posed and graduated in amount
accordingly as circumstances seemed to excite in greater or less degree
the sympathies or the indignation of the jury. In November, 1838, for
instance, a locomotive exploded upon the Liverpool and Manchester line,
killing its engineer and fireman; and for this escapade a deodand of
twenty pounds was assessed upon it by the coroner's jury; while upon
another occasion, in 1839, when the locomotive struck and killed a man
and horse at a street crossing, the deodand was fixed at no less a sum
than fourteen hundred pounds, the full value of the engine. Yet in this
last case there did not appear to be any circumstances rendering the
company liable in civil damages. The deodand seems to have been looked
upon as a species of rude penalty imposed on the use of dangerous
appliances, a sharp reminder to the companies to look sharply after their
locomotives and employes. Thus upon the 24th of December, 1841, on the
Great Western Railway, a train, while moving through a thick fog at a
high rate of speed, came suddenly in contact with a mass of earth which
had slid from the embankment at the side on to the track. Instantly the
whole rear of the train was piled up on the top of the first carriage,
which happened to be crowded with passengers, eight of whom were killed
on the spot, while seventeen others were more or less injured. The
coroner's jury returned a verdict of accidental death, and at the same
time, as if to give the company a forcible hint to look closer to the
condition of its embankment, a deodand of one hundred pounds was levied
on the locomotive and tender.

AN UNFORTUNATE DISCUSSION.

Two gentlemen sitting opposite each other in a railway carriage got into
a political argument; one was elderly and a staunch Conservative, the
other was young and an ultra-Radical. It may be readily conceived that,
as the argument went on, the abuse became fast and furious; all sorts of
unpleasant phrases and epithets were bandied about, personalities were
freely indulged in, and the other passengers were absolutely compelled to
interfere to prevent a _fracas_. At the end of the journey the
disputants parted in mutual disgust, and looking unutterable things. It
so happened that the young man had a letter of introduction to an
influential person in the neighbourhood respecting a legal appointment
which was then vacant, which the young man desired to obtain, and which
the elderly gentleman had