The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-10-17 00:00:00

AN ELECTRIC MAN.

An account of a most extraordinary case of paralysis
which recently occurred in New Orleans, and the re-
markable symptoms which attended the patient's ill-
ness, are given by a paper of that city. The sufferer
is Major Edward Gottheil, a prominent citizen of New
Orleans. It appears that a short time after Major
Gottheirs afflictions commenced there were developed
in him symptoms which, it is stated, have but one
parallel in the history of medical science. One even-
ing he was lying asleep, almost as profound and peace-
ful as when in health. The faithful watchers sat just
within the adjoining room, ready to answer his
slightest call. Suddenly be cried out in frightful
screams of agony, and although paralyzed and in-
capable, ordinarily, of moving without aid, he sprang
up in his bed. The paroxysms of pain did not in the
least affect the clear conceptions of his intellect ;
on themontrary, they were rather strengthened than
otherwise. • Aroused in this manner from sound
slumber, his first conceit was that some one had applied
to him a galvanic battery heavily charged. Becoming
assured that such had not been the case, he then
thought that some one had stolen into his room and
done something vs him—what, he knew not. This in
turn gave way to the positive assurances of his wife and
friends; but it was plain that something had happened
of an extraordinary physical character, and the Major
with his usual scientific turn of mind set about its in-
vestigation. Lifting up his paralyzed arm, he dis-
covered that it was covered with what appeared to be
a phosphoric light. Holding the stricken limb, still
higher electric lights dripped from the fingers like
drops of liquid fire, whilst the whole arm and the cor-
responding sides of the face and neck were illumined
in like manner. The phenomenon was wonderful
to behold. It was plain the patient was mys-
teriously and wonderfully overcharged with electricity.
Feeling a mysterious influence in his left eye, he
called upon his friends to examine it. They found it
to be perfectly natural in appearance, except that it
emitted a bright illumination, which cast a light on
the wall sufficiently strong in a darkened room to
enable him to see the figures on the wall paper. Ins
word, the eye shone out like a lamp. It was at this
stage, but after these wonderful physical indications
had abated, that Dr. Nicholson was called in, and it
will gratify the many old and cherished friends of
Major Gottheil to be informed that the symptoms of
his painful illness have taken a favourable turn.
Already he has measurably recovered the use of his
lower limb, and with steadily increasing strength
the strongest hopes are entertained of his speedy
recovery.

months ago, Mr. Gladstone addressed a letter to
the Chairman of the Metropolitan District Railway
urging the Directors, in view of their unsatisfactory
dividends, to canvass for the widest possible sup-
port, partly by lowering their fares, and partly by
substituting two classes of fares and carriages for the
existing three classes. Mr. Gladstone based this
advice on the conviction he had
.acquired in a long
career of financial administration, that in the long run
'the State, or individual, or Company thrives best
which dives deepest down into the mass of the com-
munity, and adapts its arrangements to the wants of
the meatest number." Of the general truth of this
principle there can be no question, and though, as we
observed at the time, such a policy has in all proba-
bility both its limits and its exceptions, it is not sur-
prising to find that it is likely to be extensively tried.
The addition of third-class carriages to all trains was
an important step in this direction, and, unless the
other Companies induce the Midland to reconsider its
determination, Mr. Gladstone's advice will now be
fully tested.

It would be premature to pronounce either for or
against an alteration the merit of which can only be
conclusively determined by actual trial. In this as in
other points of Railway management the question will
turn upon a balance of advantages and disadvantages.
But on some points it is not difficult to perceive in
what manner the change will operate, and it is clear
that its effect will, in one important reepect, be very
different from that which might seem to be implied by
its technical description. The Directors, it is said,
propose, for the future, to carry no second-class pas-
sengers. In what way they may modify their rolling
stock we do not pretend to surmise; but the apparent
effect of the change will be to abolish not so much
second-class as first-class travelling, as firot- °lass travel-
ling is now understood. To a great extent this would
probably have been the result even had the existing
scale of fares been maintained, for if the choice only
lay between first-class, even at high fares, and exposure
to the risks of a very mixed company in the third class,
many persons who have hitherto been content with the
comparative selectness of the second-class would take
refuge in the first. But a far larger number of persona
of moderate means would have been driven into the
third-class, and the loss by the cessation of second-
class fares would probably have largely exceeded
the gain in first-class fares. 'fhe Directors, accordingly,
have guarded against this danger by reducing first-class
fares to a lower rate per mile than the second-class
fares of the present; or, at all events, to a very
cheap second-class rate. To the second-class pas-
sengers, accordingly, the result will be pure gain.
They will, at least, not lose in point of fares, and they
will necessarily gain in comfort. So far as mere
physical comfort goes the average cannot henceforth
fall much below that of our existing first-class carriages.
But, except in point of cushions and space, the luxury
of the first-class will disappear, and there are many
persons not chargeable with a morbid love of ex
elusiveness who will greatly regret the loss. There
are social customs, too, which will often make the
change an inconvenient one. Take the case, for in-
stance, of a family travelling with their servants
for a long distance. The master and mistress who
may, very properly, object to send their servants
to take the chances of third-class travelling, will
doubtless escape from having their company in their
own carriage, but with the alternative of enjoying
the society of their neighbour's maid or footman.
As far as social cmtoms go, in short, the change
seems to run counter te facts. By universal admission
there are, roughly speaking, three classes in all
societies, and the existing arrangement of Railway
carriages appears to correspond very closely with the
ordinary habits of life. There are, moreover, delicate
persons to whom exceptional quiet and comfort are
necessary conditions of travelling at all, and if they
are willing to pay for such conveniences it will
seem hard that they should be refused. It will
occur to those who are accustomed to Continental
travelling that, if a change is to be made, the ordinary
custom on the Swiss and German lines might be con-
veniently imitated. It has been sard that in three
countries the only first-class travellers are Princes,
Englishmen, and fools. At the same time, first-class
carriages are provided, and there are occasions when
lersons belonging to no one of the three classes just
named may need the exceptional luxury. We confess
to a belief that any change must be injurious to present
first-class passengers; but supposing they are, at all
events, to be made victims to new views of Railway
economy, it would seem the less of two evils to supple-
ment the arrangements proposed on the Midland line by
some such provision. The great rams of travellers
might be divided into third and second clans, as on
the Continent and special comforts might be provided
at sufficiently high fares to reduce within small limits
the number of those who would make use of them and
to insure adequate remuneration to the Company.
Perhaps, moreover, the form of carriage in use in
Switzerland might with advantage be adopted. In
America there is, as a rule, only one class; but even
there, on the long journeys, there are the Pullman
cars for the more wealthy passengers. These cars,
indeed, have lately been introduced on the Midland,
I and we can hardly suppose they are to be done away
I with.

