AN invention has recently been brought to perfection, and patented, which we think we may fairly charac- terize as one of the most ingenious of modern times. This invention, which is the production of Mr. J. Boydell, an engineer of experience and great prac- tical ingenuity, is no less than an endless railway, which, attached to the wheels of any vehicle, enables it to travel on its iron way over the softest sand or shingle; over rough, uneven, or stony ground, or mud; up hill and down dale, and even over considerable obstacles, such as a large stone or the trunk of a moderately-sized tree, lying in its way.

We feel no doubt that this extraord- inary invention will be most exten- sively and profitably employed for agricultural purposes, such as to carts for drawing heavy loads over soft or A* wet ground, or for carrying off timber when cut down; since it both effects an immense saving of labour, and also prevents the ground travelled over from being cut up by ruts, as is the case with ordinary wheels.

It has already been successfully used, attached to a locomotive steam- engine, for ploughing, drawing several ploughs after it at one and the same time. The point of view, however, under which it comes before us, is its applicability to the conveyance of life- boats; and we do conceive, from the trials we have already witnessed of it, that it will prove an incalculable ad- vantage in that respect, and will be thus indirectly the means of saving many human lives.

The apparatus of the railway may be thus briefly described. A series of flat boards, six in number, plated with iron on both sides, and each equal in length to the radius of the wheel, and from 10 to 16 inches wide, are loosely attached round the felloe of the wheel, in such a manner that they are carried round with it as it revolves, and each in succession is laid flatly on the ground in front of it, and lifted again in its rear, as soon as passed over.

On the inner surface of these boards, or on that next the circumference of the wheel an iron rail or tramway is fixed, upon which the tyre of the wheel runs; the boards thus corres- ponding to the sleepers of an ordinary railway, so the wheels fitted with this apparatus carry their own rails and sleepers with them, laying down a literally endless railway whenever they are set in motion..