As to the United States themselves, I look upon their railways as a little more than the main arteries from which an indefinitely large circulating system will branch out. Besides these countries I need only allude to the Dominion of Canada, whose vast territory bids fair to rival that of the United States in agricultural importance, to our Australian colonies, to Brazil, and other countries in which railways are still comparatively in their infancy, to show that, quite apart from the renewal of existing lines, the world's manufacture of rails has an enormous future before it.
RELATIONS BETWEEN EMPLOYERS AND WORKMEN.
I look on the excellent feeling which happily prevails between the employers and the workmen in our great industry as another of the most important elements of its future prosperity. It confers honor on all concerned that by our Boards of Conciliation and Arbitration, ruinous strikes, and even momentary suspensions of labor, are avoided; and still more that masters like our esteemed Treasurer, Mr. David Dale, should deserve, and that large bodies of workmen should have the manliness and discernment to bestow on him, the confidence implied in choosing him so frequently as an arbitrator. I believe that similar friendly relations exist in some, at any rate, of the other great centers of the iron and steel industries, and that although our methods may not be adapted to the habits of all, there is no country in which some way does not exist, or may not be found, to avoid those contests which were so fatal to our prosperity in former days. Lastly I regard as one of the most hopeful signs of the future the increased estimate of the value of science entertained by our practical men. In this respect we may claim with pride that the Iron and Steel Institute has been the pioneer, at any rate, so far as this country is concerned. But the conviction that the elements of science should be placed within the reach of those who occupy a humbler position in the industrial hierarchy than we do who are assembled here is rapidly spreading among us. The iron manufacturers of Westphalia have been the first to found an institution in which the intelligent and ambitious ironworker can qualify himself by study for a higher position, and I hope when this Institute visits Middlesbrough in the autumn, some progress will have been made in that locality toward the establishment of a similar school. Other districts will doubtless follow, and the result will be, to quote the words of Sir W. Siemens on a late occasion, that "by the dissemination of science a higher spirit will take possession of our artisans; that they will work with the object of obtaining higher results, instead of only discussing questions of wages." It is on the mutual co-operation in this spirit of all the workers of every grade in our great craft that we may build the hope—nay, that we may even cherish the certain expectation—of placing it on even a higher eminence than that which it has already attained.
THE "SWALLOW," A NEW VEHICLE.
The graceful vehicle shown in the accompanying cut is much used in Poland and Russia, and we believe that it has already made its appearance at Paris. The builder is Mr. Henri Barycki, of Warsaw, who has very skillfully utilized a few very curious mechanical principles in it.
The driver's seat is fixed in the interior of a wide ring to which are fastened the shafts. This ring revolves, by the aid of three pulleys or small wheels, within the large ring resting on the ground. It will be seen that when the horse is drawing the vehicle, the friction of this large wheel against the ground being greater than that of the concentric one within it, the latter will revolve until the center of gravity of the whole is situated anew in a line vertical to the point at which it bears on the ground. The result of such an arrangement is that the driver rolls on the large wheel just as he would do on the surface of an endless rail. As may be conceived, the tractive stress is, as a consequence, considerably diminished.
There are two side wheels which are connected by a flexible axle to the seat of the carriage, but these have no other purpose than that of preventing the affair from turning to one side or the other.
The "swallow," for so it is named, is made entirely of steel and wrought iron. It is very easily kept clean; the horse can be harnessed to it in three minutes; and, aside from its uses for pleasure, it is capable of being utilized in numerous ways.—La Nature.