“Over the rails they go and back. Over the miles of gleaming track.’

Scene at old Auckland Station,

Engines—the small boy's dream, the father's secret vice. Engines—that hold their charm against the onslaught of the years. The early aspiration to be master of one of those splendid masses of iron and steel, gleaming brass and whirring wheels, most often fades away into the limbo of the great unrealised. Yet there are those who before the years fall thickly on them, snatch the passing moment and follow their ambition through. They are the men whose hands are to-day on the controls of the railway engines that daily skim over the face of New Zealand, whose eyes peer down the trail ahead, who plunge into dark caverns and emerge again into the light of day, to the ceaseless tattoo of racing steel and belching smoke-clouds. Men who caught the dream and saw it through.

But he has his apprenticeship to serve, this eager youngster, not twenty, with the long look in his eyes. Instead of an engine he is handed a cleaning-rag, and the night and a foreman cleaner claim him. He must serve before he can control. Along with his young fellow-cleaners he is required to attend for duty at any hour of the day or night, to give at least six hours service each day. He is now servant to the ponderous things that have captured his imagination, that come panting into the sheds after a long run over the sweep of countryside, stained with the grease and grime of miles. Now the cleaner joins his comrades in swarming over their bulk, like Lilliputians on the recumbent forms of so many Gullivers, bringing back to his charge the sparkle of its brass and the silky sheen to its sides. Then on to the next with his industrious rag, until, in his zeal, he has gathered unto his person sufficient grime to make him resemble the young chimneysweep in Charles Kingsley's “Water Babies.” Indeed, he truly becomes a water baby when the night is over and his most urgent need is a hot bath. And so to home and ablution the cleaners hie, like benevolent demons.

Climbing Higher.

A year or two passes. The cleaner is now brought in and examined as to the duties of a fireman. Successful in the test, he goes up another rung, as Kingsley's young sweep would climb from the sooty regions of his chimney towards the wonder of the sky. The one-time cleaner knows his engine now, and has a working knowledge of signals, rules and regulations. His services in his new capacity are utilised according to the page 39 play of circumstances for a few years, after which time he is appointed a regular fireman on, shunting engines. In due time it falls to his lot to go out as fireman on more important runs, such as passenger trains, mixed and goods trains. After another three or four years, at last he becomes a driver. Several years have passed since he was a water baby with a cleaning rag. Now he has become a driver on shunting work, goods trains, and short passenger runs. Five years or more may pass before he is examined for first-class driver's duties, but his goal is attained and his certificate in his pocket, he steps into the cab of an express engine with its charge of human lives. Certainly older, possibly a little grey, but he has got there.

Under him is an engine that cost £6,000 to build, a noble thing throbbing with power. He knows its mechanism, its capacity and its needs. Arriving on duty an hour before the scheduled time of departure, he sets about placing his engine in running order. He ascertains if there is a sufficient supply of sand to spill on a greasy track along a heavy grade, when the wheels churn and scream; he oils necessary parts, checks the supply of water and coal in the tender, makes sure that the fire box is free of all foreign matter, checks the smoke box and axle boxes, inspects the pistons and valves, screws, bolts and plates, and determines that the engine's great white eye is shining true. As a companion he has his fireman, who attends to his own particular duties.

Last Minute Orders.

When all is in readiness, a call is made at the office of the foreman by both the driver and fireman to learn if there are any special orders that concern them on the run they are about to undertake. Although safety is assured under the signalling system, there may be special instructions regarding speeds over certain sections, owing to slips or some other such trouble. Too, there may be special trains running which disturb the routine of the track. Forewarned and forearmed, the driver runs his engine out into the yard. It is like a groomed and spirited horse ready for the test. It takes air and is coupled up with the carriages that have been marshalled in the meantime by the shunting gang. The adjusting of the Westinghouse brake is watched by the train examiner, who makes sure that the brakes are thoroughly released so that there will be no extra drag on the wheels caused by faulty adjustment.

It is necessary also that “the man with the hammer” shall do his part by “ringing” the tyres of the wheels of the train in search of flaws, since a loose tyre may be the cause of a big derailment. As he goes about this job he feels with one hand the axle boxes that may be overheated.

Passengers are now taking their seats and bidding last farewells with all the last minute rush that is generally the case on a railway station. “All seated, please!” A clanging of gates, a closing of windows, a scream from the engine, and the long journey has begun, the “Limited” is away.

The Fiery Cabin.

Up in the engine cab are the two men who have worked for years to win to where they are now. The driver, dungaree-clad, his peaked cap low over his eyes, leans out of the window, his hands on the controls, watching the endless path that is being flooded with light ahead of him. The ships and the sea and the long line of breakwater fall away. Furious gusts of smoke, alive with leaping glow-worms, mount into the air. The open furnace door takes great gulps of coal from the fireman's shovel and throws a ruddy aura against the sky. The engine responds to the mounting head of steam and gathers up its power like a runner his muscles. Dark shapes in the outer darkness rush up and flash past as if they are the hurtling denizens of a dream. Through it all runs the rhythmic tattoo of the flying wheels.

There are no speed gauges on the railway engines of New Zealand, since early devices of the kind proved unsatisfactory. Instead, the engine makes its way on the “speed sense” of the driver (which years of practice have developed to a remarkable keenness), under the limits imposed by a carefully worked-out schedule which has taken full account of grades and curves. Although it is necessary for him to observe different speed requirements during the course of a journey, he is able to gauge the progress his page 40 engine is making, and he brings the train into a station right up to time, or within a fraction of a minute of it. Each time, where the tablet system is operating, he changes his tablet before setting out for the next station.

And so the miles are eaten up under the guidance of the driver in his fiery cabin. The men have need to watch their supply of water, which has to be replenished at certain stations. The fireman's shovel works more quickly on the heap of black diamonds in the tender, as the engine gasps for the fuel that will help it up a heavy grade, which it then conquers spiritedly to roar down with zest into a tunnel's mouth. And whether the skies are starry or whether the storm-god screams, the railway engine zooms confidently through the heart of night, with a schedule as its pride.

But even a first-class engine-driver can tire, and the journey is by no means over when the driver and fireman, arrived at one of the stations en route, swing down from their cabin and hand over the next lap to others, while they themselves seek rest. When they have slept, they take charge of a

“Where flowers degenerate man cannot live.”—Napoleon.
The station garden at Mosgiel, Otago, South Island.

train going in the opposite direction, and re-traverse the route back to their homes. And it is to these men and the rest of their division, who have to watch and work while others sleep, that wifely solicitude is the first of life's blessings.

Giants in Mid-air.

But they also need attention, these great engines. When an engine has done 75,000 miles it is considered to have earned an overhaul, and that is when it goes to the workshops to be strung up in mid-air like a helpless giant. Since an express engine covers up to 50,000 miles a year, it is not long before it is taken off to be doctored. Her boiler, axle boxes and running gear in trim once more, she is ready for the road again. The cost of repairing an engine may run into £1500 or £2000. The average life of an engine is about thirty years, and when that time has passed the engine goes to the honoured graveyard of the stalwarts of the road. And then her driver steps into the glowing cabin of a new companion, whose flying wheels strike up for him anew the old, old song of the track.