NARROW V. BROAD GAUGE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 325, 3 October 1874, Page 4

NARROW V. BROAD GAUGE.

On Friday last, the Great Western Railway Company began a combined and carefully organised operation for converting their south-western lines from the broad to the narrow gauge, and had the entire job finished in three days. The abandonment of the gauge which was Brunei's special pride, and which so long gave the line be engineered its distinctive celebrity, has been accomplished so quietly ais :to excite little notice. Since the days when the great " battle of the gauges " was fought ao fiercely in Parliamentary committee rooms,- and in Parliament itself, a new generation has arisen which scarcely understands the vehemence of the original dispute,- for it is now many years since, on groubds of economy among others, the narrow gauge was left to ramify itself all over England. That point settled, the abolition of the broad gauge io the districts to which it was confined became a mere question of time, the necessities of connecting and changing traffic urgently pleading against the maintenance of any obstacles to trains passing without interruption over every -line in the country if required. Accordingly, the Great Western proprietary some time ago resolved to set aside so much capital for the woik of conversion, and it has since been performed by stages. The task for the south-western branches seems to have been admirably managed. Late on Thursday evening each stationmaster gave a certificate that his district was clear of broad-gauge rolling stock, the last trains of which arrived at the Cbippenham end of the line about mid-, night, their work finally closed, and were then sent to appointed depots, where, we assume, the engines and carriages will be broken up. A long farewell to them! They have done a good work in their day and generation, and will, we hope, yet undergo a beneficent mechanical resurrection suited to the new times that have dawned on us. The trains fairly shunted out of sight, an army of engineers and platelayers— -2,000 in number — descended on the spot, and set to work. By dint of- bivouacking along the line, and laboring for seventeen or eighteen hours out of the twenty-four, as only Englishmen properly stimulated can wbrk the task was got through without hitch or accident. The result shows what can be done here under pressure with such industrial appliances as we possess. If the engineers alone were in question, railways could be constructed more; quickly and aoondiy, and therefore more cheaply— in the long run — throughout Englaad than in any other civilised country;-— English paper. :