It is hardly to be supposed, however, that in making
this alteration the Directors have been chiefly con-
cerned to afford the greatest amount of comfort, or
even convenience, to passengers. To a great extent,
indeed, the interests of passengers and shareholders
must sooner or later coincide, but they are not com-
pletely identical. It is the interest of Directors
to do everything in their power to increase the
number of passengers, and comfort and convenience
in travelling are important elements in attracting
such an increase. But the main object of travellers
it to get from place to place, and so long as Directors
render this process cheaper and speedier they have,
probably, a large margin within which they may
modify the comforts of the actual journey with a
view rather to their own profits than to the perfer-
ences of their customers. It is not improbable that
in some measure the present change is a neccessary
consequence of the previous step of attaching third-
class carriages to all trains. It has been stated that
the admission of travellers of all classes to every
train rendered it very difficult to provide the re-
quisite number of carriages without unduly augment-
ing the length and weight of trains. So long as
trains were varied in character passengers of dif-
ferent classes travelled at different times, and there was
little difficulty in separating them, or in estimating the
average accommodation which each train would re-
quire; but now that every train is liable to an in-
definite invasion of travellers of all classes, the work of
separating them into three divisions possibly becomes
too complicated. These must be content, we are told,
with one rough line of separation, and two kinds of car-
riages are all the Directors can conveniently provide.
If, moreover, as has also been stated, second-class
carriages are comparatively deserted, especially since the
general addition of third-class carriages, Companies
cannot but recognize the fact and act upon it. Yet, if the
change be considered merely with reference to its prob-
able financial effects, it does not seem easy for Railway
capitalists themselves to form a decided opinion. It
will have been noticed from our Money Article of
Saturday that the first effect of the announcement was
to depress the market in Railway Stocks, particularly
in the case of lines which derive a larger share of their
revenue from passenger than from merchandise
traffic. There were, indeed, other causes acting to
discourage investment, but it must be concluded
that those who are most immediately interested in
Railway property feel some doubt respecting the
profitableness' of the change. There will, doubtless,
be some clear advantages. So far as the second-
class fare is at all reduced, and still more so far as the
comforts of second-class travelling are increased, pas-
sengers will probably be attracted from the third-class
carriages, and this may furnish such an accession to the
Companies' receipts as to outweigh the loss of first-
class fares. But the principal gain must be in the sim-
plification of the management of traffic and the pos-
sible reduction of the dead weight of trains. The ex-
pense of which Directors chiefly complain is that trains
are so unequally filled, and "omnibus traffic" is, un-
doubtedly, the mostremunerative. Trains will now be
greatly equalized, and so far the gain is likely to be
considerable. Experience, however, can alone answer
the many questions which the change suggests, and
the experiment which the Midland have undertaken
will be watched with very great anxiety. We are pro-
bably tending in some such direction, but we trust the
new arrangement may prove open to many modifica-
tions in practice.

"A Commercial Man," writing to The Times on the
abolition of the second class, says :
"It is a measure that will never become popular.
Three classes are natural and necessary in England,
end it is only the stupidity of Directors that has pre-
vented them all from being duly supported. First class
passengers, as a rule, are content with things as they
are, and the second and third are notoriously discon-
tented. Yet strange to say, it Is proposed to abolish,
not the second, but virtually, the first class, all the
cherished distinctions of which are to be merged in the
second, while the third is to be left as it is now, with the
prospect of its indigenous element of discontent being
doubled. The first-class fares should remain as they are, or
be kept up to 2d. a mile at least the maximum of the third
class should be Id. per mile and a second class should
be created at one-fourth advance on third-class fares, or a
maximum lid, per mile. If this were done, u-ho can
doubt that there would be an immense influx from the
third-class into the second? All those persens to whom a
small modicum of comfort, with separation from the lowest,
roughest, noisiest, dirtiest, part of the travelling commu-
nity, is slightly appreciable in money, would come habi-
tually to employ the second class. The commercial body
(now third-class travellers) to a man, small tradesmen and
their families, travellers for pleasure, &c., all those "rather
better than common," who now take their chance with the
roughs rather than pay 50 or 60 per cent, extra for accom-
modation often no better than the third—all these are safe
for the farthine, but will not stand the halfpenny and its odd
fraction. Under the system proposed by the Midland Com-
pany there will be more full carriages than ever. The public
knows what that means, though, of course, it is a proper
object for the companies to aim at. But there will also be
greater proximity than hitherto among classes who desire to
be kept apart. A well-balanced scheme of three classes
would obviate the latter evil, without rendering the
economical object particularly difficult of attainment."