injury.
[55] This experiment excited the greatest interest, and it was long afterwards related how Mr. Brunel, by the stroke of a hammer, had knocked to pieces the scientific deductions of Dr. Lardner, who, as was well known, had prompted Mr. Wood’s decision in this matter.
Mr. Brunel was so much impressed with the great influence which the operation of the blast-pipe had on the working of the locomotive that he afterwards investigated the whole subject, and made further experiments to determine whether or not it might be expedient to abandon the steam blast, and to maintain the draught in the chimney with a fan worked by a rotary steam jet.
[56] The inconveniences of a break of gauge had already been brought into notice. One of the narrow-gauge companies, the Midland, worked two existing lines of railway, one between Birmingham and Gloucester, laid on the narrow gauge, and another between Bristol and Gloucester, on the broad gauge; and thus there was a break of gauge at Gloucester.
[57] It should, however, be added, that the Commissioners had stated in the body of their report: ‘We feel it a duty to observe here, that the public are mainly indebted for the present rate of speed, and the increased accommodation of the railway carriages, to the genius of Mr. Brunel and the liberality of the Great Western Company.’