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The colliery village of Wylam is situated on the north bank of the Tyne, about eight miles west of Newcastle. The Newcastle and Carlisle railway runs along the opposite bank; and the traveller by that line sees the usual signs of a colliery in the unsightly pumping-engines surrounded by heaps of ashes, coal-dust, and slag; whilst a neighbouring iron-furnace in full blast throws out dense smoke and loud jets of steam by day and lurid flames at night. These works form the nucleus of the village, which is almost entirely occupied by coal-miners and iron-furnacemen. The place is remarkable for its large population, but not for its cleanness or neatness as a village; the houses, as in most colliery villages, being the property of the owners or lessees, who employ them in temporarily accommodating the workpeople, against whose earnings there is a weekly set-off for house and coals. About the end of last century the estate of which Wylam forms part, belonged to Mr. Blackett, a gentleman of considerable celebrity in coal-mining, then more generally known as the proprietor of the ‘Globe’ newspaper.

There is nothing to interest one in the village itself. But a few hundred yards from its eastern extremity stands a humble detached dwelling, which will be interesting to many as the birthplace of one of the most remarkable men of our times—George Stephenson, the Railway Engineer. It is a common two-storied, red-tiled, rubble house, portioned off into four labourers’ apartments. It is known by the name of High Street House, and was originally so called because it stands by the side of what used to be the old riding post road or street between Newcastle and Hexham, along which the post was carried on horseback within the memory of persons living.

The lower room in the west end of this house was the home of the Stephenson family; and there George Stephenson was born, the second of a family of six children, on the 9th of June, 1781. The apartment is now, what it was then, an ordinary labourer’s dwelling—its walls are unplastered, its floor is of clay, and the bare rafters are exposed overhead.

Robert Stephenson, or “Old Bob,” as the neighbours familiarly called him, and his wife Mabel, were a respectable couple, careful and hard-working. It is said that Robert Stephenson’s father was a Scotchman, and came into England as a gentleman’s servant. Mabel, his wife, was the daughter of Robert Carr, a dyer at Ovingham. When first married, they lived at Walbottle, a village situated between Wylam and Newcastle, afterwards removing to Wylam, where Robert was employed as fireman of the old pumping engine at that colliery.

An old Wylam collier, who remembered George Stephenson’s father, thus described him:—“Geordie’s fayther war like a peer o’ deals nailed thegither, an’ a bit o’ flesh i’ th’ inside; he war as queer as Dick’s hatband—went thrice aboot, an’ wudn’t tie. His wife Mabel war a delicat’ boddie, an’ varry flighty. Thay war an honest family, but sair hadden doon i’ th’ world.” Indeed, the earnings of old Robert did not amount to more than twelve shillings a week; and, as there were six children to maintain, the family, during their stay at Wylam, were necessarily in very straitened circumstances. The father’s wages being barely sufficient, even with the most rigid economy, for the sustenance of the household, there was little to spare for clothing, and nothing for education, so none of the children were sent to school.

Old Robert was a general favourite in the village, especially amongst the children, whom he was accustomed to draw about him whilst tending the engine-fire, and feast their young imaginations with tales of Sinbad the Sailor and Robinson Crusoe, besides others of his own invention; so that “Bob’s engine-fire” came to be the most popular resort in the village. Another feature in his character, by which he was long remembered, was his affection for birds and animals; and he had many tame favourites of both sorts, which were as fond of resorting to his engine-fire as the boys and girls themselves. In the winter time he had usually a flock of tame robins about him; and they would come hopping familiarly to his feet to pick up the crumbs which he had saved for them out of his humble dinner. At his cottage he was rarely without one or more tame blackbirds, which flew about the house, or in and out at the door. In summer-time he would go a-birdnesting with his children; and one day he took his little son George to see a blackbird’s nest for the first time. Holding him up in his arms, he let the wondering boy peep down, through the branches held aside for the purpose, into a nest full of young birds—a sight which the boy never forgot, but used to speak of with delight to his intimate friends when he himself had grown an old man.

The boy George led the ordinary life of working-people’s children. He played about the doors; went birdnesting when he could; and ran errands to the village. He was also an eager listener, with the other children, to his father’s curious tales; and he early imbibed from him that affection for birds and animals which continued throughout his life. In course of time he was promoted to the office of carrying his father’s dinner to him while at work, and it was on such occasions his great delight to see the robins fed. At home he helped to nurse, and that with a careful hand, his younger brothers and sisters. One of his duties was to see that the other children were kept out of the way of the chaldron waggons, which were then dragged by horses along the wooden tramroad immediately in front of the cottage-door. This waggon-way was the first in the northern district on which the experiment of a locomotive engine was tried. But at the time of which we speak, the locomotive had scarcely been dreamt of in England as a practicable working power; horses only were used to haul the coal; and one of the first sights with which the boy was familiar was the coal-waggons dragged by them along the wooden railway at Wylam.

