especially to look at the two levers, the levers
by the movement of which to and fro, according
to the usual plan, the danger signals are every
day raised or lowered at all railway stations.
The iron handles of the two levers we found
firmly glued back to the lips of two large
magnets, that projected like two posts out of
the ground beside them. Each lever was
thus fastened back, and in that position each
held down the corresponding danger signal.
The poles telegraphed " All right."

But it is to be noted that the magnets were
electro-magnets, that they were massive plates
of steel, round which the wires that left the
battery were coiled, one wire about each
magnet, coiled in many a fold, upon the way
to the small box under the rail. When the
electric current passed along the wires, as it
was then doing, those bars were magnets strong
enough to hold the levers back and to support
the weight attached to them, which hoists the
danger signal when it is allowed to fall. Let
a train or truck now come into the station:
the flange of the first wheel presses on the
spring that causes the two ends of wire to
separate within the buried box. Instantly
the electric current ceases, the magnetic power
quits the bars of steel, and the levers are
drawn back by the unresisted weights that
do their assigned work: out shoot therefore
the danger signals. Once out only the will
of man can draw them in again.

This is the whole device, and it is one so
beautifully simple that we think enough has
been already said to make it comprehensible.
So long as the battery is kept in working
order, no train can come into or pass a station
without throwing up the danger signals. Once
up, they remain up till a station officer
deliberately puts them down, by restoring the
lever to the magnet, for the magnet has no
power to draw it back again, though it has
very abundant power to retain it when the
contact is restored. If, however, any rash
attempt be made to put the danger signal
down while there is a train actually at the
station, pressing on the rail and breaking the
voltaic current, the magnet will aid no such
indiscretion, for in such a case it will not act.
What if the battery be neglected, or the wires
be cut in any place? Luckily, in that case,
the result can only be cessation of the current
and the hoisting of the danger signals. The
self-acting principle is thus in every way
calculated to protect the traveller, and as the
apparatus we have been describing is not a
substitute for the old method, but a graft
upon it, in case of necessity the signals may
be worked at any station just as they are now
worked, even after the establishment of the
self-acting system. The cost of adopting the
self-acting railway signals, of the kind we
have described, cannot of course easily be
deduced from the expenses of an isolated first
experiment; but it is not likely that they
would involve an expense of more than fifteen
pounds a station. The cost of Whitworth's
contrivance, including signal apparatus at the
stations, was, if we remember rightly,
estimated at twenty-five pounds to each engine.

Thus, then, there are now two schemes for
the protection of the public against collisions,
offered to the notice of the railway potentates.
We ask again, need railway travellers be
smashed?

Before we quit this subject we may add,
that as we came into the London Bridge
station on our return from Red Hill, there
was pointed out to us a train that had been
fitted up in obedience to the public wish
with means of communication by a bell
between the guard and driver. It was said,
somewhat triumphantly, that "it was a perfect
failure, for the bell did nothing but jingle the
whole way with the motion of the train, and
the driver never could be sure whether or not
the guard was ringing it." Was it a kitchen-
bell, hung on a spring? It was a bell hung
in some way, we fear, with an eye to failure,
since it is surely notorious that there exist in
these days bells answering to each pull, gong-
fashion, with a single blow upon the metal
that no shaking of a locomotive could
produce, and no state of vibration simulate or
mystify.

When it is asked of a railway director,
or of a railway official, what a railway
accident generally costs, the conventional reply
is, "Oh! somewhere about ten thousand
pounds." Surely five-and-twenty pounds
per engine for Mr. Whitworth's contrivance,
or fifteen pounds per station for Mr. Jonathan
Crowley's plan—instead of being unprofitable
investments—would give an upward
impetus to the value of railway stock, as
a means of economy in superseding costly
repairs and swingeing compensations—not to
mention the saving of the mere lives of
passengers.

A CHILD'S HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

CHAPTER XXIX.

HENRY THE EIGHTH had made a will,
appointing a council of sixteen to govern the
kingdom for his son, while he was under age
(he was now only ten years old), and
another council of twelve to help them. The
most powerful of the first council was the
EARL OF HERTFORD, the young King's uncle,
who lost no time in bringing his nephew with
great state up to Enfield, and thence to the
Tower. It was considered at the time a
striking proof of virtue in the young King
that he was sorry for his father's death; but,
as common subjects have that virtue, too,
sometimes, we will say no more about it.

There was a curious part of the late King's
will, requiring his executors to fulfil whatever
promises he had made. Some of the court
wondering what these might be, the Earl of
Hertford and the other noblemen interested,
said that they were promises to advance and
enrich them. So, the Earl of Hertford made