Genre:

Exam paper, Spoof

Subjects:

Engineering, Language, Expertise

    Presents an example of how railway engineers should respond to questions from parliamentary committees. Responses are deliberately technical and designed to bamboozle the committee. For example, replying to a question about the sufficiency of a gradient, the engineer asserts that he would 'undertake to show in five minutes that a patent axle, working on a broad gauge and going consecutively in rotation after a double stuffing-box' would be sufficient.