THE IRON TABERNACLE.
TIAD a philosophic spirit, instead of mere chance, presided over the arrangement of goods in the International Exhibition, the department of machinery would have had another place than the one now assigned. As it is, the god of this iron age, the creator of ' one-half the marvels which are gathered together in the World's Fair, has been exiled into an unseemly corner of the big temple, the outer and inner aspect of which contrasts wofully with the rest. A large portion of visitors to the Exhibition as yet do not seem at all aware that there is a collection of machinery in motion to be seen within the building. The extreme western wing, which contains it, is blocked up so skilfully with foreign packing-cases as to prevent even a glimpse of it from the central nave ; and the very entrance is all but sealed by a gigantic framework of Austrian liquor bottles, looking like a monster tavern turned inside out. Nor is the first view of the machine-temple, behind the bottles, anything but in- viting. The ground is broken up like a ploughed field, as far as the eye can reach ; the atmosphere is filled with smoke and dust ; and the ear is assailed by a terrific drum, as of all Meyerbeer's operas being played simultaneously. It takes a little time to accli- matize both ear and eye to the new region; the trouble of which, however, is amply repaid.
The visitor, after due acclimatization, will find hihiself in a large shed, covering about four acres of ground, the centre of which is occupied by two gigantic centrifugal pumping engines, one of which throws fifteen thousand gallons of water in a minute. A miniature Niagara comes rushing down from an elevated platform, while four rivers are discharging their contents high into the air, descending in torrents of spray. There is mighty music in the life of these centrifugal hydrostatics ; but mightier still in that of a score of power-looms, ranged along the nave, and against the left longitudinal wall of the shed, on a slightly raised platform. These looms are the pride of the machine-temple, the Titans of the iron age. The highest ingenuity of the mechanical mind, of which the Exhibition is both the type and the apotheosis, is centored here, in a complication of mechanism rivalling that of life itself. Au Aristoteles would have been lost in astonishment before this legion of iron limbs, moving about in all directions, cross- ing and recrossing each other, leading tender threads of cotton through an intricate maze bewildering to the eye, and finally spread- ing out before the beholder a beautiful textile fabric woven into harmonious colours. And no hand of man is visible throughout, but only a whiff of steam moving through secret pipes. The loom, properly, is the triumph of mechanism — the nearest approach yet made of matter to mind. Whether the generality of visi- tors to the Exhibition have seen power-looms before, or not, certain it is that all gaze upon these wonderful automatons with a sort of amazement. In the presence of other machinery, people commonly ask questions of the attendants or workmen; but in sight of the looms everybody seems mute, in apparent utter hopelessness of comprehending the working of the whole. This is particularly the case with the Jacquard carpet power-looms, the flying shuttles of which are dazzling to the eye as to the brain, and in comparison with the intricacy of the movements of which a steam-engine seems simplicity itself. Visitors seldom stop long
to look at these looms, the impression of the whole not being pleas- ing'-beeause not understood. The poor attendants on the weaving automatons also look indescribably weary and fatigued. At one of the carpet power-looms we noticed a pun.- woman of rather pretty appearance, who watched the shuttles with such a mechanical expres- sion of face as if she had become part of the mechanism herself. All on a sudden a child ran up to her—a little girl, probably her own daughter. It was touching to behold how she hugged and kissed the little creature, her whole heart seeming to give vent to long pent- up sources of human joy and affection. It was as lithe maternal feeling tried to revenge itself on the shuttlecocks.
Right opposite the power-looms, on the other side of the building, stand a score of locomotives, for whose promenade into the big shed a special line of railway has been laid down. The examination of these neat reformers of modern life is interesting from a national no less than international point of view. Of the nineteen locomotives exhibited, eleven are of English, and eight of foreign construction. We learn, with astonishment, that an industry, which had its origin and, until lately, its sole home in this country—as far as Europe is concerned—is gradually being transplanted into other countries, to such an extent as to cause more than simple competition. The largest manufactory of locomotives in the world, at the present time, we hear, is not in Great Britain, but in Prussia. Herr Borsig, of Berlin, a manufacturer not established until 1847, has a locomotive at the Exhibition numbered 1361, showing that he has turned out more travelling steam-engines from his works than any Scotch, English, or American firm. The two largest British factories—R. Stephenson and Co., and Sharp, Stewart, and Co.—have, it appears, not quite ar- rived at Herr Borsig's number, while there are only two or three more makers in this country who have sent above a thousand finished loco- motives from their works. Herr Borsig, nevertheless, is not the only German manufacturer who turns out locomotives in such enormous numbers, there being several other wholesale factories of the same kind, among others, at Chemnitz, in Saxony. These Chemnitz loco- motives are very extraordinary-looking machines, greatly unlike the English. The cylinders are outside, and long pities extend from them to the dome and smoke box, while the whole is resting on only four wheels. It is with some pride the German attendant points out that their engines will "run round in a ring." But whatever the ad- vantages of these foreign locomotives may be it is apparent, even tb the unprofessional eye, that, as far as good workmanship is con- cerned, they are decidedly not so well made as the English. There is a want of substantial solidity and finish about the best of them, such as Herr Borsig's machines, which contrasts very unfavourably with the productions of British workshops. There is, among the English locomotives, one marked "Manchester," at the side of which the French and German engines look as Birmingham jewellery does compared with the genuine New Bond-street article. The "Manchester" seems the sovereign among the nineteen lords of the rail. It—or, in the language of railway porters, "she"—is finished like a watch, and might be a fit ornament for a Brobdingnagian draw- ing-room.