Thus eight years passed; after which, the coal having been worked out, the old engine, which had grown “dismal to look at,” as one of the workmen described it, was pulled down; and then Robert, having obtained employment as a fireman at the Dewley Burn Colliery, removed with his family to that place. Dewley Burn, at this day, consists of a few old-fashioned low-roofed cottages standing on either side of a babbling little stream. They are connected by a rustic wooden bridge, which spans the rift in front of the doors. In the central one-roomed cottage of this group, on the right bank, Robert Stephenson lived for a time with his family; the pit at which he worked standing in the rear of the cottages.

Young though he was, George was now of an age to be able to contribute something towards the family maintenance; for in a poor man’s house, every child is a burden until his little hands can be turned to profitable account. That the boy was shrewd and active, and possessed of a ready mother wit, will be evident enough from the following incident. One day his sister Nell went into Newcastle to buy a bonnet; and Geordie went with her “for company.” At a draper’s shop in the Bigg Market, Nell found a “chip” quite to her mind, but on pricing it, alas! it was found to be fifteen pence beyond her means, and she left the shop very much disappointed. But Geordie said, “Never heed, Nell; see if I canna win siller enough to buy the bonnet; stand ye there, till I come back.” Away ran the boy and disappeared amidst the throng of the market, leaving the girl to wait his return. Long and long she waited, until it grew dusk, and the market people had nearly all left. She had begun to despair, and fears crossed her mind that Geordie must have been run over and killed; when at last up he came running, almost breathless. “I’ve gotten the siller for the bonnet, Nell!” cried he. “Eh Geordie!” she said, “but hoo hae ye gotten it?” “Haudin the gentlemen’s horses!” was the exultant reply. The bonnet was forthwith bought, and the two returned to Dewley happy.

George’s first regular employment was of a very humble sort. A widow, named Grace Ainslie, then occupied the neighbouring farmhouse of Dewley. She kept a number of cows, and had the privilege of grazing them along the waggon-road. She needed a boy to herd the cows, to keep them out of the way of the waggons, and prevent their straying or trespassing on the neighbours’ “liberties;” the boy’s duty was also to bar the gates at night after all the waggons had passed. George petitioned for this post, and, to his great joy, he was appointed at the wage of twopence a day.

It was light employment, and he had plenty of spare time on his hands, which he spent in birdnesting, making whistles out of reeds and scrannel straws, and erecting Lilliputian mills in the little water-streams that ran into the Dewley bog. But his favourite amusement at this early age was erecting clay engines in conjunction with his chosen playmate, Bill Thirlwall. The place is still pointed out where the future engineers made their first essays in modelling. The boys found the clay for their engines in the adjoining bog, and the hemlocks which grew about supplied them with imaginary steam-pipes. They even proceeded to make a miniature winding-machine in connexion with their engine, and the apparatus was erected upon a bench in front of the Thirlwalls’ cottage. The corves were made out of hollowed corks; the ropes were supplied by twine; and a few bits of wood gleaned from the refuse of the carpenter’s shop completed their materials. With this apparatus the boys made a show of sending the corves down the pit and drawing them up again, much to the marvel of the pitmen. But some mischievous person about the place seized the opportunity early one morning of smashing the fragile machinery, much to the grief of the young engineers.

As Stephenson grew older and abler to work, he was set to lead the horses when ploughing, though scarce big enough to stride across the furrows; and he used afterwards to say that he rode to his work in the mornings at an hour when most other children of his age were asleep in their beds. He was also employed to hoe turnips, and do similar farm-work, for which he was paid the advanced wage of fourpence a day. But his highest ambition was to be taken on at the colliery where his father worked; and he shortly joined his elder brother James there as a “corf-bitter,” or “picker,” to clear the coal of stones, bats, and dross. His wages were then advanced to sixpence a day, and afterwards to eightpence when he was set to drive the gin-horse.

Shortly after, George went to Black Callerton to drive the gin there; and as that colliery lies about two miles across the fields from Dewley Burn, he walked that distance early in the morning to his work, returning home late in the evening. One of the old residents at Black Callerton, who remembered him at that time, described him to the author as “a grit growing lad, with bare legs an’ feet;” adding that he was “very quick-witted and full of fun and tricks: indeed, there was nothing under the sun but he tried to imitate.” He was usually foremost also in the sports and pastimes of youth.

