Test

Upon hearing this, Napoleon grabbed the handrail and began climbing the steps. Halfway up, he looked down and saw Joseph still standing beside him. He said, "Joseph, why don't you come up and take a look too?"

Joseph instinctively wanted to decline.

"Get on, don't worry, this is a steam locomotive, it won't overturn," Napoleon said again.

"I don't believe you!" Joseph thought to himself. At the same time, he realized the car hadn't even been started, so it couldn't possibly start, much less explode. So he said to Watt, "Mr. Watt, I remember there's quite a bit of space up there. Why don't we go up and take a look together? Hmm, the ladder is a bit steep, so perhaps you could go first?"

"Haha, Dean Bonaparte, are you worried I'll fall and want to catch me? I may be a little old, but climbing a ladder like this is no problem," Watt laughed.

As Watt said this, he went up the ladder first, and Joseph followed him up. The group climbed up and went into the driver's cab.

The cab was indeed very spacious, about eight or nine square meters in size. On the right side of the cab was a control panel with several handles, and a rope was hanging nearby.

"Is this the pull cord for the light bulb?" Napoleon asked.

"No, it's the whistle's pull cord," Watt said. "The light cord is over there, near the entrance."

Napoleon nodded, then turned his head and saw a closed hatch a little to the left of the driver's cab. Next to it was a small cart and a few shovels.

"What is this?" Napoleon asked.

"This is the boiler's feed inlet," Watt explained. "When the steam engine was running, the workers fed coal in here to burn. This small cart was for bringing coal from the water car at the back, over there..."

Watt pointed to a pipe and a valve nearby, saying, "Your Excellency, this is a water pipe used to add water to the steam engine. Of course, water can only be added when the steam engine is stopped and there is no pressure in the cylinders..."

Napoleon nodded and thanked Watt again. Then they looked around the vehicle again before leaving the locomotive.

The next morning, after breakfast, Napoleon and Joseph, accompanied by their guards, arrived at the testing ground. By then, the locomotive had left the factory and was on the railway outside. The morning sun shone on the steel behemoth and the rails, making the rails, the glass on the locomotive, and the brass decorations gleam in the sunlight.

A grandstand was built on a hill about 200 meters high, about 300 meters from the railway. Joseph explained why the grandstand was placed so far away as follows:

"From this position, you can see the entire test track and the locomotive's performance throughout. If you were in another location, you would only be able to see a small part of it. As for the problem of not being able to see clearly from a distance, that can be completely compensated for with binoculars."

Everyone agreed that Joseph's view was very reasonable, except for Napoleon, who privately expressed his doubts to his brother. Joseph also honestly admitted that there were indeed other reasons why he was unwilling to watch up close.

"I don't like the smell of coal smoke," Joseph said.

"Heh heh..." Napoleon said.

However, the brothers did not continue the discussion on this issue in depth, because on the railway over there, the "Progress No. 1" locomotive had already started emitting smoke.

Napoleon, forgetting his usual mockery of his elder brother (though such things always brought him a lot of amusement), raised his telescope and peered in that direction, asking, "Joseph, Joseph, is it about to move?"

"It's just starting the steam engine, the trailer isn't even attached yet, what's the rush?" Joseph looked at his brother with the eyes of someone looking at a country bumpkin. "Besides, how can they move if we don't give the order here? Hmm, by the way, Napoleon, isn't this order supposed to be given by you? Didn't you carefully read the procedure I showed you last night?"

"I saw it, I remember. Once they were ready, they hung up a blue flag for us and called to let us know they were ready and could leave at any time. Then we gave the departure order by phone and a red flag. How come I don't remember that? I just found it very novel..."

Time ticked by, but there was still no call from them, nor were any blue flags displayed.

"So slow..." Napoleon said.

"I told you long ago, they should have finished starting the fire and pressurizing first, but you insisted on watching the whole process yourself," Joseph said. "But it should be done soon."

"It's finally moving... ah, it's moving! It's moving! I still..."

"That's to attach the trailer," Joseph said.

The locomotive below slowly began to move, but not forward; instead, it slowly moved back a short distance, backing up to the side of the trailers.

"Your Excellency, Progress No. 1 will be hauling nine trailers this time, each carrying more than fifty tons of coal. Including the weight of the trailers themselves, Progress No. 1 will be hauling more than five hundred tons," Watt explained.

