Mr. Stephenson had none of the in-door habits of the student. He read very little; for reading is a habit which is generally acquired in youth; and his youth and manhood had been for the most part spent in hard work. Books wearied him, and sent him to sleep. Novels excited his feelings too much, and he avoided them, though he would occasionally read through a philosophical book on a subject in which he felt particularly interested. He wrote very few letters with his own hand; nearly all his letters were dictated, and he avoided even dictation when he could. His greatest pleasure was in conversation, from which he gathered most of his imparted information.
It was his practice, when about to set out on a journey by
railway, to walk along the train before it started, and look into the carriages to see if he could find “a conversable face.” On one of these occasions, at the Euston Station, he discovered in a carriage a very handsome, manly, and intelligent face, which he afterwards found was that of the late Lord Denman. He was on his way down to his seat at Stony Middleton, in Derbyshire. Mr. Stephenson entered the carriage, and the two were shortly engaged in interesting conversation. It turned upon chronometry and horology, and the engineer amazed his lordship by the extent of his knowledge on the subject, in which he displayed as much minute information, even down to the latest improvements in watchmaking, as if he had been bred a watchmaker and lived by the trade. Lord Denman was curious to know how a man whose time must have been mainly engrossed by engineering, had gathered so much knowledge on a subject quite out of his own line, and he asked the question. “I learnt clockmaking and watchmaking,” was the answer, “while a working man at Killingworth, when I made a little money in my spare hours, by cleaning the pitmen’s clocks and watches; and since then I have kept up my information on the subject.” This led to further questions, and then Mr. Stephenson told Lord Denman the interesting story of his life, which held him entranced during the remainder of the journey.
Many of his friends readily accepted invitations to Tapton House to enjoy his hospitality, which never failed. With them he would “fight his battles o’er again,” reverting to his battle for the locomotive; and he was never tired of telling, nor were his auditors of listening to, the lively anecdotes with which he was accustomed to illustrate the struggles of his early career. Whilst walking in the woods or through the grounds, he would arrest his friend’s attention by allusion to some simple object,—such as a leaf, a blade of grass, a bit of bark, a nest of birds, or an ant carrying its eggs across the path,—and descant in glowing terms upon the creative power of the Divine Mechanician,
whose contrivances were so exhaustless and so wonderful. This was a theme upon which he was often accustomed to dwell in reverential admiration, when in the society of his more intimate friends.
One night, when walking under the stars, and gazing up into the field of suns, each the probable centre of a system, forming the Milky Way, a friend said to him, “What an insignificant creature is man in sight of so immense a creation as that!” “Yes!” was his reply; “but how wonderful a creature also is man, to be able to think and reason, and even in some measure to comprehend works so infinite!”
A microscope, which he had brought down to Tapton, was a source of immense enjoyment to him; and he was never tired of contemplating the minute wonders which it revealed. One evening, when some friends were visiting him, he induced them each to puncture their skin so as to draw blood, in order that he might examine the globules through the microscope. One of the gentlemen present was a teetotaller, and Mr. Stephenson pronounced his blood to be the most lively of the whole. He had a theory of his own about the movement of the globules in the blood, which has since become familiar. It was, that they were respectively charged with electricity, positive at one end and negative at the other, and that thus they attracted and repelled each other, causing a circulation. No sooner did he observe anything new, than he immediately set about devising a reason for it. His training in mechanics, his practical familiarity with matter in all its forms, and the strong bent of his mind, led him first of all to seek for a mechanical explanation. And yet he was ready to admit that there was a something in the principle of life—so mysterious and inexplicable—which baffled mechanics, and seemed to dominate over and control them. He did not care much, either, for abstruse mechanics, but only for the experimental and practical, as is usually the case with those whose knowledge has been self-acquired.
Even at his advanced age, the spirit of frolic had not left
him. When proceeding from Chesterfield station to Tapton House with his friends, he would almost invariably challenge them to a race up the steep path, partly formed of stone steps, along the hill side. And he would struggle, as of old, to keep the front place, though by this time his “wind” had greatly failed. He would occasionally invite an old friend to take a quiet wrestle with him on the lawn, to keep up his skill, and perhaps to try some new “knack” of throwing. In the evening, he would sometimes indulge his visitors by reciting the old pastoral of “Damon and Phyllis,” or singing his favourite song of “John Anderson my Joe.” But his greatest glory amongst those with whom he was most intimate, was a “crowdie!” “Let’s have a crowdie night,” he would say; and forthwith a kettle of boiling water was ordered in, with a basin of oatmeal. Taking a large bowl, containing a sufficiency of hot water, and placing it between his knees, he poured in oatmeal with one hand, and stirred the mixture vigorously with the other. When enough meal had been added, and the stirring was completed, the crowdie was made. It was then supped
with new milk, and Stephenson generally pronounced it “capital!” It was the diet to which he had been accustomed when a working man, and all the dainties with which he had become familiar in recent years had not spoiled his simple tastes. To enjoy crowdie at his age, besides, indicated that he still possessed that quality on which no doubt much of his practical success in life had depended,—a strong and healthy digestion.