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cents per mile; and the cost on the Harlem railway is greater, they keeping their own horses. I estimate the cost of a steam omnibus at eleven cents per mile, and of a steam car at eight or nine cents. I think there is a general opinion that steam will be much cheaper than horses, even at the speed allowable in cities; and that the reason it has not long ago been introduced has been political rather than economical. At least, so far as I have heard the objections of men in their management, they have been mainly on the ground that the conditions of their grants prohibit their using steam, and they have had no hope of getting those conditions altered without enormous sacrifice of money, and principle, and character. I know nothing of the justice of the charges of bribery that are current against legislators and councilmen; but the belief that these charges are just has discouraged men from attempting to introduce steam cars, and I have myself been prevented from raising capital to build a steam omnibus, by the refusal of a license either for an omnibus or a hackney coach. The foundation of the financial difficulty is this political difficulty. It was so in England. Not until within three years has there been an act of parlia ment to protect steam carriages against arbitrary tolls, and that bill limits their speed to ten miles per hour in the country, and five miles in the cities, while horses may be driven at their highest speed-twelve or fourteen miles per hour-the great advantage of steam is denied to it. Under such discouragements capitalists have declined investments. Abundant capital was subscribed, on condition that parliament should pass a bill to place steam carriages on equality with horses; but the Lords rejected two bills which the Commons had passed, and the matter was abandoned in 1835, and not again agitated until 1858; and even then 'the meager relief was not granted until the third year after it was asked. It has been supposed that we in this country are not at liberty to use steam carriages without special leave. Street railways, whose privileges are special, cannot use steam until they have further privilege. Omnibuses of any kind must have licenses; and it is now difficult to get licenses for a new line. Hacks must be licensed; and the license clerks, for want of judgment, or supposed want of authority, may refuse to license steam; but private carriages need no license, and may be run by steam, and there is no law to hinder them, unless it be the common law against nuisances; and if this law is appealed to the complainant must prove that it is a nuisance. It must be clearly shown that the consequence complained of is not the result of imperfection that may be remedied, want of expertness that practice may supply, or of fright of horses that proper training may prevent. The distinction between English and American law and that of despotisms, is that in despotisms the subject has no liberty but that which is specially granted, but in free governments the subject or citizen has entire liberty in all things, except there are specific laws restricting it; and the court cannot stretch the law to make it reach a case not yet legislated upon. Hence, if steam carriages are built by individuals, or by clubs, and do not carry passengers or goods for hire, they can be run as they are now in London. But without hire they may not be deemed a good speculation, so people view it; but I should be glad of a chance to show the contrary to those who want wagons or carriages for

private use, or to gentlemen who may like to form clubs, and have private club carriages that will carry them with superior comfort and speed to their residences within twenty miles of the city.

There is a financial difficulty, which, although aggravated by the political difficulty, is distinct from it, and increases with the expiration of every steam carriage patent. It is the want of protection against the competition of all the plans that are free to be built at mere manufacturers' prices, and will be built as soon as the labor and outlays of inventors and their coöperators shall have convinced common carriers that steam can work cheaper than horses. In England, in 1832 to 1840, there were six or more different plans of steam carriages, nearly equal in efficiency and economy, which were rivals to each other, and threatened competition that would preclude profits commensurate with the risks incident to a new enterprise of this kind. These plans are all now free; therefore, they are more discouraging than when they were all patented. I have added to the invention a new element, which I deem indispensable to the most efficient and economical results on uneven roads. A first class engineering estabment in Philadelphia fully indorses my claims, and would have engaged in manufacturing on my plan,-making special tools for the work, had not their business suddenly become pressing in consequence of government work. But capitalists do not foresee mechanical results; to satisfy them I must first build a carriage, and run it effectually. That I have done; six carriages on my plan have been built and run satisfactorily, attaining speed of 18 and 22 miles per hour. Then arose a question-which I foresaw, though capitalists did not-it was this: Will not Gurney's, or Hancock's, or Ogle's, or Maceroni's, or Russell's, or Hill's, or Anderson's, or Moudslay's, or Field's, or Roberts', or Rickett's, or some of the untried plans, now free to compete, rival yours, or surpass it? To answer this question satisfactorily, I must build a carriage on every one of these plans, and beat every one of them, in a race, and in a year's wear, and show by attested books that mine is the most economical as well as the most pow erful. Then another question will arise: Have you done justice to these rival pians? Have you not puposely vitiated proportions, or jockeyed them so as to beat them? Will you give us a bond of indemnity, so that if we are hereafter beaten by these plans when they are built and improved by the Rogers' Locomotive Works, and all the other locomotive builders, we shall be reimbursed? There is no end to such caviling. If you indulge men in such illiberal fears, they will never cease to imagine difficulties. All we can say is, if you insist on assurance of profit, you must be content with current rates of profit-eight or nine per cent.; but if you will liberally hazard your capital and labor, you may honestly desire great profits. Your best security is, if you are diffident of your own engineering judgment, to consult engineers, and pay them for their opinions, and act upon them.

