per minute, and possible to print three
hundred.

The first thing about the machine which
catches the eye is an upright mahogany shaft,
about two feet high, large enough in the
inside to contain a pile of blank tickets, laid
flat upon each other. Hidden within the
machine is a little form of type, containing
the names of the places to be printed, and the
class of carriage. The practice of printing
the fare is now nearly abolished, it being
found to occasion great loss and inconvenience
in case of the fare having to be altered;
which must now and then happen. The type
is inked by a saturated ribbon, which travels
over a wheel, and is brought into contact with
the form. A feeder withdraws the blank
tickets incessantly, one by one, from the
bottom of the pile, and passes them under
the form of type, which is pressed down upon
each as it proceeds to the opening where it
presents itself, face uppermost, to the printer
who is working the lever, so that he can see
that each is right and complete, before it falls
into its place in the receptacle below. As
we have said, two or three hundred can pass
under his eye every minute that he is at
work. But each one of these tickets bears a
different number, from 0 up to 10,000. Two
brass-banded wheels, so close to each other as
to look like one, and each bearing raised
figures, revolve at different rates with the
working of the rest of the apparatus, the
distance of one figure at a time for the units,
and the second wheel, the distance of one
figure at a time for the hundreds: so that
the tickets present a numbered end to the eye
of the printer, as he works his lever. Lest
there should be any mistake, however,
through a moment's lapse of attention on the
part of the workman, there is a Checking
Machine—also the invention of Mr. Edmondson
—by which the printed tickets are finally
tested. They are piled in a shaft, and dropped,
one by one, by the turning of a handle which
turns also an index, numbered; so that the
number turned up and the ticket dropped
should correspond. This process is so easy
that six hundred per minute can be disposed of.

There are specimens in this room of all the receptacles
for tickets invented by Mr. Edmondson;
the Issue Cases, of various prices and
constructions, from the small one needed at
a little rural station or on board a steamer,
to the great cupboard required at any central
railway station. There are the shafts or
columns which are to be kept supplied with
tickets, the undermost of which tickets is to
be drawn out by the touch of a finger-tip;
and there are the slips of slate on which the
clerk is to note down the number of the
ticket with which he begins his issue for
the train then in hand. There are drawers
or cases, with compartments, with similar
slips of slate for humbler uses. There
is also a more important little machine
than any other but the printing-machine
—the Dating-press. We are all familiar
with the click of the sort of bottle-jack
which stands on the counter of every booking-office;
that machine into which the clerk
pushes one end of the ticket he is selling,
and from which it comes out dated. This is
Mr. Edmondson's convenient dating-press,
which does its work without any further
trouble to the clerk than his changing the
type the last thing at night for the next day,
and seeing now and then that the ribbon is
duly saturated with the mixture which is to
ink the type. Let us see—what is there besides
in this quiet little Dublin office? There is
the box of type, in the slits of which are the
arranged types—the names of the stations, all
ready to be transferred to the form in the
machine. And there is a neat mahogany
slide or case, in which the printed tickets are
marshalled, to be tied in packets of two
hundred and fifty; and whence they are
taken to be packed in their proper drawers,
in readiness for the orders which will certainly
be coming in soon. In the general directions
issued, in the form of a pamphlet, to all
clerks-in-charge on railways, it is the first
order that they are to be incessantly careful
to keep a sufficient provision of tickets from
their own station to every other to which
passengers are booked: and especially when
fairs, or other incidents, are likely to cause
an increased demand; and next, that the
tubes are to be duly replenished with tickets,
the lowest number being at the bottom. Each
clerk had need be careful to watch lest any of
his stock should be misplaced; for, if too high
a number gets abroad, he must account for
all below it. The rule is, that the clerk must
make good all deficiencies, and pay over all
surplus money. This is no hardship to an
able and honest clerk, who will not get
wrong in his accounts; and it is a necessary
rule, if the vast host of railway clerks is to be
kept in any order at all. But it renders a
sharp look-out a matter of indispensable self-defence
to the official who lives under such an
ordinance. After the closing of the hatch in
the booking-office, the account of the passengers
just despatched has to be made out;
and this is done by means of the numbering
on the ticket. The closing number that went
away by the preceding train is booked; and
at the bottom of the tube is the lowest
number remaining; the number between the
two is that which has now to be accounted
for—that, of course, of the passengers who are
now whirling away to their several destinations.
The clerk has to record twice the
closing number of the tickets for each train;
that is, in the compartments at the station,
and in the proper column in the passengers'
ticket-book, which is ruled and printed for
the purpose. There are returns, in a puzzling
number, to be filled up daily, several of which
are connected, more or less, with the records
involved in the delivery of these wonderful
tickets. We will not perplex ourselves with