AN OPERATIC RAILWAY TRAIN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XX, Issue 6823, 29 September 1883, Page 2 (Supplement)

AN OPERATIC RAILWAY TRAIN.

The Troy Daily Times publishes a long leading article on the subject of a railway car now being build by order of Colonel Mapleson for the special use of Mdme. Adelina Patti, and of other cars to be run with it for the accommodation "of the members of the company with which, during her next4meriCcin tour, Mdme. Patti will sing. The Patti car will, as regards its inferior arrangements and decoration, be nearly a duplicate of a car built in Europe for the Grand Duke Michael of Russia. In the centre is a drawing room, thirteen aad a half feet long, finished in amaranth wool and embossed leather, and profusely decorated ; gold predominating. The' chairs and sofas are in French tapestry ; the curtams are of silk and velvet. • At each of this saloon are bedrooms, entered from a side corridor one of which is finished with emboesed leather while the other is draped with blue-and-gold satin. Opening from the bed-rooms me baths and dressing-rooms fitted with all appurtenances, including a "veritable bith-tub sup- , plied with both hot and cold water. further along the corridors are rooms _ with berths for Ecrvants; and the car, which is fifty-five feet long, includes, moreover, a buffet servants lava:ories, and all necessary adjuncts. The,two other cars, which with the Addina Patti car constitute the operatic train, are eich sixty-foar feet long. They are comfortable sleeping cars at night and "Insurious parlour cars" by day ; all indications of sleeping arrangement being at the proper mom'.iit made to disappear, as if in a transformation scene. The boudoir cars bave at either end a vestibule, opauing into dres»- j iug-tooms and closets ; and the two vestibules are connected by a corridor running along the side of the cars. Opening into this cnrridsr are various compartments or boudoirs, some arranged for two and some for four persons. The so-called boudoirs are obins with high arched ceilings, larce plate-gla3s windows, and one or two luxurious sofas, with high soft backs and cushioned arm-rests. The sofas are athwart the car ; and under them and behind the inclined backs are carried the mattrasses and bedding. Thus the chief weight is near the floor. At night the back of the sofa, hinge;! at it 3 top to the cross partitions, is raized to a horizontal position, where, automatically faeteniug itself, it forms the upper bed, the soU-seat 'besoming the lower bed. Thai with the addition of bedding two wide beds aro made up from each sofa. Iα becis thus arranged across the,cur, the sleaper is said to avoid the rolling motion experienced in longitudinal beda, while the head is removed from the noise incident to close contact with the ear wall. The ventilation o£ the cars is by a novel system. Abundant air i} taken iu at oue end the car by funnels, forced through a filter, which frees it of ail iluat, and thence discharged into the "heater-r>om." Thus iu winter the purified air is heated, while in summer the so-ctlled "heatarroom is converted iuto a huge refrigerator with ice. From this room the 5 air passes alonL; a flue enclosing the heater-pipes down the corridor, and is discharged thi'ough registers opposite the doors of each compartment, " which doors being provided with slates or louvres, aimit the xre?h h;ateu or cold air in great quantities." In each compartment are three exhausting ventilators which, while they cannot admit air from without, draw off the air from within. By this system all the air iu the car is changed every five minutes without draughts or dast. Offtha ia'iies' vestibule there is a boudoir reserved for ladie.? travelling alone ; and here, we are assured, a young girl might journey acrose the contiuent without escort a:id with pa-feot propriety. At the other end of the boudoir car, connected with the gentlemen's vestibule, there is a smoking room and a buffet; and in every compartment there is an electric bell communicating with the porter's compartment. The dead wei»ht of the new cars will, it is estimated, be fuliy fifteen per cent, leas t l, an that of the American palace cars, and travellers by them will enjoy as much privacy as in a house or an hotel. The inconvenieuca of dressing and undressing in a palace car is so great that many American ladies decline to travel in them ; while much annoyance is caused by conductors and others pa?siug to and fro between the lines of curtains. All this will in the new cars be avoided. The interior partitions will, moreover, strengthen the care against crushing in accidents, while they would greatly retavil the progress of fire through tlia cars. To this latter danger, the operatic train will be lighted with in candescent; electric lamps; the electricity being stored and regulatad by accumulators uuder the car.?.