facts before our readers now which have never before been published, which are sufficiently startling, and while supplying a missing link in the history of the locomotive, go far to show that much that has hitherto been held to be true is not true at all.

When the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was opened on the 15th of September, 1830, among those present was James Nasmyth, subsequently the inventor of the steam hammer. Mr. Nasmyth was a good freehand draughtsman, and he sketched the Rocket as it stood on the line. The sketch is still in existence. Mr. Nasmyth has placed this sketch at our disposal, thus earning the gratitude of our readers, and we have reproduced as nearly as possible, but to a somewhat enlarged scale, this invaluable link in the history of the locomotive. Mr. Nasmyth writes concerning it, July 26, 1884: "This slight and hasty sketch of the Rocket was made the day before the opening of the Manchester and Liverpool Railway, September 12, 1830. I availed myself of the opportunity of a short pause in the experimental runs with the Rocket, of three or four miles between Liverpool and Rainhill, George Stephenson acting as engine driver and his son Robert as stoker. The limited time I had for making my sketch prevented me from making a more elaborate one, but such as it is, all the important and characteristic details are given; but the pencil lines, after the lapse of fifty-four years, have become somewhat indistinct." The pencil drawing, more than fifty years old, has become so faint that its reproduction has become a difficult task. Enough remains, however, to show very clearly what manner of engine this Rocket was. For the sake of comparison we reproduce an engraving of the Rocket of 1829. A glance will show that an astonishing transformation had taken place in the eleven months which had elapsed between the Rainhill trials and the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. We may indicate a few of the alterations. In 1829 the cylinders were set at a steep angle; in 1830 they were nearly horizontal. In 1829 the driving wheels were of wood; in 1830 they were of cast iron. In 1829 there was no smoke-box proper, and a towering chimney; in 1830 there was a smoke-box and a comparatively short chimney. In 1829 a cask and a truck constituted the tender; in 1830 there was a neatly designed tender, not very different in style from that still in use on the Great Western broad gauge. All these things may perhaps be termed concomitants, or changes in detail. But there is a radical difference yet to be considered. In 1829 the fire-box was a kind of separate chamber tacked on to the back of the barrel of the boiler, and communicating with it by three tubes; one on each side united the water spaces, and one at the top the steam spaces. In 1830 all this had disappeared, and we find in Mr. Nasmyth's sketch a regular fire-box, such as is used to this moment. In one word, the Rocket of 1829 is different from the Rocket of 1830 in almost every conceivable respect; and we are driven perforce to the conclusion that the Rocket of 1829 never worked at all on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway; the engine of 1830 was an entirely new engine. We see no possible way of escaping from this conclusion. The most that can be said against it is that the engine underwent many alterations. The alterations must, however, have been so numerous that they were tantamount to the construction of a new engine. It is difficult, indeed, to see what part of the old engine could exist in the new one; some plates of the boiler shell might, perhaps, have been retained, but we doubt it. It may, perhaps, disturb some hitherto well rooted beliefs to say so, but it seems to us indisputable that the Rocket of 1829 and 1830 were totally different engines.

FIG. 1. THE ROCKET, 1829. THE ROCKET, 1830.

Our engraving, Fig. 1, is copied from a drawing made by Mr. Phipps, M.I.C.E., who was employed by Messrs. Stephenson to compile a drawing of the Rocket from such drawings and documents as could be found. This gentleman had made the original drawings of the Rocket of 1829, under Messrs. G. & R. Stephenson's direction. Mr. Phipps is quite silent about the history of the engine during the eleven months between the Rainhill trials and the opening of the railway. In this respect he is like every one else. This period is a perfect blank. It is assumed that from Rainhill the engine went back to Messrs. Stephenson's works; but there is nothing on the subject in print, so far as we are aware. Mr. G.R. Stephenson lent us in 1880 a working model of the Rocket. An engraving of this will be found in The Engineer for September 17, 1880. The difference between it and the engraving below, prepared from Mr. Phipps' drawing, is, it will be seen, very small—one of proportions more than anything else. Mr. Stephenson says of his model: "I can say that it is a very fair representation of what the engine was before she was altered." Hitherto it has always been taken for granted that the alteration consisted mainly in reducing the angle at which the cylinders were set. The Nasmyth drawing alters the whole aspect of the question, and we are now left to speculate as to what became of the original Rocket. We are told that after "it" left the railway it was employed by Lord Dundonald to supply steam to a rotary engine; then it propelled a steamboat; next it drove small machinery in a shop in Manchester; then it was employed in a brickyard; eventually it was purchased as a curiosity by Mr. Thomson, of Kirkhouse, near Carlisle, who sent it to Messrs. Stephenson to take care of. With them it remained for years. Then Messrs. Stephenson put it into something like its original shape, and it went to South Kensington Museum, where "it" is now. The question is, What engine is this? Was it the Rocket of 1829 or the Rocket of 1830, or neither? It could not be the last, as will be understood from Mr. Nasmyth's drawing; if we bear in mind that the so-called fire-box on the South Kensington engine is only a sham made of thin sheet iron without water space, while the fire-box shown in Mr. Nasmyth's engine is an integral part of the whole, which could not have been cut off. That is to say, Messrs. Stephenson, in getting the engine put in order for the Patent Office Museum, certainly did not cut off the fire-box shown in Mr. Nasmyth's sketch, and replace it with the sham box now on the boiler. If our readers will turn to our impression for the 30th of June, 1876, they will find a very accurate engraving of the South Kensington engine, which they can compare with Mr. Nasmyth's sketch, and not fail to perceive that the differences are radical.

In "Wood on Railroads," second edition, 1832, page 377, we are told that "after those experiments"—the Rainhill trials—"were concluded, the Novelty underwent considerable alterations;" and on page 399, "Mr. Stephenson had also improved the working of the Rocket engine, and by applying the steam more powerfully in the chimney to increase the draught, was enabled to raise a much greater quantity of steam than before." Nothing is said as to where the new experiments took place, nor their precise date. But it seems that the Meteor and the Arrow—Stephenson engines—were tried at the same time; and this is really the only hint Wood gives as to what was done to the Rocket between the 6th of October, 1829, and the 15th of September, 1830.

There are men still alive who no doubt could clear up the question at issue, and it is much to be hoped that they will do so. As the matter now stands, it will be seen that we do not so much question that the Rocket in South Kensington Museum is, in part perhaps, the original Rocket of Rainhill celebrity, as that it ever ran in regular service on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. Yet, if not, then we may ask, what became of the Rocket