the extension of the railway system to points where the outlook
for freight business was much less than between Liverpool and
Manchester. Though these roads were fiercely opposed by the
landowners, the canal-men, and turnpike proprietors, they were
pressed forward in every direction. Robert Stephenson shared with
his father the responsibility of engineering some of the
principal lines, though the two men had the grim satisfaction of
seeing the experts who had ridiculed the initial project now
eagerly bidding for the opportunity of conducting surveys for the
new lines.

A mania for building railroads seized the world. The Stephensons
were in demand not only throughout Great Britain, but even on the
Continent. They had already made a market for their engines
abroad, when, in 1835, they were summoned by the King of Belgium
to assist in laying out a system of railways for that kingdom.
For his services here the engineer was knighted by the King and
banqueted at the royal table. Honored at home and abroad; happy
in the general adoption of the ideas to which he had clung
through opposition and adversity; proud of the son Robert, for
whose education he had worked like a slave, and whom he now saw
hailed as one of the great engineers of the world; fortunate in
business; respected and beloved by men of every class, George
Stephenson spent the closing years of his life in affluence and
ease. He had earned his peace, for he had fought and won the
battle of the locomotive, and so, by improving the means of
communication, had advanced the interests of trade, and promoted
the welfare of England and of mankind. George Stephenson died in
1848. His son Robert outlived him but eleven years, and was
buried in Westminster Abbey as one of the great men of the