would tell you of long, dark, winter nights, when the tempest howled madly through the trees and bridges and sang shrilly in the telegraph wires; when the rain fell in a deluge from the inky sky, or the sleet and snow drove in blinding clouds and was piled upon the weatherproof tarpaulins. Or again they would relate of running smoothly on summer nights under the pale southern moon, or when the stars glittered in the frosty heavens, or dense fog, so troublesome and dangerous to the ever-watchful and valiant old driver, shut everything out of view, signals and all, so that their very whereabouts were only known and identified by paying close attention to the loud, shot-like explosions of the detonators placed along the line by the fogmen.

Now all these things are at an end. They have run their race, and grown old in the service. They have fulfilled their period of usefulness on the line and, like old veterans returned from the war, they have come back to their native town to end their days. Being fairly sound of constitution and having escaped the shocks of collision and accident, they were adjudged too solid to be broken up yet, so, as a last use, they were placed here to receive the punchings and trimmings from the shears and presses, and ingloriously waste away in their old age, exposed to all the inclemencies and caprices of the weather.

The scrap, made daily, soon amounts to hundreds of tons. It is of all shapes and sizes. There is plate from an eighth of an inch to an inch and a half thick from the presses, ends and trimmings of rods and bars from the shears and steam-hammers, burs from the stamping plant and scrag ends from the forgings. In addition to this there are scores of tons of old iron and steel, brought from all over the system to be cut up at the hydraulic shears — sole-bars of waggons, stanchions and “diagonals,” “T”-iron plates, and hundreds of old draw-bars and buffers. The iron and steel are carefully observed and kept separate and huge piles soon accumulate, far more than the waggons can hold. The iron refuse is by and by passed on to the rolling mills, while the steel scrap awaits a purchaser. No attempt is made to utilise that on the premises. There are secrets in the manufacture of steel which are never betrayed to outsiders, and it would be a waste of time and money for the local furnacemen and forgers to attempt to do anything with it. However carefully the furnaceman tends it in the fire he cannot get it to cohere well in the piles, and if it is at all over-heated it bursts and scatters in all directions, brittle and glassy, as soon as the steam-hammer touches it with a gentle blow.

There is, at the same time, enormous waste in the matter of scrap iron and steel, which intelligent supervision would certainly lessen. Material that might economically be used in the workshop is indiscriminately passed out with the rubbish and sold away at a cheap rate — at a fraction of its real value. Tons of metal — good solid iron, often of the highest quality — which might be used for forging and stamping, are rejected and scrapped because it would take a trifle longer to handle. Other large scrap material might be slabbed and used without sending it to the mill, and thus large profits would accrue to the shed; for the rolling mills people will only purchase, theoretically, at trade prices, that is, at about two pounds a ton for scrap iron.

CHAPTER III

THE SHUNTERS — WATCHMEN — DETECTING A THIEF — FIRES — CARRIAGE FINISHERS — PAINTERS — “WASHERS-DOWN” — CUSHION-BEATERS — CHANGES AND INNOVATIONS — DEPARTMENTAL RELATIONS

A short way off in the yard, in a small space clear of the confusing network of lines that cross and recross here and there, running in every direction and connecting the various workshops together, are two old railway coaches dispossessed of their wheels and lodged upon baulks of timber let into the ground. Like the old scrap waggons, they have had their day in active service, and, coming home in fairly good condition, though antiquated in style and useless for passenger traffic, have yet been found convenient as occasional storehouses and shelters. They are now used as cabins, one for the shunters, who conduct their operations round about, and the other for watchmen, and they are fitted with stoves for warming the men’s food, and for drying their clothes in wet weather. The roofs and windows are intact, and some of the original seats still remain. These are of bare wood and are not padded and upholstered in the comfortable and luxurious style now required and expected by the railway traveller.

These old carriages are at this time very rarely met with and are nearly extinct. For years after they disappeared from the general traffic — superseded by more commodious and comfortable vehicles — the best of them were kept stored up in sheds and yards in out-of-the-way places to await the time of trippers and excursionists. Then they were regularly hauled out to accommodate the multitude. The windows were hastily wiped over and the interiors dusted out; they were ready to receive the people. Goods engines of the old type were brought up to draw them along. The trippers squeezed themselves inside, and, with the shrieking of steam whistles and hooters and the playing of concertinas and melodions, the trains started off and went jolting and jogging away to their destinations. At the end of the tripping season the coaches were again stored away in the yards and sidings, until they became too crazy and dangerous to run on the main line, when they were either utilised for storehouses and shelters, or broken up. The refuse wood from the destruction of old worn-out rolling stock is sawn up and used for lighting the fires in the furnaces and boilers, and is distributed throughout the system. A large quantity is also sold to the workmen, who use it both for firing and for the construction of outhouses.

The shunters of the yard are a hard-working body of men, and they are exposed to many dangers. The hours are long and they must cover many miles during the day by running up and down the lines. It is their duty to transfer the carriages and waggons from road to road and from one workshop to another, to dispose of the old ones brought in for repairs, to lead out the new, and distribute the various stores — iron and steel, coal, coke, and timber — at several points. Whatever the weather may be they must be up and doing, or the traffic in the yard would soon be in utter confusion. Rain or snow, cold or heat, sunshine or cloud, July glow or December fog and gloom are all one to them. The busy swarm of workmen comes and goes, the furnaces spout their dense black clouds of smoke into the heavens; the dazzling steam, shot out from the engines and steam-hammers, leaps up in an ascending pillar, the rapid wheels spin round in the roof or under the wall, and the endless toil goes on, all which must be catered for by the shunters.

Great care must be taken to prevent the sidings from becoming blocked by crossing a wrong point. Where two or more engines are operating over a complex siding this may easily be done, and a delay of several hours will be the result. If an inexperienced shunter, mistaking the number of his points, shifts his waggons on to the wrong track and, not perceiving his error, at once proceeds to carry out several other manœuvres, he may shut in the engines so completely and confusedly that he will want all his wits about him to extricate them again; it will be like a mathematical problem. Happily for the shunter’s credit, this is not a common occurrence.