upon which were piled six bales of cotton. A fortification was
thus provided between the passengers and any future negro sitting on the
safety valve. We are also assured that 'the safety valve being out of
the reach of any person but the engineer, will contribute to the
prevention of accidents in the future, such as befel the _Best Friend_.'
Judging by the cut which represents the train, this occasion must have
been even more marked for its 'hilarity' than the earlier one which has
already been described. Besides the locomotive and the barrier car there
are four passenger coaches. In the first of these was a negro band, in
general appearance very closely resembling the minstrels of a later day,
the members of which are energetically performing on musical instruments
of various familiar descriptions. Then follow three cars full of the
saddest looking white passengers, who were present as we were informed to
the number of one hundred and seventeen. The excursion was, however,
highly successful, and two-and-a-quarter miles of road were passed over
in the short space of eight minutes--about the speed at which a good
horse would trot for the same distance.

This was in March, 1831. About six months before, however, there had
actually been a trial of speed between a horse and one of the pioneer
locomotives, which had not resulted in favour of the locomotive. It took
place on the present Baltimore and Ohio road upon the 28th of August,
1830. The engine in this case was contrived by no other than Mr. Peter
Cooper. And it affords a striking illustration of how recent those
events which now seem so remote really were, that here is a man until
very recently living, and amongst the most familiar to the eyes of the
present generation, who was a contemporary of Stephenson, and himself
invented a locomotive during the Rainhill year, being then nearly forty
years of age. The Cooper engine, however, was scarcely more than a
working model. Its active-minded inventor hardly seems to have aimed at
anything more than a demonstration of possibilities. The whole thing
weighed only a ton, and was of one horse power; in fact it was not larger
than those handcars now in common use with railroad section-men. The
boiler, about the size of a modern kitchen boiler, stood upright and was
fitted above the furnace--which occupied the lower section--with vertical
tubes. The cylinder was but three-and-a-half inches in diameter, and the
whe