On 28 December 1879 the new railway bridge over the Firth of Tay in Scotland collapsed under a train. In the first days of January 1880 Theodor Fontane wrote the ballad Die Brück’ am Tay, The Bridge on the Tay. In it Johnie, the bridge keeper’s son on the train, trusts his engine: Ein fester Kessel, ein doppelter Dampf, / Die bleiben Sieger in solchem Kampf. (A solid boiler, a double steam, they will win in such a fight.) Three witches frame the poem, and one of them has the last word: Tand, Tand / Ist das Gebilde von Menschenhand! (A trinket, a trinket is the work of human hands.) Today the ballad is a classic of German lessons in school. German Wikipedia calls it a warning against a hubris that believes in technology.