Passage 4
Those who welcomed the railway saw it as more than a rapid and comfortable means of passing. They actually saw it as afactor in world peace. They did not foresee that the railway would be just one more means for the rapid movement of aggressive armies. None of them foresaw that the more weare together-the more chances there are of war. Any boy or girl who is one of a large family knows that.
Whenever any new invention is put forward, those for it and those against it can always find medical men to approve or condemn. The anti-railway group produced doctors who said that tunnels would be most dangerous to public health: they would produce colds, catarrhs and consumptions. The deafening noise and the glare of the engine fire, would have a bad effect on the nerves. Further, being moved through the air at a high speed would do grave injury to delicate lungs. In those with high blood-pressure, the movement of the train might produce apoplexy . The sudden plunging of a train into the darkness of a tunnel, and the equally sudden rush into full daylight, would cause great damage to eyesight. But the pro-railway group was of course able to produce equally famous medical men to say just the opposite. They said that the speed and swing of the train would equalize the circulation, promote digestion, tranquilize the nerves, and ensure good sleep.
The actual rolling-stock was anything but comfortable. If it was a test of endurance to sit for four hours outside a coach in rain, or inside in dirty air, the railway offered little more in the way of comfort. Certainly the first-class carriages had cushioned seats; but the second-class had only narrow bare boards, while the third-class had nothing at all; no seats and no roof; they were just open trucks. So that third-class passengers gained nothing from the few mode except speed. In the matter of comfort, indeed they lost; they did, on the coaches, have a seat, but now they had to stand all the way, which gave opportunities to the comic press. This kind of thing: A man was seen yesterday buying a third-class ticket for the new London and Birmingham Railway. The state of his mind is being enquired into.
A writer in the early days of railways wrote feelingly of both second-and third-class carriages. He made the suggestion that the directors of the railways must have sent all over the world to find the hardest possible wood. Of the open third-class trucks he said that they had the peculiar property of meeting the rain from whatever quarter it came. He described them as horizontal shower-baths, from whose searching power there was no escape.
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“母亲”这个伟大的职业(双语)
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英语晨读:潘多拉
英语名篇名段背诵精华20
浪漫英文情书精选:Keep You Forever永远温存着你
英语精美散文15
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英语标准美文85
英语晨读:金窗
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被我们遗忘在生活中的哲理V
人生哲理:多一点开心 少一点抱怨
英语标准美文75
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诗歌:在清晨许个愿
诗歌:放慢你的舞步
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英语名篇名段背诵精华11
世界上最美丽的英文3
英语标准美文51
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英语美文:越长大越孤独(双语)
双语阅读:美丽的微笑
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