"Ah, this is already a large ship," Napoleon said. "Can it be pulled?"

"According to the calculations, there are no problems," Joseph said.

"Oh," Napoleon said, and asked no further questions.

It took some time to assemble the trailers, and by the time the sun was high in the sky, the blue flag was finally raised. The guard who was watching the phone also received a call from the other side, a call that had already been prepared.

"Alright, let's begin!" Napoleon shouted.

The signal was sent out, and a long blast of a ship's horn came from the other side shortly afterward. The sound could be heard clearly even from the high ground hundreds of meters away.

"Now you know how right we are to be here, don't you? If we were down here, the noise would be..." Joseph said. "Let me tell you, Napoleon, no one knows better than me how to choose the right spot in the stands."

"Shut up, stop arguing," Napoleon said, holding up his binoculars. "That carriage moved!"

Indeed, after the whistle sounded, the train began to slowly move forward.

"Why is it so slow? Much slower than a carriage," Napoleon said. "But it can pull so much at once, so its efficiency is still far superior to that of a carriage."

Historically, the earliest steam locomotives, although they had a system of adding a ring on the inside of the wheels to secure them to the rails, lacked proper suspension (crucially, there wasn't enough cheap enough spring steel). The wheels were rigidly attached directly to the locomotive. This meant that at even slightly higher speeds, these steam locomotives would shake violently, sometimes even lifting the wheels off the rails and causing derailments.

Furthermore, the rails used on those locomotives were mostly wrought iron rails, weighing less than 10 kilograms per meter. Compared to the steel rails used in today's Progress No. 1 locomotives, they were much lighter and softer. If a steam locomotive went even a little fast and experienced a bump, the impact force from the wheels was enough to bend and deform the rails. Therefore, those locomotives at that time could indeed not outrun horse-drawn carriages, not because they lacked power, but because they simply dared not go fast—going fast would truly be fatal!

However, these problems do not exist in the "Progress No. 1". Both the locomotive and the trailers behind it have spring suspension. This not only increases the comfort of the vehicle, but more importantly, it ensures that the wheels are always firmly attached to the rails, preventing the wheels from jumping up and falling off the rails, which could lead to derailment.

The Progress No. 1 used genuine heavy-duty steel rails, whose load-bearing capacity far surpassed that of wrought iron rails. Unlike cheaper rails, it wouldn't bend or derail like some other trains. So, it would be a joke if the Progress No. 1 couldn't outrun a horse-drawn carriage. Napoleon's initial feeling that it was slower than a carriage stemmed entirely from the fact that, like all trains, the Progress No. 1 had poor acceleration and deceleration capabilities. However, given enough time and increased speed, the Progress No. 1 would inevitably surpass the speed of a horse-drawn carriage.

The train sounded its whistle again and began to gradually accelerate, enveloped in swirling steam. Napoleon nodded repeatedly, "Excellent, excellent! It's quite fast, no less than a horse-drawn carriage! Such a large thing, dragging so much cargo, and it's moving so fast! This is wonderful! Joseph, can it go any faster?"

However, at this point, the train had already begun to slow down. The six-kilometer experimental track was still a bit too short, insufficient to allow the train to reach its maximum speed. The highest speed tested in this experiment was thirty kilometers per hour, which wasn't the absolute maximum, but for that era, it was already an extremely fast speed.

"This thing should be able to carry people too," Napoleon said. "This thing is really useful, Joseph. When will you be able to get that Land Battleship out for me?"

"That thing?" Joseph scoffed. "Let's wait a bit. Let's build the railway network that connects all the important locations in the country first, and make some money before we talk about it. Okay, look, the train is heading back. You'll have something to say when it stops. But speaking of Land Battleship, well, some railways are also very strategically valuable. We can call them 'defense railways,' and then..."

"Then you'd allocate funds from the War Department's account to build it, and then you'd use it, wouldn't you say?" Napoleon said. "Even if I have no problem with it, are you sure General Carnot would agree to such a thing?"

"General Carnot?" Joseph said, "Just tell him that this thing is very important for the military, and then tell him that in peacetime, by leasing it to private companies and collecting rent, he can recoup his investment and even make a profit. I think he will agree."