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Discussion Groups / English Usage / May 2009The heifer who met a train
Some years ago I heard or read a 'poem' about a cow who took to walking across a railway bridge, and up there met a train. I don't recall the details, but as I understand it it did not end well. I am sure the word used for the bovine was heifer, and I never perceived it as a song. It was a short piece. Would you recall this masterpiece? Lars Stockholm > Some years ago I heard or read a 'poem' about a cow who took to > walking across a railway bridge, and up there met a train. I don't [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > > Would you recall this masterpiece? I would not. And I really tend to doubt your memory as well. A railway bridge is generally built of railroad ties with gaps between them and rails passing over them. Cows will not walk on such a surface: they tend to fall into the gaps if they try. OTOH, just because the premise is ludicrous does not mean that the poem does not exist. . . Jim Deutch (JimboCat) -- "it's no more difficult for me to not-believe in a deity who can alter fundamental logical truths than to not-believe in one who can't." -- Wim Lewis >> Some years ago I heard or read a 'poem' about a cow who took to >> walking across a railway bridge, and up there met a train. I don't [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] > OTOH, just because the premise is ludicrous does not mean that the > poem does not exist. . . Many years ago (in 1942 and 1943), I used to cross a railroad bridge across the river Gauja in Carnikava (in Latvia) regularly. The bridge was mainly for trains, but it was used also by pedestrians and an occasional horse-drawn vehicle or two. I was crossing the bridge to get milk from a farm on the opposite side of the river from where we were renting a summer place. This was during the German occupation (and war), and there were armed bridge guards overseeing the activities of the crossers and anyone near the bridge. As far as I can tell, using online maps, there is no road there now that leads to the bridge.  SignatureSkitt (AmE) In message <60a96f8b-d6e8-43e2-999e-ad6f70d81547@x6g2000vbg.googlegroups.com>, JimboCat <103134.3516@compuserve.com> writes >I would not. And I really tend to doubt your memory as well. A railway >bridge is generally built of railroad ties with gaps between them and >rails passing over them. Cows will not walk on such a surface: they >tend to fall into the gaps if they try. Such trestle bridges may be common in America but they're relatively rare in the civilised world south and east of Watford. SignatureJames Follett. Novelist > In message > <60a96f8b-d6e8-43e2-999e-ad6f70d81...@x6g2000vbg.googlegroups.com>, [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > Such trestle bridges may be common in America but they're relatively > rare in the civilised world south and east of Watford. Ah, the perils of a parochial viewpoint! I apologize, and promise to visit a civilized country at the earliest opportunity. Watford won't do, I gather? Jim Deutch (JimboCat) -- "This line about civilization trying to destroy itself has been current since at least World War I, yet civilization apparently keeps bungling the job. World War I couldn't even kill as many people as a flu epidemic, and World War II, even with atomic bombs, couldn't take out more than a couple of percent of the total population at the time. And then the US and USSR so badly bungled the scheduled apocalyptic nuclear exchange that _nobody got killed at all_. Personally, I think Civilization is faking, and doesn't really want to destroy itself at all. This is just attention-getting behavior." [Jim Cambias] >Ah, the perils of a parochial viewpoint! I apologize, and promise to >visit a civilized country at the earliest opportunity. >Watford won't do, I gather? Errr... no. You clearly haven't visited Watford. Regards Jonathan Jim Deutch: > ... I really tend to doubt your memory as well. A railway bridge > is generally built of railroad ties with gaps between them and > rails passing over them. That may *often* be true for the wood or steel truss construction of the late 19th and early to mid 20th century, but there are also plenty of examples where a deck is provided, if only for the benefit of maintenance staff, as on this one: http://hobor.hu/blog/2006/feb/north_rail_bridge_budapest_hungary_0060.jpg Also, early to mid 19th-century railway bridges often used masonry arches (especially in Britain), and new ones today often use concrete. Either method provides a flat supporting surface where the ties (UK: sleepers) would normally rest on ballast, the same as on open ground. Here are two examples of these modern concrete bridges: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ttc-keele-crossing.jpg http://ghostdepot.com/rg/images/tennessee%20route/de%20beque%20bridge%20deck%20P 6180017.jpg > Cows will not walk on such a surface: they > tend to fall into the gaps if they try. > > OTOH, just because the premise is ludicrous does not mean that the > poem does not exist. . . True. I'm not familiar with it myself, as it happens, though. SignatureMark Brader | "And I won't like [this usage] any better if you Toronto | produce examples from Shakespeare, Milton, Johnson ... msb@vex.net | Or, indeed, myself." --Mike Lyle My text in this article is in the public domain. [...] > Also, early to mid 19th-century railway bridges often used > masonry arches (especially in Britain), and new ones today often [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ttc-keele-crossing.jpg > http://ghostdepot.com/rg/images/tennessee%20route/de%20beque%20bridge%20deck%20P 6180017.jpg [...] And here's an old favourite, the brick one at Maidenhead: famous for its daringly shallow curves. <http://berkshireengland.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/maidenhead.jpeg> I tried, briefly and without success, to find a picture of the rather ugly steel one across the M4 near Bristol. That one's interesting for being a replacement copy of its predecessor, mostly built off site and lifted in. It fitted! SignatureMike. Mark Brader: >> Also, early to mid 19th-century railway bridges often used >> masonry arches (especially in Britain), and new ones today often >> use concrete. Either method provides a flat supporting surface >> where the ties (UK: sleepers) would normally rest on ballast, the >> same as on open ground. Here are two examples ... Mike Lyle (text rearranged for convenience): > And here's an old favourite, the brick one at Maidenhead ... > <http://berkshireengland.