The Iron Horse

It was well for the engine-driver that he had been trained in a rough school, for his powers of endurance were severely tested that night, by the attentions of his numerous friends who called to inquire for him, and in some cases insisted on seeing him.

Among others came one of the directors of the company, who, seeing how matters stood, with much consideration said that he would not sit down, but had merely looked in for a moment, to tell John Marrot that an appointment had been found for his son Robert in the “Works,” and that if he would send him over in the morning he would be introduced to the locomotive superintendent and initiated into the details of his new sphere of action.

This was very gratifying to the engine-driver of course, but much more so to Bob himself, whose highest earthly ambition was to become, as he styled it, an engineer. When that aspiring youth came home that night after cleaning his lamps, he wiped his oily hands on a bundle of waste, and sat down beside his sire to inquire considerately into his state of body, and to give him, as he expressed it, the noos of the line.

“You see, daddy,” he said, “the doctor tells me you’re to be kep’ quiet, an’ not allowed to talk, so in course you’ve got nothin’ to do but lie still an’ listen while I give ’ee the noos. So ’ere goes. An’ don’t you sit too near baby, mother, else you’ll wake ’im up, an’ we’ll have a yell as’ll put talkin’ out o’ the question. Well then—”

“Bob,” said Loo, interrupting her brother as she sat down opposite, and began to mend one of baby’s pinafores—which by the way was already so mended and patched as to have lost much of its original form and appearance—“Bob, Mr Able has been here, and—”

“Who’s Mr Able?” demanded Bob.

“One of the directors,—don’t you know?”

“How should I know?” retorted Bob; “you don’t suppose that the d’rectors is all my partikler friends, do you? There’s only two or three of ’em as has the honer of my acquaintance.”

“Well,” resumed Loo with a laugh, “you ought to consider Mr Able one of your particular friends at all events, for he has been here this evening making kind inquiries after father, and telling him that he has got you appointed to the works that you’ve been so long hankering—”

“What!” interrupted Bob in great excitement; “you don’t mean that, Loo?”

“Yes, I do.”

“To the great Clatterby Works, where the big hammer is?”

“Well, I suppose it is to these works,” said Loo.

“Ay, Bob, to the Clatterby Works, lad; so you’re a made man if you only behave yourself and do your dooty,” said John Marrot in reply to his son’s look of inquiry.

In the strength of his satisfaction the boy rose, and, taking Loo round the neck, kissed her pretty mouth heartily, after which he bestowed the same favour on his mother and little Gertie, and looked as if he meant to do it to baby too, but he thought better of it.

“Why, mother,” he said, resuming his seat at the bedside, “these are the works where they’ve got the big hammers—so big, mother; oh! you’ve no notion how big they are, and heavy. Why, one of ’em is full five tons in weight—think o’ that! equal to five carts of coals, mother, all rolled into one.”

“Nonsense!” said Mrs Marrot.

“But it’s true,” said Bob, earnestly.

“Nonsense!” repeated Mrs Marrot; “w’y, what would be the use of a hammer as no one could lift?”

“Steam lifts it, mother,” said Bob, “as easy—yes, as easy as you lift the rollin’ pin.”

The unbelieving woman still shook her head, smiled, and said, “Nonsense!”

“Moreover,” continued Bob, waxing enthusiastic on his favourite topic, “I’m told, for I haven’t seen ’em yet, that they’ve got a pair o’ scissors there as can cut cold iron as easy as you can cut paper—they could cut through,” said Bob, pausing and looking round, “they could cut through the poker and tongs and shovel, all at one go, as easy as if they was straws.”

“Gammon!” said Mrs Marrot.

“Isn’t it a fact, daddy?” cried Bob.

“Quite true, Molly, my dear. I must take you over to see the works some day and convince you,” said John with a faint smile. “But what’s the news you were goin’ to give us, Bob?” he added.

“The noos?—ah; that good noos drove it all out o’ my ’ead. Well, as I wos agoin’ to say, there’s a great to-do down at the shed, ’cause it’s said that an awful lot o’ thefts has bin goin’ on of late at Bingly station, and it’s bin reported that some of the drivers or firemen are consarned in it. An’ d’ee know, father,” continued Bob, suddenly becoming grave and very earnest, “I heard one o’ the men say that Will Garvie is suspected.”

There was a momentary deep silence, as if every one had received a shock; then Mrs Marrot exclaimed “What say ’ee, boy?”

At the same time her husband demanded sternly, “Who said that?”

“I don’t know, father. I was passing through the shed at the time and didn’t see who spoke, I only heerd ’im.”

“Father,” said Leo, over whose face a deep crimson flush had spread, “surely you don’t for a moment believe it?”

“Believe it,” replied John, “believe that my mate, Will Garvie, is a thief? I’d as soon believe that my Molly was a murderer!”

