Stokers and pokers : $b or, The London and North-Western Railway, the electric telegraph, and the railway clearing-houseHead, Francis Bond, Sir
History
Stokers and pokers : $b or, The London and North-Western Railway, the electric telegraph, and the railway clearing-house
Head, Francis Bond, Sir
London and North-Western Railway; Railway Clearing House (London, England); Telegraph -- Great Britain
As soon as these four simultaneous operations are concluded,
directions are given by the station-master to remove the up-carriages
from their position, that the rails may be clear for the arrival of
the next train. At this word of command a pilot-engine, darting from
its lurking place like a spider from its hole, occasionally hisses up
to the rear of the train, and drags it off bodily into a siding. The
usual mode, however, of getting an in-train out of the way is by the
assistance of various unnoticed turn-tables, upon which portions of
it are standing. By these simple contrivances the carriages, after
being unhooked from each other, are rapidly carried off into the
sidings, where they are arranged, according as they may afterwards be
required, among the five sets of rails which lie between the opposite
platforms of the arrival and departure trains. No sooner, however,
do they reach this haven, than, _fifthly_, a large gang of strong
he-housemaids, clattering towards them in wooden shoes and in leather
leggings rising above their bony knees, are seen advancing; some with
mops in their hands, others with large chamois leathers, while others
are carrying on their shoulders a yoke, from which are suspended
_in equilibrio_ two pails. From pipes on each side of these five
sets of rails water is immediately drawn off, and the busy operation
of washing then begins. Half a dozen dusty, dirty-faced, or rather
dirty-bodied, carriages are simultaneously assailed on each of their
sides by wet mops flying up, down, and around in all directions. The
wielders of these, be it noticed, are so skilful in their vocation,
that, while they are talking to their “pailers,” they with great
velocity continue to mop round the wood-work of the various-shaped
plate-glass windows just as vigorously and as accurately as if they
were looking at them; indeed, it is evident that they know the
position of railway-carriage doors, windows of all forms, handles,
steps, &c., so accurately, that they could mop a coach clean in
the dark and probably they often go through these motions when
they are asleep, just as King Richard III. in his dream called
for his horse and for linen bandages--just as the sleeping orator
ejaculates portions of his last speech--and just as an equally tired
outstretched fox-hound during the night occasionally convulsively
kicks with his uppermost hind leg and yelps aloud when he thinks of
the view he got of Renard as he first gallantly broke away from ----
gorse. It may possibly not be known to some of the most fashionable
of our readers that among “moppers” there exist the same gradations
which so distinctly separate other classes of society. A “first-class
mopper” would on no account demean himself by mopping a second-class
carriage, and in like manner a “second-class mopper” only attains
that distinction after he has for a sufficient length of time been
commissioned to mop horse-boxes and common luggage-trains.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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