2-798-885 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Boy using surveying instrument, 1845. Illustration to 'Railway Mania', a story by Alfred Crowquill, a satire on the obsession with the railways, a recent innovation in Britain at the time. '...straight a-head goes the surveyor, with his theodolite, and, in a few weeks, whiz! comes the engine; and, if you stand in the way, to expostulate in favour of your kitchen-garden, make up your mind to scaldings. Surveyors, by the by, are now getting exceedingly scarce; they are advertised for at their own prices; whilst advertising masters promise to perfect gentlemen in the art of surveying, in twelve lessons, for twenty guineas...Under these circumstances, juvenile surveyors are set to work, and have a man to carry the chain, and a chair for them to reach the sight of the theodolite - all the full- grown ones having been used up many months ago'. From "Illustrated London News", 1845, Vol VII.