Among his first strongly-developed tastes was the love of birds and animals, which he inherited from his father. Blackbirds were his special favourites. The hedges between Dewley and Black Callerton were capital bird-nesting places; and there was not a nest there that he did not know of. When the young birds were old enough, he would bring them home with him, feed them, and teach them to fly about the cottage unconfined by cages. One of his blackbirds became so tame, that, after flying about the doors all day, and in and out of the cottage, it would take up its roost upon the bed-head at night. And most singular of all, the bird would disappear in the spring and summer months, when it was supposed to go into the woods to pair and rear its young, after which it would reappear at the cottage, and resume its social habits during the winter. This went on for several years. George had also a stock of tame rabbits, for which he built a little house behind the cottage, and for many years he continued to pride himself upon the superiority of his breed.

After he had driven the gin for some time at Dewley and Black Callerton, he was taken on as an assistant to his father in firing the engine at Dewley. This was a step of promotion which he had anxiously desired, his only fear being lest he should be found too young for the work. Indeed, he used afterwards to relate how he was wont to hide himself when the owner of the colliery went round, in case he should be thought too little a boy to earn the wages paid him. Since he had modelled his clay engines in the bog, his young ambition was to be an engineman; and to be an assistant fireman was the first step towards this position. Great therefore was his joy when, at about fourteen years of age, he was appointed assistant-fireman, at the wage of a shilling a day.

But the coal at Dewley Burn being at length worked out, the pit was ordered to be “laid in,” and old Robert and his family were again under the necessity of shifting their home; for, to use the common phrase, they must “follow the wark.” They removed accordingly to a place called Jolly’s Close, a few miles to the south, close behind the village of Newburn, where another coal-mine belonging to the Duke of Northumberland, called “the Duke’s Winnin,” had recently been opened out.

One of the old persons in the neighbourhood, who knew the family well, describes the dwelling in which they lived as a poor cottage of only one room, in which the father, mother, four sons, and two daughters, lived and slept. It was crowded with three low-poled beds. The one apartment served for parlour, kitchen, sleeping-room, and all.

The children of the Stephenson family were now growing apace, and several of them were old enough to be able to earn money at various kinds of colliery work. James and George, the two eldest sons, worked as assistant-firemen; and the younger boys worked as wheelers or pickers on the bank-tops. The two girls helped their mother with the household work.

Other workings of the coal were opened out in the neighbourhood; and to one of these George was removed as fireman on his own account. This was called the “Mid Mill Winnin,” where he had for his mate a young man named Coe. They worked together there for about two years, by twelve-hour shifts, George firing the engine at the wage of a shilling a day. He was now fifteen years old. His ambition was as yet limited to attaining the standing of a full workman, at a man’s wages; and with that view he endeavoured to attain such a knowledge of his engine as would eventually lead to his employment as an engineman, with its accompanying advantage of higher pay. He was a steady, sober, hard-working young man, but nothing more in the estimation of his fellow-workmen.

One of his favourite pastimes in by-hours was trying feats of strength with his companions. Although in frame he was not particularly robust, yet he was big and bony, and considered very strong for his age. At throwing the hammer George had no compeer. At lifting heavy weights off the ground from between his feet, by means of a bar of iron passed through them—placing the bar against his knees as a fulcrum, and then straightening his spine and lifting them sheer up—he was also very successful. On one occasion he lifted as much as sixty stones weight—a striking indication of his strength of bone and muscle.

When the pit at Mid Mill was closed, George and his companion Coe were sent to work another pumping-engine erected near Throckley Bridge, where they continued for some months. It was while working at this place that his wages were raised to 12s. a week—an event to him of great importance. On coming out of the foreman’s office that Saturday evening on which he received the advance, he announced the fact to his fellow-workmen, adding triumphantly “I am now a made man for life!”

The pit opened at Newburn, at which old Robert Stephenson worked, proving a failure, it was closed; and a new pit was sunk at Water-row, on a strip of land lying between the Wylam waggon-way and the river Tyne, about half a mile west of Newburn Church. A pumping engine was erected there by Robert Hawthorn, the Duke’s engineer; and old Stephenson went to work it as fireman, his son George acting as the engineman or plugman. At that time he was about seventeen years old—a very youthful age at which to fill so responsible a post. He had thus already got ahead of his father in his station as a workman; for the plugman holds a higher grade than the fireman, requiring more practical knowledge and skill, and usually receiving higher wages.

