But, besides the amount of business above mentioned daily transacted in each of the agents’ great “receiving-sheds,” there are nine other sheds, in which, throughout the day, and especially at night, the same process on a smaller scale is going on. Close to these stores there is also a water-dock for iron and heavy goods to be shipped for the Thames. The carting establishments of Messrs. Pickford and Chaplin for the collection and delivery of their share only of the goods-traffic—for the Company have establishments of their own for loading and unloading at every station except London—would appear to any foreigner unacquainted with the modest and unassuming powers with which the mercantile business of England is quietly transacted, to be incomprehensible and almost incredible. For instance—

Messrs. Pickford’s establishment, on account of the London and North-Western Railway, is as follows:—

Clerks.Porters.Horses.Vans.Waggons.Drays.
234538396825725

The weights carted by Messrs. Pickford, on account of the Company, for the year ending the 30th of June last, amounted to—

Tons. cwts. qrs. lbs.
Collected 133,437 18 0 15
Delivered 139,898 19 0 5
Making a gross total of 273,336 17 0 20
Or rather more than 841 tons per day.

And yet the Company’s merchandise operations at Liverpool exceed those at London in the proportion of 9 to 6½!

As soon as the two agents, at their respective receiving-sheds, have loaded their trucks, and have securely covered them with water-proof and fire-proof tarpaulins, they turn them out, labelled, into the open air, from which moment they are considered to be in the hands of the Company’s superintendent of the goods-department. Accordingly, under his direction, they are immediately drawn by horses first over a weighbridge to receive their weigh-bills, and thence to a series of ten turn-tables, by which they are scattered among thirteen sets of rails, where they are marshalled into trains for their respective destinations. In this operation it is alarming to see the superintendent’s horses dragging the various luggage-vans, for not only are the rails as well as the pavement between them exceedingly slippery, but as the carriages have no shafts, the poor horse has not power to stop his load, and accordingly affixed to it by his traces he trots away before it, until it appears as if he must inevitably be smashed to a sandwich between it and the carriage at rest which he is approaching; however, just before the collision between the buffers of each vehicle takes place, the dull-looking animal jumps aside, and very dexterously saves himself from annihilation. The luggage-trains thus formed are usually composed of 35, but sometimes of 70 or 90 waggons, weighing when empty about three tons each, and averaging when laden about six tons. At the rear of each of these trains there sits a guard. The Company’s goods-waggons of all descriptions amount in number to 6236.

Engine Stable and Cattle Wharf.

In order to prevent the locomotive engines which draw these luggage-trains from crossing, or otherwise perilling the main passenger-line at Camden Station, there has been constructed an immense rotunda, 160 feet in diameter, lighted from the top by plates of glass nine feet in length by half an inch thick, and capable of containing twenty-four of the largest-class engines. In the centre of this great brick building there is a turn-table 40 feet in diameter, from whence the engines radiate to their twenty-four stalls, which on a large scale much resemble those constructed in a stable for hunters. The majority of these locomotives are capable of drawing 600 tons at the rate of twelve miles an hour. Each, when supplied with coke and water, with steam up ready for its journey, weighs about 50 tons. At the entrance of this building there is a pit into which, after their journey, they may drop their fire, and between the rails in each of the twenty-four stalls we observed a smaller pit to enable artificers to work beneath any engine that may require reparation. The drivers of these huge locomotives, after every journey, inspect and report in a book, as in the passenger-trains, any repairs that may be required, and the engines are thoroughly cleaned every time they come in.

At a short distance from this rotunda we observed a platform about 300 yards long, constructed for the landing of cattle, which arrive there generally on Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 P.M. till midnight. Fifty waggon-loads of bullocks, sheep, or pigs can here be unloaded at a time, and then driven into strong pens or pounds, constructed in the rear. The Company’s cattle and merchandise waggons are usually painted blue, their sheep-waggons green. On the arrival of a train of cattle it is interesting to see such a quantity of polished horns, bright eyes, streams of white breath, and healthy black wet noses projecting above the upper rail of their respective waggons, and fatal as is the object of their visit to John Bull’s metropolis, it is some consolation to reflect that—poor things—they are, at all events, in ignorance of the fate that awaits them. In disembarking the cattle, in spite of every precaution, an enfuriated Welsh or a wild Irish bullock will occasionally escape from this platform, and by roaring, jumping, and galloping, with depressed head and up-stretched tail—