EXCURSION TRAINS.

As Excursion Trains have now as distinctly marked a season as any of the sports and pastimes of the people, we may perhaps be permitted a few words touching that development of the locomotive habits of the age. Far be it from us to disparage in any way that thorough ventilation of our population, so to speak, which has been one of the most notable results of the invention of railway-travelling. That the people of this island were existing in a thorough state of stagnation before Stephenson commenced his transformation-scenes with the locomotive, we know too well; and the experience of these last twenty years has given ample proof of the effect the Rail has had, in breaking up the condition of isolation in which every class but the very highest was placed before that period. It would ill become us, therefore, to speak ill-naturedly of excursion trains, which bring the advantages of this great invention to the doors of the very lowest of the artisan class. But we cannot help, at the same time, seeing that some very grave disadvantages accompany the present method of airing our holiday

people, and of interchanging for the day our rural and urban populations.

We may liken a railroad, with its various branches and the rolling stock at work upon them, to one great machine the different trains forming as much a portion of the instrument as the piston-rod forms a portion of a steam-engine. The exactitude with which these trains keep their time is also as essential to the good order of the traffic as a whole, as would be the exactitude with which one of the drivingwheels kept time with the other. This being the case, what shall we say to the temerity of Directors who, in working this delicate machine, the combined movements of which, to insure the safety of its living freight, depend upon a clock-like regularity, drop into it with deliberate carelessness a disturbing element, the shock of which is felt throughout its entire framework, and which throws out the precision of time so requisite for its safety? Is it not as foolish a thing to do as it would be to drop a screw into the works of a chronometer? or rather, is it not a far more foolish thing?-for, in the one case, only delicate workmanship is at stake, in the other, human creatures' lives.

Whenever the Directors of a railway start an excursion train they commit this error. The time of the regular traffic of the road is entirely thrown out for the day; and in many cases lives are jeopardized where, through the abrupt curves of the road or the ill working of a switch, this disturbing element makes its appearance at distant parts of the line at unlooked

for moments. It may be said that these excursion trains should be made such regular irregularities, that their amount of disturbance would be a fixed quantity, to use a term of the physicist; but all those who have watched the manner in which these monster trains are despatched, and have noticed the habits of that class of people who travel by them, will at once understand how hopeless it would be to attempt any order or method in their despatch, or to look for any possibility of their starting by an appointed time. In the first place, the officials themselves seem wholly incompetent to deal with the enormous pressure of the crowd which the announcement of a cheap trip calls to their platform. A sudden irruption of fifteen hundred or two thousand people is met by the ordinary staff at the station of departure; and the consequence is a most awful confusion, which is increased into a scene of yelling and fighting that would scarcely be believed, when the one clerk opens the one chequetaking window, and the fight for tickets commences. This want of all proper arrangement would in itself be sufficient hopelessly to delay the departure of the train at the appointed time, were not that difficulty further augmented by the amount of impedimenta that the "cheap trippers" and "excursionists" invariably carry. The chief mistake of women on these occasions is in the number and the helplessness of the babies with which, by way of taking pleasure, they encumber themselves; and the less amiable weakness of the men is for four-gallon jars filled with beer. These, the more lively elements of enjoyment, are placed in

the foreground; but the solid food, without which the Briton of a certain class cannot move five miles from his door, is not wanting. The general state of bewilderment, also, which appears to take possession of the cheap-tripper the moment he puts foot into the station, together with the unwieldiness of his belongings, render him the most difficult animal to "embark" that can well be conceived. But there is yet another element of delay in excursion trains, the difficulty the officials have in estimating the number of riders they will have to provide room for,—a difficulty which is generally met by simply building up the train to meet the requirements of the multitude pouring in upon them. As this system of building up the train is generally allowed to progress at a pace suited to that of the most dilatory or the most baby-burthened mother, and as length seems to be of no account, it is not surprising that a monster excursion train often starts as late as two hours after the appointed time; and when it finally draws its slow length along from the platform, it is seen that the people in this pleasure excursion are designedly placed between an engine at the tail of the train and two in front. Now let us imagine the state of excitement which the passage of such a train as this must cause; the strain which is put upon every station-master, pointsman, and guard, along a hundred and twenty miles of rail, having to provide against accidents to intermediate trains whilst this excursion train is whizzing about the country at no given time. Imagine fogs coming on (and the foggy month of September is generally chosen for

excursions), when signals are of no avail; and then consider if the chances of excursion trains coming in collision with express trains, which generally have to pass them on the same line, are less than passengers on board steamers have of shipwrecks from icebergs or the rocks of Cape Race! Indeed, it is to us a most extraordinary thing that, with these excursion trains flying across and athwart the island in every direction, we do not hear more of serious accidents to railway travellers than we do.

But, it may be asked, cannot we in any way avoid the causes of danger and disturbance which at present render excursion trains such a nuisance to the ordinary railway traveller? It seems to us that the difficulty of obtaining tickets may be obviated by issuing them a day or two beforehand. Railway companies may urge that this plan would not answer, as holiday folks would like to make sure of a fine day before investing their money in a ticket. If this really be a valid objection, the only way to meet it would be to distribute the tickets when the carriages were in motion. By so doing very much valuable time would be saved, and one element of danger would be eliminated. It is quite clear that the system of adding carriage after carriage to a train, until it attains a length which is unmanageable without the aid of a locomotive to push behind as well as to pull, should be entirely prohibited. The multitude who trust themselves to a train so propelled are placing their lives between an upper and a nether millstone; and if a stop be not put to this most perilous method