property." And a statement to the same
effect was made in November 1833, to which the following names are
appended:--

Thomas Telford, P.I.C.E.
John Rickman, commissioner for Highland roads and bridges.
C.W. Pasley, colonel royal engineers.
Bryan Donkin, manufacturing engineer.
T. Bramah, civil engineer.
James Simpson, manufacturing engineer.
John Thomas, civil engineer.
Joshua Field, manufacturing engineer.
John Macneil, civil engineer.
Alexander Gordon, civil engineer.
William Carpmael, civil engineer.

"There can be no doubt," say they, "that a well-constructed engine, a
steam-carriage conveyance between London and Birmingham, at a velocity
unattainable by horses, and limited only by safety, may be maintained; and
it is our conviction that such a project might be undertaken with great
advantage to the public, more particularly if, as might obviously be the
case, without interfering with the general use of the road, a portion of
it were to be prepared and kept in a state most suitable for travelling in
locomotive steam-carriages."

But in this is the whole difficulty as far as regards the best granite
road; for, supposing for a moment that all the other conditions were
fulfilled--that it was hard and smooth--one great element is to be taken
into consideration, from which no skill and science can exempt the best
and firmest Macadam; and that is the effect of atmospheric changes on the
surface of the road. The difference of tractive power in summer and winter
must be immense, and the great disadvantage of mechanical, as compared
with animal draught, is its want of adaptability to the exigencies of an
ordinary road. A steam-carriage of ten horse power cannot under any
circumstances, when it encounters a newly mended part of the road, or a
softer soil, put forth an additional power for a minute or two, as a team
of horses can do; so that equality of exertion is nearly indispensable for
the full advantage of an engine. We accordingly find that the opponents of
steam-travelling on common roads, gained their object by covering the
highway with a coating of broken stones fourteen inches deep. Through this
it was impossible to force the coach without such a strain as to displace
or otherwise injure the machinery. But when a system of locomotion,
containing so many advantages, has so nearly been brought to perfection,
in spite of the many difficulties presented by the common modes of making
a road,