There was a strong push made to get one laid down in Broadway, and corporation jobbery had nearly succeeded. For my own part, did I live in Broadway, if they would lay down a single line of rail, with shunters at intervals, to enable the cars to pass one another, and fix regular hours for running, I should infinitely prefer it to the unlimited army of omnibuses that now block up the street; but I fancy the interests of the latter are too deeply involved to be readily resigned.
Before leaving the subject of railway carriages, I may as well give you a description of the travelling cars in ordinary use.
They are forty-two feet long, nine and a half wide, from six to six and a half feet high, and carry from fifty to sixty passengers. Each seat is three feet four inches long, placed at right angles to the window, and has a reversible back. There is a passage through the centre of the car, between the rows of seats. In winter, a stove is always burning in each carriage; and in one of them there is generally a small room partitioned off, containing a water-closet, &c. A door is placed at each extremity, outside which there is a platform whereon the break is fixed. These carriages are supported at each end by four wheels, of thirty-three inches diameter, fitted together in a frame-work, and moving on a pivot, whereby to enable them to take more easily any sharp bend in the road. Their weight is from ten to twelve tons, and their cost from 400l. to 450l. sterling. The system of coupling adopted is alike rude and uncomfortable; instead of screwing the carriages tightly up against the buffers, as is the practice in England, they are simply hooked together, thus subjecting the passengers to a succession of jerks when starting, and consequently producing an equal number of concussions when the train stops.
From the foregoing sketch, it will be seen that the narrowness of the seats is such as to prevent its two occupants--if of ordinary dimensions--from sitting together without rubbing shoulders. It will also be observed, that the passage through the centre of the carriages enables any one to pass with ease throughout the whole length of the train. This is a privilege of which the mercurial blood and inquisitive mind of the American take unlimited advantage, rendering the journey one continued slamming of doors, which, if the homoeopathic principle be correct, would prove an infallible cure for headache, could the sound only be triturated, and passed through the finest sieve, so as to reach the tympanum in infinitesimal doses. But, alas! it is administered wholesale, and with such power, that almost before the ear catches the sound, it is vibrating in the tendon Achilles. It is said by some, that salmon get accustomed to crimping; and I suppose that, in like manner, the American tympanum gets accustomed to this abominable clatter and noise.