It may well be supposed that Mr. Stephenson’s time was fully occupied in superintending the extensive, and for the most part novel works, connected with the railway, and that even his extraordinary powers of labour and endurance were taxed to the utmost during the four years that they were in progress. Almost every detail in the plans was directed and arranged by himself. Every bridge, from the simplest to the most complicated, including the then novel structure of the “skew bridge,” iron girders, siphons, fixed engines, and the machinery for working the tunnel at the Liverpool end, had to be thought out by his own head, and reduced to definite plans under his own eyes. Besides all this, he had to design the working plant in anticipation of the opening of the railway. He must be prepared with waggons, trucks, and carriages, himself superintending their manufacture. The permanent road, turntables, switches, and crossings,—in short, the entire structure and machinery of the line, from the turning of the first sod to the running of the first train of carriages upon the railway,—were executed under his immediate supervision. And it was in the midst of this vast accumulation of work and responsibility that the battle of the locomotive engine had to be fought,—a battle, not merely against material difficulties, but against the still more trying obstructions of deeply-rooted mistrust and prejudice on the part of a considerable minority of the directors. He had no staff of experienced assistants,—not even a staff of draughtsmen in his office,—but only a few pupils learning their business; and he was frequently without even their help. The time of his engineering inspectors was fully occupied in the actual superintendence of the works at different parts of the line; and he took care to direct all their more important operations in person. The principal draughtsman was Mr. Thomas Gooch, a pupil he had brought with him from Newcastle. “I may say,” writes Mr. Gooch, “that nearly the whole of the working and other drawings, as well as the various land-plans for the railway, were drawn by my own hand. They were done at the Company’s office in Clayton Square during the day, from instructions supplied in the evenings by Mr. Stephenson, either by word of mouth, or by little rough hand-sketches on letter-paper. The evenings were also generally devoted to my duties as secretary, in writing (mostly from his own dictation) his letters and reports, or in making calculations and estimates. The mornings before breakfast were not unfrequently spent by me in visiting and lending a helping hand in the tunnel and other works near Liverpool,—the untiring zeal and perseverance of George Stephenson never for an instant flagging and inspiring with a like enthusiasm all who were engaged under him in carrying forward the works.” {189}