I have agreed with a majority of the present steam carriage builders and projectors in this country, to assign their patents and inventions to a company, if it can be formed with sufficient capital, so that we may not oppose and hinder each other, as the English did thirty years ago, and are doing now. I do not deem it expedient now to explain my plan publicly,

but I invite such as may wish to invest talent or capital to confer with me privately, and judge whether my views are such as will warrant them in coöperating with me.

Leaving now the discussion of the parts of this subject, and looking at the whole, as if all the interests were united, or as if we had a government, and the public interests were regarded, I may express my views of the relative economy of the old system, and the amended system now agitated, and the system which I propose, by saying that the introduction of steam cars, as now likely to be, sanctioned by the bill before the legislature, would, in the passenger traffic, nearly but not fully attain the economy that would result from the system I advocate; but it would in no degree improve the freight traffic, the hackney coach, private carriage and wagon traffic. It would involve the maintenance of two conflicting systems —a system of rails, injurious to common wheels, and obstructive, and incapable of turnouts, and it would still leave the streets in a state of uncleanliness inconsistent with the luxury of private houses, and in no respect economical even to the poorest of the people; on the contrary, a cause of injury to the clothing of the poor, and a severe tax upon them in every way. Even if the notion kept up by vulgar demagogues were true, that the laborers produce all the wealth, and pay all the taxes, still it would be best for the laborers to pay for clean streets, although the cost should be double what is now paid for filthy streets; but it is agreed by engineers that iron roads and steam would cost less than a quarter of what is now paid for the barbaric system of animal power, and roads suited to that power. Three cents a car per mile, compared with twenty-five cents a car per mile by horse power, warrants the exhibition of a greater saving than this. But the capital of the wealthy is the main element of the production of wealth; the machinery in England, in 1825, produced more than the whole population of the world could produce without machinery; and since that time this kind of capital has vastly increased, in this country as well as in England. Whoever teaches this doctrine, that tends to embitter the minds of laborers against capitalists, is either a vulgar speculator or a malignant knave. The real truth is, that in cities where trade is increasing, the taxes fall ultimately on the owners and lessees of real estate; every improvement is their speculation; if it is judicious, it adds to their wealth; if injudicious, it diminishes their wealth. It is my opinion that a board of talented civil and mechanical engineers could so improve Broadway as to add one-half to the value of the property upon it; and that in their improvements could be included an iron floor and a system of steam conveyances, controlled by a liberal company, or by a good government.

I deem it my duty to speak of the course pursued by the Broadway proprietors, in thwarting the schemes of the railway proprietors. In the beginning of that attempt to plant a great excrescence that should prevent a scientific progress, the proprietors appealed to the people, and by their votes got a new charter adopted by a great majority. Then, instead of manfully and liberally nominating good candidates for the council, they disgraced themselves, and betrayed the interests they volunteered to defend, by selecting from the two tickets nominated by the managers of the two [AM. INS.]

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parties. That was the last of their efforts. They had promised that when the would-be monopolists were defeated, they would propose a "relief" for Broadway. All they ever proposed was that the omnibuses should carry change-takers, as the cars do. I have little sympathy with men of wealth who have so little liberality, and who, though claiming to be gentlemen, seem to be unconscious that gentlemen have peculiar duties, and to suppose that they can act merely for their own interest and pleasure, and yet be honored more than other men. This class, like those who profess to be the elect in the religious world, look for benefits and enjoyments for themselves with the least exertion of their own. I understand that true Christians are to bear the burden of reforming the world, for the benefit of the world, being prompted thereto by the disposition which distinguishes them from sinners; so I understand that true gentlemen are to bear the burden of promoting liberal improvements, for the public good, being prompted thereto by the taste and liberality which distinguish them from the commonalty. I regret that a sense of duty constrains me to add, that I do not see in American gentlemen so vivid a sense of this duty as I see in English gentlemen, and especially in the conduct of the Broadway proprietors I do not see enough of this liberal spirit to entitle them to higher esteem than is due to respectable tradesmen.