The energetic driver here struck his fist so violently on the bed as to cause his wounded side an acute twinge of pain. It had scarcely passed away when the door opened and Will Garvie himself entered.

“Well, Jack,” he said, going up to his friend’s couch and taking his hand, “how d’you feel now—better?”

The frank open countenance of the young man—albeit begrimed with smoke, and his clear laughing blue eyes, were such a flat contradiction to the charge which had been made against him that John looked up in his face and laughed.

“Well, you must be better, if that’s the way you answer me!”

“Oh, I’m all right,” said John, quietly; “leastwise I’m on the rails agin, an’ only shunted on to a sidin’ to be overhauled and repaired a bit. You’ve heard the noos, I fancy?”

“What of Bob’s appointment?” said Will, glancing at Loo; for he knew that anything that was for Bob’s advantage gave her intense delight, and he liked to watch her countenance in such circumstances—“of course I’ve heard of that. Moreover, I’ve bin to the locomotive superintendent and got leave to go over with him to-morrow and show him through the works, along with any of his family that might want to go. I made a special request for this, thinkin’ that mayhap—”

He looked pointedly at Loo, and Loo looked pointedly at the pinafore which suddenly claimed her undivided attention. Bob, before Will could finish his sentence, broke in with—

“Now, ain’t that a su’cumstance? w’y, we was just talkin’ of havin’ mother over to see the works, an’ lettin’ her be convinced by her own eyes that there is a hammer there of five ton weight, drove by steam, an’ a pair o’ scissors as can cut cold iron an inch thick. You’ll go mother, won’t you?”

“Well, I dessay it would be amoosin’; yes, I’ll go, Bob, if father’s better.”

Accordingly, much to Will Garvie’s disappointment it was arranged that Mrs Marrot was to accompany him and Bob to the great railway “Works” on the following day.

Chapter Eight.

Mrs Marrot and Bob Visit the Great Clatterby “Works.”

We cannot presume to say what sort of a smiddy Vulcan’s was, but we feel strongly inclined to think that if that gentleman were to visit the works of the Grand National Trunk Railway, which are about the finest of the kind in the kingdom, he would deem his own old shop a very insignificant affair!

The stupendous nature of the operations performed there; the colossal grandeur of the machinery employed; the appalling power of the forces called into action; the startling chiaro scuro of the furnaces; the Herculean activity of the 3500 “hands;” the dread pyrotechnic displays; the constant din and clangour—pshaw! the thing is beyond conception. “Why then,” you will say, “attempt description?” Because, reader, of two evils we always choose the less. Description is better than nothing. If you cannot go and see and hear for yourself, there is nothing left for you but to fall back on description.

But of all the sights to be seen there, the most interesting, perhaps, and the most amusing, was the visage of worthy Mrs Marrot as she followed Will Garvie and her son, and gazed in rapt amazement at the operations, and listened to the sounds, sometimes looking all round with a half-imbecile expression at the rattling machinery, at other times fixing her eyes intently down on one piece of mechanism in the vain hope of penetrating its secrets to the core. Bob was not much less amazed than his mother, but he had his sharp wits about him, and was keenly alive to the delight of witnessing his mother’s astonishment.

The works covered several acres of ground, and consisted of a group of huge buildings which were divided into different departments, and in these the railway company manufactured almost every article used on the line—from a locomotive engine to a screw-nail.

Here, as we have said, above 3500 men and boys were at work, and all sorts of trades were represented. There were draughtsmen to make designs, and, from these, detailed working drawings. Smiths to forge all the wrought-iron-work, with hammermen as assistants. Pattern-makers to make wooden patterns for castings. Moulders, including loam, dry-sand and green-sand moulders and brass-founders. Dressers to dress the rough edges off the castings when brought from the foundry. Turners in iron and brass. Planers and nibblers, and slotters and drillers. Joiners and sawyers, and coach-builders and painters. Fitters and erecters, to do the rougher and heavier part of fitting the engines together. Boiler-makers, including platers or fitters, caulkers and riveters. Finishers to do the finer part of fitting—details and polishing. In short almost every trade in the kingdom concentrated in one grand whole and working harmoniously, like a vast complex machine, towards one common end—the supply of railway rolling-stock, or “plant” to the line.

All these were busy as bees, for they were engaged on the equitable system of “piece-work,”—which means that each man or boy was paid for each piece of work done, instead of being paid by time, which of course induced each to work as hard as he could in order to make much as possible—a system which suited both masters and men. Of course there are some sorts of employment where it would be unjust to pay men by the amount of work done—as, for instance, in some parts of tin-mines, where a fathom of rock rich in tin is as difficult to excavate as a fathom of rock which is poor in tin—but in work such as we are describing the piece-work system suits best.

Like a wise general, Will Garvie began with the department in which the less astonishing operations were being performed. This was the timber and sawing department.