Page:The Working and Management of an English Railway.djvu/228

 whenever there is any enquiry with regard to goods not delivered, every available means being meanwhile taken to discover the owners, by a number of clerks specially employed on this duty.

There are many other arrangements in operation, both with regard to "up" and "down" traffic, with a view to guard against irregularities, and to rectify mistakes; but perhaps enough has been said to give an adequate idea of the amount of method and organisation required to conduct such a business with order and despatch.

The warehouse, already referred to, which occupies one side of the yard, and rears its imposing height far above most of the surrounding buildings, consists of four storeys, besides extensive cellarage in the basement, and the different floors are reached from the stage by means of two 25-cwt. hydraulic lifts. Packed closely from top to bottom with goods of every possible description, it would at first sight appear that an individual package once deposited here, would be to all intents and purposes lost, but a brief examination will correct this error, and reveal order in the apparent chaos, for the numerous iron pillars which support each floor divide it into small sections, each of which bears a number, while every article which comes into the warehouse, either waiting for delivery, or for forward transit, is entered in a book with the number, against the entry, of the floor and section in which the article is deposited. Amongst a great deal of curious flotsam and jetsam, which has drifted into this capacious repository, perhaps one of the most interesting features is a huge wooden case, fashioned after the manner of a coffin, and which contains what are alleged to be the fossilised remains of a gigantic specimen of the human race, upwards of twelve feet in