The Express.
London, England, 1855-02-15 00:00:00

01? ACCIDENTS ON RAIL-
WAYS.

WE have often said, and we still think, that if
the Government had entered into a contract with
any respectable engineering flan for the capture of
Sebastopol we should have had to congratulate the
glestry long ere this on the taking of that fortress.
•i lineation this to show that it is not from our low
of the power or intelligence of our engineers
wen amplain of them for the scandalous neglect
11111,1111 by the railwayoonspanies in not having adopted
MOO good practical means of communication between
the guards and driven of railway trains. It is not
intelligence in the engineers, bat desire on the part
of the directors, that is wanting to this end. To
produce this desire in the directors some such stimu-
lus as the dread of competition is necessary; and
competition on any line of railway there is practically
none, except perhaps to a slight extent in the matters
of comparative ehespnees and the rapidity and ha
gummy of their journeys. Not that even competition
always produces excellence; for really habit seems
often to fix the limit of excellence as well as of
price ; witness the obstinate resistance of omnibuses
to adopt the very simple means by which passengers
communicate with the conductor, which have for
yoga been adopted on the Continent. In England
we have been contented in order to "an the
bother" of any apparatus, however simple, to scream,
and poke the conductor. It is really the public
themselves who are to blame for not insisting: upon
some arrangement being made for enabling the
pea to telegraph to the driver; and the reason why
the public have not insisted upon it, is because
dams is at the bottom of the English character
a very culpable disregard for life and limb which, in
the United States, we see exaggerated into utter
recklessness. As long as the main object of any un-
dertaking—and in railways this is speed—is attained
people seem to care very little about, or at any rate
to take very little can to guard against, accidents.
In the Report to the Board of Trade on Accidents
on Railways during 1854, we find that 223 persons
have been killed and 453 wounded. Of the 95
accidents which came under the cognisance of the
Board, 85 were specially reported on ; and of thee°
only 22 could not have been guarded against.
It appears, also, that a circular was sent from the
Board to different railway companies, calling their
attention to the necessity of making provision " for
enforcing the means of constant communication
tween all the servants to whom the safety of the
passengers in any train is entrusted." Abstreste
of the replies of the railway companies are
given in the Report. Ont of 46 companies, 18,
learning a lesson from "my Lords," in true official
style, "acknowledge the receipt of the circular.°
Most of the remainder will investigate, or are investi-
gating, or will adopt what certain other railways
adopt, or have tried the clearing-hones plan, and
found it not to answer, &c. Nine companies have
ordered the adoption of, or have already adopted plans
to effect the object, and these plans are the rope and
whistle, rope and bell, or foot-boards for the guards to
walk along. The Cockermouth and Worthington Com-
pany say that no communication can be effected by
means of machinery. The South Western give a full
description of their plan—a cord running through a