The very best steam engines convert about 11 per cent. of the heat given them into useful work, the remaining 89 per cent. being wasted, principally in the exhaust of the engine.

Gas engines now convert 20 per cent. of the heat given to them into work, and very probably will, in a few years more, convert 60 per cent. into useful work.  The conclusion, then, is irresistible that, when engineers have gained greater experience with gas engines and gas producers, they will displace steam engines entirely for every use—­mills, locomotives, and ships.

* * * * *

RAPID CONSTRUCTION OF THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY.

By E.T.  Abbott, Member of the Engineers’ Club of Minnesota.  Read December 12, 1884.

During the winter of 1881 and 1882, the contract was let to Messrs. Langdon, Sheppard & Co., of Minneapolis, to construct during the working season of the latter year, or prior to January 1, 1883, 500 miles of railroad on the western extension of the above company; the contract being for the grading, bridging, track-laying, and surfacing, also including the laying of the necessary depot sidings and their grading.  The idea that any such amount of road could be built in that country in that time was looked upon by the writer hereof, as well as by railroad men generally, as a huge joke, perpetrated to gull the Canadians.  At the time the contract was let, the Canadian Pacific Railway was in operation to Brandon, the crossing of the Assiniboine River, 132 miles west of Winnipeg.  The track was laid, however, to a point about 50 miles west of this, and the grading done generally in an unfinished state for thirty miles further.  This was the condition of things when the contract was entered into to build 500 miles—­the east end of the 500-mile contract being at Station 4,660 (Station being at Brandon) and extending west to a few miles beyond the Saskatchewan River.

The spring of 1882 opened in the most unpromising manner for railroad operations, being the wettest ever known in that country.  Traffic over the St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba Railroad, between St. Paul and Winnipeg, was entirely suspended from April 15 to the 28th, owing to the floods on the Red River at St. Vincent and Emerson, a serious blow to an early start, as on this single track depended the transportation of all supplies, men, timber, and contractors’ plant, together with all track materials (except ties), all of these things having to come from or through St. Paul and Minneapolis.  The writer hereof was appointed a division engineer, and reported at Winnipeg the 15th of April, getting through on the last train before the St. Vincent flood.  No sooner was the line open from St. Paul to Winnipeg than the cotillon opened between Winnipeg and Brandon, with a succession of washouts that defied and defeated all efforts to get trains over, so it was not until the fifth day of May that I left Winnipeg to take charge of the second division of 30 miles.