Preconditions for Transformation 519impoverished Balkans, some peasants began to grow corn, potatoes, and
tomatoes.
Yet in much of Europe, including Portugal, where two-thirds of the land
was not cultivated, and the Balkans and Greece, subsistence agriculture
continued as it had for centuries. In Russia, the rich Black Earth region,
covering the middle Volga River area and much of Ukraine, still was undevel
oped. During the first half of the nineteenth century, some of the larger
estates, benefiting from fertilizer and even some farm machinery, began to
produce and export more wheat and rye. The yield of potatoes and sugar
beets increased dramatically during the 1830s and 1840s. Yet Russian farms
could barely feed the empire’s huge population in good times, and their out
put was grossly inadequate in bad times. Serfdom still shackled Russian
farm productivity.
Trains and Steamboats
Besides the growth in population and the expansion of the agricultural base,
remarkable improvements in transportation also contributed to the transfor
mations of the Industrial Revolution. The first railroad train began hauling
coal in northern England in 1820, and passenger train service began
between Liverpool and Manchester in 1830. (It was macabre testimony to
the novelty of the train that the British minister of commerce was run down
and killed by a train after stepping out of a carriage.) Britain had about 100
miles of rail in 1830 and 6,600 in 1852. Railway construction employed
200,000 men by mid-century. Some observers compared the building of rail
lines to the construction of the pyramids of ancient Egypt, as embankments,
tunnels, and bridges transformed the countryside. The wonders of modern
science were now clearly applied to daily life. In England railroad terminol
ogy was swiftly incorporated into the teaching of the alphabet, and board
games and puzzles quickly embraced the train. Paintings, lithographs, draw
ings, and engravings took the magic of the railroad and the wonders of travel
as themes. Giant railway stations became centers of urban activity, attract
ing hotels and commerce (see Map 14.1).
The railroad’s development served as a significant catalyst for investment,
catching the imagination of the middle classes, which identified the railway
with progress that could be seen, heard, and experienced. Private investment
completely financed British railways during this period. Whereas earlier
investments in businesses had been largely the preserve of patricians,
smaller companies undertaking railroad construction attracted middle-class
investors. Railway booms accustomed more middle-class people to the bene
fits (up to 10 percent annually in 1846), as well as the risks, of investment.
The value of the stock-in-trade of the London and North Western Railway
had outstripped that of the East India Company by the mid-nineteenth
century.