The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century. by Edward W. Byrn

transcontinental railways, was completed in 1869. The great Trans-Siberian Railway is nearing completion, and in the Twentieth Century a Trans-Sahara Railway will probably relieve the burdens of the camel, as it has already done those of the horse. At the end of the year 1898 there were in use in the United States 36,746 locomotives, 1,318,700 cars, and the mileage in tracks, including second track and sidings, was 245,238.87, which, if extended in a straight line, would build a railway to the moon. The money investment represented in capital stock and bonds was $11,216,886,452. The gross earnings for the year 1898 were $1,249,558,724. The net earnings were $389,666,474. Tons of freight moved were 912,973,853. Receipts from freight were $868,924,526. Number of passengers carried was 514,982,288. Receipts from passengers were $272,589,591, and dividends paid were $94,937,526. Add to the above the elevated railroads and street railroads, which are not included, and the immensity of the railroad business in the United States becomes apparent. In 1898 the United States exported 468 locomotives, worth $3,883,719. Mulhall estimates that the steam horse power of railroads in the world amounted in 1896 to 40,420,000, of which the United States had more than one-third. He also states that the railways in the United States carry _every day_, in merchandise, a weight equal to that of the whole of the seventy millions of persons constituting its population; that the total railway traffic of the world in 1894 averaged ten million passengers and six million tons of merchandise _daily_; and that the total railway capital of the world reached in that year, 6,745 million sterling, or about thirty-three billion dollars. It is said that the highest railway speed ever attained by steam prior to 1900 was by locomotive No. 564 of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railroad, made during part of a run from Chicago to Buffalo. In this run 86 miles were made at an average rate of 72.92 miles an hour. The train load was 304,500 pounds, and the 86 mile run included one mile at 92.3 miles an hour, eight miles at 85.44 miles an hour, and thirty-three miles at 80.6 miles an hour. On May 26, 1900, however, an experiment on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, made by Mr. F. U. Adams between Baltimore and Washington, demonstrated that by sheathing the train to prevent retardation by the air, an average speed of 78.6 miles an hour was obtained, and for five miles on a down grade a speed of 102.8 miles an hour was reached. The largest and most powerful locomotives in the world are those being built for the Pittsburg, Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad for hauling long trains of iron and ore, one of which has just been completed. Its cylinders are 24 × 32 inches; drive wheels, 54 inches diameter; weight, 125 tons; draw bar pull 56,300 pounds, and hauling capacity 7,847 tons. One of these mammoth engines is capable of drawing a train of box cars, loaded with wheat, and more than a mile long, at a speed of ten miles an hour. This load of wheat would represent the yield of 14 square miles of land. No doubt it would greatly astonish our forefathers to know that at the end of the century we would have iron horses capable of carting away, at a single load, the products of 14 square miles of the country side, and do it at a gait faster than that of their local mail coach.