George’s duty as plugman was to watch the engine, to see that it kept well in work, and that the pumps were efficient in drawing the water. When the water-level in the pit was lowered, and the suction became incomplete through the exposure of the suction-holes, it was then his duty to proceed to the bottom of the shaft and plug the tube so that the pump should draw: hence the designation of “plugman.” If a stoppage in the engine took place through any defect which he was incapable of remedying, it was for him to call in the aid of the chief engineer to set it to rights.

But from the time when George Stephenson was appointed fireman, and more particularly afterwards as engineman, he applied himself so assiduously and so successfully to the study of the engine and its gearing—taking the machine to pieces in his leisure hours for the purpose of cleaning and understanding its various parts—that he soon acquired a thorough practical knowledge of its construction and mode of working, and very rarely needed to call the engineer of the colliery to his aid. His engine became a sort of pet with him, and he was never wearied of watching and inspecting it with admiration.

Though eighteen years old, like many of his fellow-workmen, Stephenson had not yet learnt to read. All that he could do was to get some one to read for him by his engine fire, out of any book or stray newspaper which found its way into the neighbourhood. Buonaparte was then overrunning Italy, and astounding Europe by his brilliant succession of victories; and there was no more eager auditor of his exploits, as read from the newspaper accounts, than the young engineman at the Water-row Pit.

There were also numerous stray bits of information and intelligence contained in these papers, which excited Stephenson’s interest. One of these related to the Egyptian method of hatching birds’ eggs by means of artificial heat. Curious about everything relating to birds, he determined to test it by experiment. It was spring time, and he forthwith went a birdnesting in the adjoining woods and hedges. He gathered a collection of eggs of various sorts, set them in flour in a warm place in the engine-house, covering the whole with wool, and then waited the issue. The heat was kept as steady as possible, and the eggs were carefully turned every twelve hours, but though they chipped, and some of them exhibited well-grown chicks, they never hatched. The experiment failed, but the incident shows that the inquiring mind of the youth was fairly at work.

Modelling of engines in clay continued to be another of his favourite occupations. He made models of engines which he had seen, and of others which were described to him. These attempts were an improvement upon his first trials at Dewley Burn bog, when occupied there as a herd-boy. He was, however, anxious to know something of the wonderful engines of Boulton and Watt, and was told that they were to be found fully described in books, which he must search for information as to their construction, action and uses. But, alas! Stephenson could not read; he had not yet learnt even his letters.

Thus he shortly found, when gazing wistfully in the direction of knowledge, that to advance further as a skilled workman, he must master this wonderful art of reading—the key to so many other arts. Only thus could he gain an access to books, the depositories of the wisdom and experience of the past. Although a grown man, and doing the work of a man, he was not ashamed to confess his ignorance, and go to school, big as he was, to learn his letters. Perhaps, too, he foresaw that, in laying out a little of his spare earnings for this purpose, he was investing money judiciously, and that, in every hour he spent at school, he was really working for better wages.

His first schoolmaster was Robin Cowens, a poor teacher in the village of Walbottle. He kept a night-school, which was attended by a few of the colliers and labourers’ sons in the neighbourhood. George took lessons in spelling and reading three nights in the week. Robin Cowen’s teaching cost threepence a week; and though it was not very good, yet George, being hungry for knowledge and eager to acquire it, soon learnt to read. He also practised “pothooks,” and at the age of nineteen he was proud to be able to write his own name.

A Scotch dominie, named Andrew Robertson, set up a night-school in the village of Newburn, in the winter of 1799. It was more convenient for George to attend this school, as it was nearer to his work, and only a few minutes’ walk from Jolly’s Close. Besides, Andrew had the reputation of being a skilled arithmetician; and this branch of knowledge Stephenson was very desirous of acquiring. He accordingly began taking lessons from him, paying fourpence a week. Robert Gray, the junior fireman at the Water-row Pit, began arithmetic at the same time; and Gray afterwards told the author that George learnt “figuring” so much faster than he did, that he could not make out how it was—“he took to figures so wonderful.” Although the two started together from the same point, at the end of the winter George had mastered “reduction,” while Robert Gray was still struggling with the difficulties of simple division. But George’s secret was his perseverance. He worked out the sums in his bye-hours, improving every minute of his spare time by the engine-fire, and studying there the arithmetical problems set for him upon his slate by the master. In the evenings he took to Robertson the sums which he had “worked,” and new ones were “set” for him to study out the following day. Thus his progress was rapid, and, with a willing heart and mind, he soon became well advanced in arithmetic. Indeed, Andrew Robertson became very proud of his scholar; and shortly after, when the Water-row Pit was closed, and George removed to Black Callerton to work there, the poor schoolmaster, not having a very extensive connexion in Newburn, went with his pupils, and set up his night-school at Black Callerton, where he continued his lessons.

