New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1889-12-26
A NOTED ENGINEER.

LIFE OF CHARLES BLACKER VIGNOLES. BY DIN
thus j. Vignoles. svo.. PIP. 4o7. Longmans.
Green & Co.
If the materials for the "Lifc of Charles Blacker
yignoes," by his son. the Rev. Olinthus J. Vgnoles
Qondon: Longmans), had been better digested, or
If the author Ito change the hgure had been gifted
with better sense of perspective the result might
have been a book easier to read. Even within the
sanctuary Of family history the record Of polite
invitation to come and bring all your friends the
turgid perfunctorness of official letter Of thanks
ought TO be held i'm sort Of subordinaon to the
real events of a mans life Yet there is fascination
and value in this very disorder. If the pudding
compacted purely sanitary principles. there would
be fewer plums, and less fun
well as smaller profit. And it is
these plums thickly scattered all through
that have made ii pleasure, and not merely a
possibility TO read every word of the 500 octave
pages in which aHcctonate and painstakng son
has reverently told the story of his fathers eighty
three years Born in the West Indies descended from
Huguenot ancestors long settled. settled as can
be, in Ireland Vgnoles loses both parents by yellow
fever in his infancy and begins his varied career by
entering the British Army as an ensign at the ad-
vanced age of seventeen months. He goes half
pay, being the official document gravely puts
it, too young TO serve" Then he grows up Quarrels
with his grandfather and protector studies engineer
ing; Joins his regiment some hard fighting and
is taken prisoner at Bergen op Zoom; quits active
marres in haste, in secret, and on no particular in
come; goes to South Carolina and later TO Florida
10 seek that necessary factor does not find ii; and
returns to England Just IN time to take part in the
most wonderful transformation that came from put
ting 1anee on a carriage wheel and setting steam
to turn it--n other words, the railway From this
time, in 1925 when he first employed on the
for the Liverpool and Manchester Line. under
George stephenson, TO 1880, when lie completed his
master work. the great suspension bridge over the
Dnieper at Kief. his completely, and on
the whole, successfully identified with the progress
of railway construction and bridge building in Europe
Five years later he was made Fellow of the Royal
Society, and in 1869, being then in his seventy-sxth
year. he chosen president of the British Instit
ton of Civil Engineers.
lie original, bold. and Industrious his virtues
well as his shortcOmngs-both Of which are clearly
10 be read IN or between the lines Of almost every
page-were those OF his race and land. Tact and
personal charm Offset By specific Ievjtys lie
had what soldiers call the strategic eve; in the things
of engineering his insight and intentions came swift
and accurate yet as 10 men, apparently, he had |
neither. Thus he hangs the skirts OF costly staff
hoping for something TO turn up, Of course il
doesn't, and in maturcr years VIC find him spending /
weeks and iourneying miles with Theirs without the
shadow OF suspicion that the aStute and tallativc
Frenchman is all the time heartily opposed 70 his |
projects from the very ground In everything which
nay occur to enlarge your occupstionst is pathetic
o find his wife writing to him not long before her
endeavor TO have some security beforehand
If course lie promptly quarelled with George stephen
on or Geordic7 (wlo had nasty temper and kept
by him), with him. And equally of course. that |
ard practical, mastcrful George took the first place
where the master sits and kept II too, leaving |
gnoes In many points his superior to sit anywhere.
My not there.
The @typical example" page nincty-one is
say typical in more senses than the author intends.
dmiral Graves the officer who got lot Of work out
yignoles and paid him in fine words, can hardly
ave been one of those bad American employers
scause there was in 1925, in the United States
avy neither Graves nor Admiral. Admrals came
,rty years later.