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/maidenhead.jpeg> But *that* picture doesn't show the surface supporting the tracks. > famous for its daringly shallow curves. A Brunel design, that. When the centering under the arch was eased after the bricks were first laid, some of them came apart, but this was because it was done too soon -- the mortar wasn't dry yet. The contractor admitted error and did it over, and the bridge has stood ever since. When the GWR was widened in this area from 2 tracks to 4 (or as they say in Britain, when the line was "quadrupled"), the existing design was replicated below the new tracks, and this arch has also stood ever since. SignatureMark Brader, Toronto | The plural of "virus" is "ad nauseam". msb@vex.net | --Fred Bambrough My text in this article is in the public domain. > Mark Brader: >>> Also, early to mid 19th-century railway bridges often used [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] > design was replicated below the new tracks, and this arch has also stood > ever since. If you stand on the towpath underneath there is a quite wonderful echo. SignatureOnline waterways route planner: http://canalplan.org.uk development version: http://canalplan.eu >msb@vex.net (Mark Brader) writes: > [quoted text clipped - 23 lines] > >If you stand on the towpath underneath there is a quite wonderful echo. Especially if you break wind, or otherwise make a noise. Throughout my childhood around Maidenhead I knew of "the sounding arch", but always identified it with the span over the navigation channel. I see I was wrong. SignaturePaul >> A Brunel design, that. When the centering under the arch was eased >> after the bricks were first laid, some of them came apart, but this >> was because it was done too soon -- the mortar wasn't dry yet. [...] >If you stand on the towpath underneath there is a quite wonderful echo. There's an arch bridge over the Charles River not far from where I sit known as "Echo Bridge". It's actually a disused aqueduct,[1] with a pedestrian walkway along the top. -GAWollman [1] It may be one of the ones that's now used for sewage. SignatureGarrett A. Wollman | The real tragedy of human existence is not that we are wollman@csail.mit.edu| nasty by nature, but that a cruel structural asymmetry Opinions not those | grants to rare events of meanness such power to shape of MIT or CSAIL. | our history. - S.J. Gould, Ten Thousand Acts of Kindness Mark Brader: > When the GWR was widened in this area from 2 tracks to 4 > (or as they say in Britain, when the line was "quadrupled")... Incidentally, this sense of "quadrupled" is not in the OED. I've just emailed them a note about that, citing 5 sources, one of which is talking about this bridge. Another one is one of the cites for their existing "quadrupled" entry -- they used it without realizing it had a different sense from the others. SignatureMark Brader | "... There are three kinds of death in this world. Toronto | There's heart death, there's brain death, and msb@vex.net | there's being off the network." -- Guy Almes My text in this article is in the public domain. > Mark Brader: >> When the GWR was widened in this area from 2 tracks to 4 [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > of the cites for their existing "quadrupled" entry -- they used > it without realizing it had a different sense from the others. Nice work, though along with Mike B I don't think it's a sense much used by the laity. But it underlines what I've said before, that OED entries must be read not passively but constructively. SignatureMike. In alt.usage.english, Mark Brader wrote: >When the GWR was widened in this area from 2 tracks to 4 >(or as they say in Britain, when the line was "quadrupled") For some values of "they". Regarding the recent Trent Valley upgrade, all I've seen are "quad-tracking" and "four-tracking". That's not to say that "quadrupling" doesn't exist, but it's far from universal in the UK. Those terms mean something rather different to a recording musician, of course. SignatureMike Barnes Cheshire, England Mark Brader: >> When the GWR was widened in this area from 2 tracks to 4 >> (or as they say in Britain, when the line was "quadrupled") Mike Barnes: > For some values of "they". True. When I was assembling that list of cites I mentioned, only about 40% of the books that mentioned instances of it happening used that word for it. I had expected a somewhat higher proportion. > Regarding the recent Trent Valley upgrade, all I've seen are > "quad-tracking" and "four-tracking". I've seen "four-tracking" also, but not "quad-tracking" before. Some writers also used words like "doubling" (which the first lot of writers would use to specifically mean "widened from 1 to 2 tracks", and perhaps also to mean "narrowed to 2 tracks") or explicit expressions like "widened to four tracks". > Those terms mean something rather different to a recording musician, > of course. I daresay! SignatureMark Brader | "Whose tracks these are I think I know; Toronto | The railroad has gone bankrupt, though..." msb@vex.net | --Michael Wares (after Frost) My text in this article is in the public domain. > Some years ago I heard or read a 'poem' about a cow who took to > walking across a railway bridge, and up there met a train. I don't [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > > Would you recall this masterpiece? All I can bring to mind is "terrible collision on the railway line". On which, to my utter astonishment, I got only a single hit. Terrible collision on the railway line, Poor cow didn’t see the red light shine. Ooh, it happened long ago and they’re working on it now Sorting out the engine from poor old cow Poor old cow, poor old cow. SignatureOnline waterways route planner: http://canalplan.org.uk development version: http://canalplan.eu |
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