I know nothing as to the truth or falsehood of the charge that George Law and others have bribed legislators to confer upon them a monopoly of the passenger traffic on Broadway and other streets; nor do I know what prospect the proprietors have of defeating the scheme altogether, or getting into the city treasury the value of the grant, or getting a low rate of fare for the benefit of the people; but I see in some of the proprietors a desponding air, which evinces anticipation of total defeat; and, from this appearance in those who know the means applied on both sides, I expect that the grant will be made to the applicants, without regard to the offers of the proprietors, or their remonstrances and legal proceedings, and that the courts will never annul or impair the grant. They are either sold or given away. They may ascribe their discomfiture, and the depreciation of their property, to their own lack of liberal enterprise.

Yet there is a means by which they can retrieve their defeat, and overpower the encroaching speculators. They can yet get possession of a power that will underwork and render profitless all that the grantees can oppose to them. But if they wait until the rails are laid, and steam is at work upon them, and the talent is employed by their opponents, then it will be too late for them to prevent the principle of cheapness from banishing elegance, and even decency from their street. The crowding and discomfort of the rail cars now in use, the presence of smoky and noisy locomotives, the dirt that a sordid government will not prevent, all preindicate that Broadway will assume a working character, and lose its former character of elegance and fashion. And within thirty years the Fifth avenue will be extended downward, and built in superior style, and Broadway will be eclipsed as Pearl street has been eclipsed. If the proprietors fail to avail themselves of the talents of civil and mechanical engineers, architects and others who have applied their faculties to the solution of this problem, and rely on their own crude notions, conceived

while their minds were occupied with business that required all their attention and abilities, it is scarcely disrespectful to them to say that they will produce a contrast extremely disadvantageous to their own property. But it is hardly to be expected that they will come to us, or to me, or to any mere projectors. We must go to them; and it is useless to go until we can propose to build and guarantee, or in some way to demonstrate our theories. Moreover, as the case now stands, since the new arrangement with the Harlem railway, it is necessary to show that they can get leave to run steam. This can be shown most conveniently by building some kind of vehicles for use on pavements and common roads, or for amusement. A few steam cabs, of the design shown, to run in the Central Park, would exhibit and introduce this power, and at the same time would be a profitable speculation.

As a preliminary to the construction of a cab, it would be prudent to practice with my large carriage until we can determine the power required on different roads. To fit up this carriage in the style of a pleasure carriage, so that it will be allowed to earn money in the Park, and to make the necessary exhibitions, would require from $600 to $1,000; $1,000 ought to be ready, not necessarily to be spent. The exhibition of this carriage would probably satisfy people as to whether it is expedient to follow up the scheme, or to abandon it. Now, I invite all present to confer with me as to the investment, in this enterprise, of money, talent, or whatever else will promote it. There is already promised to it a great amount of engineering talent, and several patent rights. I have for years represented that the English were defeated by the opposition of inventors against each other, and that we are likely to be defeated if we repeat their error; and that it is our duty, as members of a liberal profession, to unite our inventions so as to make the best whole, and to unite our means so as to promote the invention most efficiently and rapidly. If we take this liberal course, we may hope that liberal men will assist us by contributions of money, in such ways as may suit their dispositions, abilities and interests. One may give a few dollars, to see an interesting and probably useful experiment; another, instead of giving a little, may hazard considerable; and another, who has nothing but his talent and leisure to spare, may contribute advice and influence.

The general condition I have proposed, and which is thus far accepted, is that the profit shall be divided, by disinterested and skillful judges, so that every one who assists shall receive what the judges deem his due, after there has been time to learn the relative merit of his invention, capital or other service, by fair and full trial.

I have found many who say that this condition is honorable, and they will accept it; if they receive less than what they deem their due, they will make no complaint, and entertain no unfriendly feelings towards their associates who have been more fortunate; and they also consider that the profit likely to result from united effort will be so much greater than that likely to result from competition, that if the most deserving gets but half his just due, he will be better off than if he had struggled in competition, with all the success that sound judgment can anticipate from this invention, now a century old, and modified in many different ways, and mostly free to

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