More interesting still than locomotives to the general public are railway carriages, also exhibited in considerable number. A short inspection of the various specimens will suffice to award the palm to Prussia. The several carriages of the Berlin Stettin Railway, thrown open to examination, are as superior in comfort and elegance to the ordinary English railway vehicles, as a private brougham is to a street cab. The seats, lined with silk, are of the most luxurious kind; damask curtains close the windows, and doors open from one com- partment into the other for intercommunication between the travellers. Above all, every compartment has attached to it a closet, fitted up. in the most comfortable manner, It is impossible to overrate the advantages of such an arrangement, which ought to exist in every railway carriage, not as a matter of luxury, but of absolute necessity. In these Prussian railway carriages, not only the first, but the second class carriages likewise have the closet in question attached to each compartment. The second class carriages are fitted up in about the same style as the English first class, while the Prussian third class are equal, if not superior, to our second class. The average fare on German railways, we were informed, is a halfpenny per mile in third class, three farthiugs per mile in second class, and about a penny a mile in first class carriages. As most German lines are known to be profitable investments to the shareholders, it is clear that this system of giving good accommodation at a moderate price is preferable, even from a financial point of view, to the policy generally pursued in this country by Olympian boards of directors, of giving as little and taking as much as possible. If the Exhibition should have the effect of bringing about some change in this important matter it would go far to redeem much of the shadowy side in conuexion with the big shop.
Compared with the display of iron, raw and manufactured, within the Exhibition, all other articles and objects sink into utter signifi- cance. In the construction of the big shop itself no less than six
thousand tons of iron were used, while the show within comprises at least double this quantity, or enough to give a coat of mail to all Fngland. Monstrous bits of iron, of seven, eight, and nine tons, lie
about the western annexe, while it is impossible to walk through any other part of the Exhibition without meeting, every few yards, some- thing made of iron or steel. But it is remarkable that the finest show of iron within the whole building is not exhibited by an English, but by a German manufacturer. This is not an individual opinion, but a fact upon which, wonderfully enough, all seem agreed who notice it. The display in question is by Herr Krupp, of Essen, Westphalia. He exhibits about a hundred tons of cast steel, covering a gigantic platform of about seven hundred square feet. The most remarkable pieces of metal in this monster collection are two halves of an ingot, weighing about twenty-one tons. These iron mountains are shown merely as specimens of Herr Krupp's casting. The two fragments were, it seems, oast in one piece, and afterwards laid under Krupp's famous steam hammer—the largest in the world, the head weighing forty tons, and falling from a height of ten feet—one stroke of which was sufficient to break the enormous mass into two. Of course, this was done to show the grain of the metal, which is uni- versally declared to be perfect and without a flaw. As ladies are standing in mute delight before the Koh-inoor, so engineers and manufacturers in iron, English workmen especially, may be seen every day in front of Herr Krupp's pretty little toys, the beauty of which must bring tears into the eye of Cyclops. But even these pretty "splinters" are not the largest pieces of iron in the EThibition. The Mersey Iron and Steel Company, whose workshops are at Liver- pool, exhibit a double-throw wrought iron crank shaft, weighing no less than twenty-five tons, and destined for the engines of one of our new mailed men-of-war. Looking at this monstrous mass of shapeless iron it seems perfectly incredible that it should ever be made to assist in propelling a vessel instead of sinking it at once to the bottom. The mischief-making qualities of other lumps of metal are much more ap- parent at first sight ; for example, those of one of Herr Krupp's cast steel breech-loading guns, weighing some ten tons, with a bore of nearly a foot in diameter. It requires no very powerful imagination to conceive the Titanic force given in the employment of such a weapon of war. However, Herr Krupp, as great an enthusiast in iron as ever lived, is fain to make us believe that all this is but the infancy of the battle music of the future. He says that he has turned his attention of late especially to floating iron fortresses, and is now building a "rolling mill," with engines of two thousand horse power, which will enable him to turn out steel plates of fifteen feet width, large enough to encase ordinary gun-boats with a garment as seamless as the holy coat of Troves. Herr Krupp evidently takes large and comprehensive views of the "bloated armaments" of the nineteenth century. He concentrates within his own iron domain of Essen the competition carried on in this country between the army and navy departments, and seeks to solve the riddle whether ordnance on terra firma, or men- of-armour at sea, will ultimately gain the day. But he does not make merely guns, and iron mail, and big steam-engines, this won- derful Herr Krupp. He seems to believe that everything we possess in and about our houses, from the kitchen-staircase to the chimney-pot, ought to be made of iron. He already manufactures a thousand things of iron, or rather steel, not dreamt of in our philosophy. Evidently Herr Krupp, of Essen, is the chief representative man of this age of iron.
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