The application of the Westinghouse continuous-brake system is exhib ited on Plates 3r and 32. Figure 16 05/. 31) shows the disposition of the operating mechanism upon the locomotive and the mode of applying the brake to the periphery of the driving-wheels, aud Figures 2 tO 5 (pl. 32) show the attachment of the brake mechanism beneath the car-body of the standard rolling-stock of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Mr. Westinghouse has recently succeeded in adapting- his brake to the requirements of freight service, and it is not unlikely, from present indications, that a few years will see its general introduction upon this important branch of the railway service. For the mechanical details of construction and operation reference may be made to the volume on Mechanics.
English and American Car reference to the internal arrangements, division of the seats, etc., of railway-cars for passenger ser vice, two systems are in vogue—namely, the English, or coupe, system, of comparatively small and light carriag-es (fii. 3o, figs. 12, 14, 16), ill which the passengers enter and leave the carriage by doors provided at the sides and occupy small compartments separated from one another by partitions; and the American, or intercommnnicating, system (figs. 13, L7, LS), in which the passengers enter and leave the car at the front and the rear, and where the seats are disposed on the right and the left of a passage-way run ning the whole length of the car.
English advantages claimed for the Eng lish or compartment system, generally in use in Europe (fig-. r6), are the following: Privacy and freedom from disturbance, the exclusive reservation of compartments for ladies, greater protection against dranglits, quicker filling and emptying of trains, greater handiness in making lip trains of smaller carriages, and corresponding saving of labor at main stations. On the other hand, the system has the disadvantages of greater dang-er in entering and in leaving the carriage, discomfort to those occupying the mid dle seats, and to the entire coupe in hot weather, isolation of the traveller, by which communication with the guards or train officials and with the occupants of adjoining compartments is prevented, danger from the side doors, i.vhich weaken the carriage-body by reason of their presence, and the 0-reater lenoth of the train.
American special advantages the following claims are made in behalf of the American system: Freedom of entrance and exit, and of communication at all times with the train officials and passengers, the con venience of retiring-rooms, good lig-hting, ventilation in hot weather, safety of the passengers from assault with intent to plunder Qr murder, the convenience to the train-hands in passing from car to car, and lessened liability to derailment, by reason of greater weight, and to destruction in case of derailment, by reason of more substantial construction. It is urged
against the American railway-car that passengers are more subject to be disturbed, and that more labor is involved in making up trains.
American Car System in has been much controversy over the relative merits and demerits of these diverse types of vehicle, but, in spite of the tenacity with which the English especially cling to the established order, the fact remains that the Ainerican railway-car is every year coming into more general nse on European railways. The American parlor-car (pl. 33, fig. r) and sleeping-car (fig. 3) are so greatly superior in convenience and comfort to anything in vogue on European railways that their adoption has of late years become very general. The gradual drift in the direction of the Atnerican plan of arrangement is shown also in the introduction of mixed or composite carriag,es, in Nyhich the effort has been to combine the features of both systems—the exclusiveness of the compart ment plan with the freedom of entrance and egress and of communication of the American car. In these composite structures the carriage is divided, as usual, into several compartments placed in communication by doors in the middle of the carriage, the entrance and exit doors being at the front and the rear (pt. 30, Jig. 134 Eurofican "Class" railway-carriages on European roads are divided into three, and occasionally four, classes, differing in respect of the comfort and convenience they afford the travelling public. The fourth class conveyance (which is rarely seen) has no seats of any kind, the pas sengers being obliged to stand; it is closed, has windows, and at most two doors. At night, lamps are provided. Such ears are used to convey laborers to and from work. The third-class carriages on the Continent, as a rule, have plain unupholstered seats with wooden backs reaching usually to the heig,lit of the shoulders (fig. 16). The entrance and exit doors are at the sides, as in the first- and second-class carriages. In England, until recently, the third-class carriages were even less comfortable, but of late they have been notably improved. The earliest first-class carriages of English roads were 15 feet long, feet wide, ,O/r feet high, and weighed three and one-fourth tons. They were divided into three compartments, each compartment accommodating six persons, or eighteen in all. Now they are built 20 or 3o feet long and from 8 to 8/,, feet wide, and weigh from eight to thirteen tons. The modern first-elass Eng.-,lish carriage has four compartments (fig. 16), and those of the second ancl third class usually five. The tendency in England, especially, has been for some time in the direction of increasing the length and the weight of the carriages.