Messrs. Clegg and Samuda afterwards, in 1840, patented their plan of an atmospheric railway; and they publicly tested its working on an unfinished portion of the West London Railway. The results of the experiment were so satisfactory, that the directors of the Dublin and Kingstown line adopted it between Kingstown and Dalkey. The London and Croydon Company also adopted the atmospheric principle; and their line was opened in 1845. The ordinary mode of applying the power was to lay between the line of rails a pipe, in which a large piston was inserted, and attached by a shaft to the framework of a carriage. The propelling power was the ordinary pressure of the atmosphere acting against the piston in the tube on one side, a vacuum being created in the tube on the other side of the piston by the working of a stationary engine. Great was the popularity of the atmospheric system; and still George Stephenson said “It won’t do: it’s but a gimcrack.” Engineers of distinction said he was prejudiced, and that he looked upon the locomotive as a pet child of his own. “Wait a little,” he replied, “and you will see that I am right.” It was generally supposed that the locomotive system was about to be snuffed out. “Not so fast,” said Stephenson. “Let us wait to see if it will pay.” He never
believed it would. It was ingenious, clever, scientific, and all that; but railways were commercial enterprises, not toys; and if the atmospheric railway could not work to a profit, it would not do. Considered in this light, he even went so far as to call it “a great humbug.” “Nothing will beat the locomotive,” said he, “for efficiency in all weathers, for economy in drawing loads of average weight, and for power and speed as occasion may require.”
The atmospheric system was fairly and fully tried, and it was found wanting. It was admitted to be an exceedingly elegant mode of applying power; its devices were very skilful, and its mechanism was most ingenious. But it was costly, irregular in action, and, in particular kinds of weather, not to be depended upon. At best, it was but a modification of the stationary-engine system, and experience proved it to be so expensive that it was shortly after entirely abandoned in favour of locomotive power. [288]
One of the remarkable results of the system of railway locomotion which George Stephenson had by his persevering labours mainly contributed to establish, was the outbreak of the railway mania towards the close of his professional career. The success of the first main lines of railway naturally led to their extension into many new districts; but a strongly speculative tendency soon began to display itself, which contained in it the elements of great danger.
The extension of railways had, up to the year 1844, been mainly effected by men of the commercial classes, and the shareholders in them principally belonged to the manufacturing districts,—the capitalists of the metropolis as yet
holding aloof, and prophesying disaster to all concerned in railway projects. But when the lugubrious anticipations of the City men were found to be so entirely falsified by the results—when, after the lapse of years, it was ascertained that railway traffic rapidly increased and dividends steadily improved—a change came over the spirit of the London capitalists. They then invested largely in railways, the shares in which became a leading branch of business on the Stock Exchange, and the prices of some rose to nearly double their original value.
A stimulus was thus given to the projection of further lines, the shares in most of which came out at a premium, and became the subject of immediate traffic. A reckless spirit of gambling set in, which completely changed the character and objects of railway enterprise. The public outside the Stock Exchange became also infected, and many persons utterly ignorant of railways, knowing and caring nothing about their national uses, but hungering and thirsting after premiums, rushed eagerly into the vortex. They applied for allotments, and subscribed for shares in lines, of the engineering character or probable traffic of which they knew nothing. Provided they could but obtain allotments which they could sell at a premium, and put the profit—in many cases the only capital they possessed [289]—into their pocket, it was enough for them. The mania was not confined to the precincts of the Stock Exchange, but infected all ranks. It embraced merchants and manufacturers, gentry and shopkeepers, clerks in public offices, and loungers at the clubs. Noble lords were pointed at as “stags;” there were even clergymen who were characterised as “bulls;” and amiable ladies who had the reputation of
“bears,” in the share markets. The few quiet men who remained uninfluenced by the speculation of the time were, in not a few cases, even reproached for doing injustice to their families, in declining to help themselves from the stores of wealth that were poured out on all sides.
Folly and knavery were, for a time, completely in the ascendant. The sharpers of society were let loose, and jobbers and schemers became more and more plentiful. They threw out railway schemes as lures to catch the unwary. They fed the mania with a constant succession of new projects. The railway papers became loaded with their advertisements. The post-office was scarcely able to distribute the multitude of prospectuses and circulars which they issued. For a time their popularity was immense. They rose like froth into the upper heights of society, and the flunkey FitzPlushe, by virtue of his supposed wealth, sat amongst peers and was idolised. Then was the harvest-time of scheming lawyers, parliamentary agents, engineers, surveyors, and traffic-takers, who were ready to take up any railway scheme however desperate, and to prove any amount of traffic even where none existed. The traffic in the credulity of their dupes was, however, the great fact that mainly concerned them, and of the profitable character of which there could be no doubt.
Mr. Stephenson was anxiously entreated to lend his name to prospectuses during the railway mania; but he invariably refused. He held aloof from the headlong folly of the hour, and endeavoured to check it, but in vain. Had he been less scrupulous, and given his countenance to the numerous projects about which he was consulted, he might, without any trouble, have thus secured enormous gains; but he had no desire to accumulate a fortune without labour and without honour. He himself never speculated in shares. When he was satisfied as to the merits of any undertaking, he subscribed for a certain amount of capital in it, and held on, neither buying nor selling. At a dinner of the Leeds and Bradford directors at Ben Rydding in October, 1844,