在1700年,从伦敦到约克(英国北部)的行程,坐四轮马车或骑马需要三天左右。这种旅行不但令人劳累,而且有时还有危险。到了1840年,坐蒸汽火车走同样的路程,需要十一个小时,而今天只要花两个多小时就行了。这也不足为奇,历史学家称这一变革为“运输革命”。十九世纪初,一般人很少离开家乡作长途旅行。然而,到了十九世纪中叶,他们突然发现仅 In 1700, a trip from London to York (northern England) took about four days to ride a carriage or ride a horse. This trip is both tiring and sometimes dangerous. By 1840, it would take eleven hours to go by the steam train on the same route, but today it takes more than two hours. This is not surprising, historians call this change “transport revolution.” In the early nineteenth century, most people rarely left home for long-distance trips. However, by the middle of the nineteenth century, they suddenly found only