George still found time to attend to his favourite animals while working at the Water-row Pit. Like his father, he used to tempt the robin-redbreasts to hop and fly about him at the engine-fire, by the bait of bread-crumbs saved from his dinner. But his chief favourite was his dog—so sagacious that he almost daily carried George’s dinner to him at the pit. The tin containing the meal was suspended from the dog’s neck, and, thus laden, he proceeded faithfully from Jolly’s Close to Water-row Pit, quite through the village of Newburn. He turned neither to left nor right, nor heeded the barking of curs at his heels. But his course was not unattended with perils. One day the big strange dog of a passing butcher espying the engineman’s messenger with the tin can about his neck, ran after and fell upon him. There was a terrible tussle and worrying, which lasted for a brief while, and, shortly after, the dog’s master, anxious for his dinner, saw his faithful servant approaching, bleeding but triumphant. The tin can was still round his neck, but the dinner had been spilt in the struggle. Though George went without his dinner that day, he was prouder of his dog than ever when the circumstances of the combat were related to him by the villagers who had seen it.

It was while working at the Water-row Pit that Stephenson learnt the art of brakeing an engine. This being one of the higher departments of colliery labour, and among the best paid, George was very anxious to learn it. A small winding-engine having been put up for the purpose of drawing the coals from the pit, Bill Coe, his friend and fellow-workman, was appointed the brakesman. He frequently allowed George to try his hand at the machine, and instructed him how to proceed. Coe was, however, opposed in this by several of the other workmen—one of whom, a banksman named William Locke, [26] went so far as to stop the working of the pit because Stephenson had been called in to the brake. But one day as Mr. Charles Nixon, the manager of the pit, was observed approaching, Coe adopted an expedient which put a stop to the opposition. He called upon Stephenson to “come into the brake-house, and take hold of the machine.” Locke, as usual, sat down, and the working of the pit was stopped. When requested by the manager to give an explanation, he said that “young Stephenson couldn’t brake, and, what was more, never would learn, he was so clumsy.” Mr. Nixon, however, ordered Locke to go on with the work, which he did; and Stephenson, after some further practice, acquired the art of brakeing.

After working at the Water-row Pit and at other engines near Newburn for about three years, George and Coe went to Black Callerton early in 1801. Though only twenty years of age, his employers thought so well of him that they appointed him to the responsible office of brakesman at the Dolly Pit. For convenience’ sake, he took lodgings at a small farmer’s in the village, finding his own victuals, and paying so much a week for lodging and attendance. In the locality this was called “picklin in his awn poke neuk.” It not unfrequently happens that the young workman about the collieries, when selecting a lodging, contrives to pitch his tent where the daughter of the house ultimately becomes his wife. This is often the real attraction that draws the youth from home, though a very different one may be pretended.

George Stephenson’s duties as brakesman may be briefly described. The work was somewhat monotonous, and consisted in superintending the working of the engine and machinery by means of which the coals were drawn out of the pit. Brakesman are almost invariably selected from those who have had considerable experience as engine-firemen, and borne a good character for steadiness, punctuality, watchfulness, and “mother wit.” In George Stephenson’s day the coals were drawn out of the pit in corves, or large baskets made of hazel rods. The corves were placed together in a cage, between which and the pit-ropes there was usually from fifteen to twenty feet of chain. The approach of the corves towards the pit mouth was signalled by a bell, brought into action by a piece of mechanism worked from the shaft of the engine. When the bell sounded, the brakesman checked the speed, by taking hold of the hand-gear connected with the steam-valves, which were so arranged that by their means he could regulate the speed of the engine, and stop or set it in motion when required. Connected with the fly-wheel was a powerful wooden brake, acting by pressure against its rim, something like the brake of a railway-carriage against its wheels. On catching sight of the chain attached to the ascending corve-cage, the brakesman, by pressing his foot upon a foot-step near him, was enabled, with great precision, to stop the revolutions of the wheel, and arrest the ascent of the corves at the pit mouth, when they were forthwith landed on the “settle board.” On the full corves being replaced by empty ones, it was then the duty of the brakesman to reverse the engine, and send the corves down the pit to be filled again.

