The Sun.
London, England, 1845-07-02 00:00:00

ENGINEERING EVIDENCE.
(From Punch.)
Usually the most profitable part of the present rail-
way mania consists in persons going before the COM-
mittees of the House of CoMmons, to give what is called
engineering evidence. Engineers are consequently in
♦ery great request; and, while they are at their present
t remendous premium, Punch has it in contemplation to
t ake a few pupils, and qualify them for giving their tes-
timony at ten guineas a day from each Committee before
which they are examined.
Punch undertakes to qualify any one to pass an exa-
mination in the following triumphant style, for a bonus
of 50/. and a share in the profits of the evidence :
Q. Now, Sir, can you explain the engineering advan-
tages of this line ?
A. I can.

Q. Do so, if you please, in your own manner.
A. It is obvious that if I take a mean isosceles triangle
of three and'a quarter, it gives a gradient of five to the
square inch, and thus tunnelling will be avoided through
at least one-half the line.
Q. But how about the embankments ?

A. If I cut a square inch out of a rhomboid, and
throw it off at right angles, it is clear that there can be
no support to the sides. It; on the other hand, I esta-
blish a fulcrum on the surface of a spheroid plane, it is
impossible that the embankments can fall in ; and this,
I take it, is the great advantage of the proposed line.
The CHAIRMAN—AIIow us to ask, Sir, whether you
think a gradient of two will be sufficient ?
A.—Certainly I do. If I had a lever and a'screw now
in the room, I would undertake to show in five minutes
that a patent axle working on a broad gauge and going
consecutively in rotation after a double stuffing box
would be of itself sufficient to do all that was required.
This answer caused the greatest excitement in the
Committee-room, and strangers were at once ordered to
withdraw that the Committee-room might deliberate.
In about a quarter of an hour the public were re-ad-
mitted, and the Chairman said he had only one more
question to ask of the last witness. It was simply this
—Can it be possible for the broad gauge to wear out the
cylinder of a single valve, without tearing off the siphon-
cock from the main boiler ?

The witness, after making a few drawings in his note-
book, and a reference to a five-foot rule, with which he
measured the table in three different directions, answered
deliberately, and with great emphasis—Certainly not.
The Chairman immediately announced :the preamble
of the Bill to be proved; and the rush to the door was
so overwhelming that our reporter was carried into
group Z, and thence into Palace-yard cab-stand. Ex-
presses were waiting for every part of the kingdom, and
shares immediately went up to 75, at which everybody
refused to realise; but a flaw having been discovered
after every one had left the room, and before the Com-
mittee had finally broken up, the Bill was subsequently
declared to be lost, and the shares fell to 2, with a down
ward tendency.

THE EDINBURGH REVIEW, No. CLXV.
will bct published on WEDNESDAY NEXT, July 9th.

CONTENTS

I. VESTIGES OF THE NATURAL HISTORY OF CREATION,
11. THE HON. MRS. NORTON'S CHILD OF THE ISLANDS.
111. LUTIIER'S CORRESPONDENCE AND CHARACTER.
IV. THE BOKHARA VICTIMS.
V. LIFE, GENIUS, AND DRAMAS OF MOLIERE.
VI. MACGREGOR'S COMMERCIAL STATISTIChI.
VII. LORD ROBERTSON'S POEMS.
VIII. TIIE OREGON QUESTION.
London : Longman and Co. Edinburgh A. and C. Black.