In addition to these physical discomforts were added the dangers attending the operation of trains entirely unprotected by any of the safety devices now so essential to the modern railroad. No road boasted of a double track; there was no telegraph by which to operate the trains. The air brake was unknown until 1869, when George Westinghouse received his patent. The Hodge hand brake which was introduced in 1849 was but a poor improvement on the inefficient hand brake of the earlier days. The track was usually laid with earth ballast and the rail joints might be easily counted by the passengers as the cars pounded over them. Add to these discomforts the necessity of frequent changes from one short line to another when it was necessary for the passengers each time to purchase new tickets and personally pick out their baggage, due to the absence of coupon tickets and baggage checks, and the joys of the tourist may be realized. [Illustration: _Car constructed by M. P. and M. E. Green of Hoboken, New Jersey, in 1831 for the Camden & Amboy Railroad._] As early as 1836 the officers of the Cumberland Valley Railroad of Pennsylvania installed a sleeping-car service between Harrisburg and Chambersburg. This first sleeping car was, as was later the first Pullman car, an adaption of an ordinary day coach to sleeping requirements. It was divided into four compartments in each of which three bunks were built against one side of the car, and in the rear of the car were provided a towel, basin, and water. No bed clothes were furnished and the weary passengers fully dressed reclined on rough mattresses with their overcoats or shawls drawn over them, doubtless marveling the while at the fruitfulness of modern invention. As time went on other similar cars, with berths arranged in three tiers on one side of the car, were adopted by various railroads, and occasional but in no manner fundamental improvements were made. Candles furnished the light, and the heat was supplied by box stoves burning wood or sometimes coal. For a number of years these makeshift cars found an appreciative patronage, and temporarily served the patrons of the road. [Illustration: _Midnight in the old coaches previous to the introduction of the Pullman sleeping car. A night journey in those days was something to be dreaded._] In the next ten years similar "bunk" cars were adopted by other railroads, but improvements were negligible and their only justification existed in the ability of the passengers to recline at length during the long night hours. The innovation of bedding furnished by the railroad marked a slight progress, but the rough and none too clean sheets and blankets which the passengers were permitted to select from a closet in the end of the car, must have failed even in that day to give satisfaction to the fastidious.