San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-07-08
TIE Daify tiqRt
THURSDAY. JULY $, 1897.
A RAILWAY ON ICE.
jules verne's Romantic Globe-Trot
to BE ExcelIed.

to BE Exce1led.
1t has been reserved for Russia to I'M
dertake what will probably rank as a
monumental railway enterprise. of the
nineteenth century-this being the
completion of belt of rails around the
world-at least, so far as terra irma is
concerned. The Transsiberian rail-
way, which is now in course of con-
struction, has reached as far as Kras-
noiarsk, which is the exact center of
Asiatic Russia, and in four years time
it is expected that it will be completed
to the Pacific coast and direct railway
communication established between
the most western point of Europe and
the most eastern point of ASIA. The
most significant fact in connection with
the Trapssiberian railway is that it will
make possible a journey around the
world in less than 40 days. and thus
Jules Verne's romantic glob-trot will
have been reduced to the tune of so per
cent.
The work of construction has been
pushed on with an energy not usually
associated with things Russian. The
manner in which the government has
gone slap-bang in this work has been a
surprise to everybody in the engineer
ing world, but. like most Muscovite I'M
dertakings, the whole line, from Chela-
binsk, in the Urals. to it's present ter
mination, has suffered from bad man
agement. The rails are miserably laid
and the road ballasted in u most pre-
carious manner. Smashups are fire.
quent, but as nobody outside Russia
hears much of them the world is not
worried. The pace, too. of the Siberian
trains is wretched. the average speed
not exceeding 20 versts (about 10 miles)
per hour.
But what the Russian engineers have
lacked in CONSTITUTIONAL skill they have
compensated for by the novel expert
ments. Everybody knows that Siberia
is cold place. The rivers freeze to
considerable depth in winter, but still
nobody would conceive that they would
freeze sufficiently to bear locomotive
and a whole train of heavy wagons
hurting across from one side to the
other. But such is the fact.
The experiment was first tried on the
river Obi last year. At first a light
train was drawn by horses over tracks
frozen onto the icy surface of the river.
Then lomocotive was steamed across,
and, as it did not go through. it was sat
isfactorily established that Siberian ice
was OF distinctly bearing quality
Once this fact. was patent, the brow of
the Russian engineer cleared. for, while
it was easy to get along rapidly with
the construction of the line on the
ground itself, the building of bridges
over the rivers was a longer Job.
and, as a matter of fact. the
bridges over the Obi and Achinsk
are not yet half finished. WHY
not use natures bridge - the ice?"
thought the Russian; and so he did.
My first experience of the railway
running on the ice was at the river
Achinsk. This is q tolerably broad
river, perhaps twice as wide as the
Thames, and when on that February
afternoon the train steamed up 10 it's
western shore the surface presented
one white mass of snow-coyered ice
The railway line continued down the
slope of the bank and across the ice TO
the other side.
The train stopped at the edge of the
bank and the conductor babe us get ont
and walk, humorously remarking that.
If the train went through, only he aid
the driver. would be drowned.
The whole motley crowd of befurred
passengers thereupon descended and
trailed across the ice. At the center of
the river 1 paused to watch how the
train would behave
Slowly the heavy mass descended the
bank and crept onto the ice. There was
a distinct "scrunch" as the locomotive
left solid bottom. Once all the weight
of the train was off land, I clearly feit
a sag in the ice and as the cars passed
me-. crackl crackl crackI like a burs
of small fireworks, notified me that tn,
ice felt it badly, But it bore bravely
and in about five minutes slow journey
the train was on firm land again.
London Answers.