The monotony of George Stephenson’s occupation as a brakesman was somewhat varied by the change which he made, in his turn, from the day to the night shift. His duty, on the latter occasions, consisted chiefly in sending men and materials into the mine, and in drawing other men and materials out. Most of the workmen enter the pit during the night shift, and leave it in the latter part of the day, whilst coal-drawing is proceeding. The requirements of the work at night are such, that the brakesman has a good deal of spare time on his hands, which he is at liberty to employ in his own way. From an early period, George was accustomed to employ those vacant night hours in working the sums set for him by Andrew Robertson upon his slate, practising writing in his copy-book, and mending the shoes of his fellow-workmen. His wages while working at the Dolly Pit amounted to from £1 15s. to £2 in the fortnight; but he gradually added to them as he became more expert at shoe-mending, and afterwards at shoe-making.

Probably he was stimulated to take in hand this extra work by the attachment he had by this time formed for a young woman named Fanny Henderson, who officiated as servant in the small farmer’s house in which he lodged. We have been informed that the personal attractions of Fanny, though these were considerable, were the least of her charms. Mr. William Fairbairn, who afterwards saw her in her home at Willington Quay, describes her as a very comely woman. But her temper was one of the sweetest; and those who knew her were accustomed to speak of the charming modesty of her demeanour, her kindness of disposition, and withal her sound good sense.

Amongst his various mendings of old shoes at Callerton. George was on one occasion favoured with the shoes of his sweetheart to sole. One can imagine the pleasure with which he would linger over such a piece of work, and the pride with which he would execute it. A friend of his, still living, relates that, after he had finished the shoes, he carried them about with him in his pocket on the Sunday afternoon, and that from time to time he would pull them out and hold them up, exclaiming, “what a capital job he had made of them!”

Out of his earnings by shoe-mending at Callerton, George contrived to save his first guinea. The first guinea saved by a working man is no trivial thing. If, as in Stephenson’s case, it has been the result of prudent self-denial, of extra labour at bye-hours, and of the honest resolution to save and economise for worthy purposes, the first guinea saved is an earnest of better things. When Stephenson had saved this guinea he was not a little elated at the achievement, and expressed the opinion to a friend, who many years after reminded him of it, that he was “now a rich man.”

Not long after he began to work at Black Callerton as brakesman, he had a quarrel with a pitman named Ned Nelson, a roistering bully, who was the terror of the village. Nelson was a great fighter; and it was therefore considered dangerous to quarrel with him. Stephenson was so unfortunate as not to be able to please this pitman by the way in which he drew him out of the pit; and Nelson swore at him grossly because of the alleged clumsiness of his brakeing. George defended himself, and appealed to the testimony of the other workmen. But Nelson had not been accustomed to George’s style of self-assertion; and, after a great deal of abuse, he threatened to kick the brakesman, who defied him to do so. Nelson ended by challenging Stephenson to a pitched battle; and the latter accepted the challenge, when a day was fixed on which the fight was to come off.

Great was the excitement at Black Callerton when it was known that George Stephenson had accepted Nelson’s challenge. Everybody said he would be killed. The villagers, the young men, and especially the boys of the place, with whom George was a great favourite, all wished that he might beat Nelson, but they scarcely dared to say so. They came about him while he was at work in the engine-house to inquire if it was really true that he was “goin to fight Nelson?” “Ay; never fear for me; I’ll fight him.” And fight him he did. For some days previous to the appointed day of battle, Nelson went entirely off work for the purpose of keeping himself fresh and strong, whereas Stephenson went on doing his daily work as usual, and appeared not in the least disconcerted by the prospect of the affair. So, on the evening appointed, after George had done his day’s labour, he went into the Dolly Pit Field, where his already exulting rival was ready to meet him. George stripped, and “went in” like a practised pugilist—though it was his first and last fight. After a few rounds, George’s wiry muscles and practised strength enabled him severely to punish his adversary, and to secure an easy victory.

This circumstance is related in illustration of Stephenson’s personal pluck and courage; and it was thoroughly characteristic of the man. He was no pugilist, and the very reverse of quarrelsome. But he would not be put down by the bully of the colliery, and he fought him. There his pugilism ended; they afterwards shook hands, and continued good friends. In after life, Stephenson’s mettle was often as hardly tried, though in a different way; and he did not fail to exhibit the same resolute courage in contending with the bullies of the railway world, as he showed in his encounter with Ned Nelson, the fighting pitman of Callerton.