^*^^' ^^ W^^' PIBRARF OF CONGRESS Ji '■im::2*>j'^»0' ^— y^g isi ^&^'"^ g€»*;^ i»^ ''j^ ^•^a: 'M "^su ,,^ ^5»M>"^- -.,^>^-~^'^.^ _ ^:>~^:ss^> ^mm g^^ >-^^>J> ►^' ^ym ^>-^ -^ xxy" ^p- TRIPS LIFE OF A LOCOMOTIVE ENGINEER. NEW YORK : J. BRADBURN (Successor to M. Dooladt), 4U WALKER STREET. FOLLETT, FOSTER & CO. 1863. /'\ V h^ Kp ?:?■-. K. vy: Entered according to Act of Congress, ia the jear 1860, By FOLLETT, FOSTER & CO., In the Clerk's Oface of the District Court of the United States for'tjie'SSuthem .. ^ District of Ohio. * DEDICATION. T O T H E RAILROAD MEN OF THE UNITED STATES, A CLASS WITH WHOM MY INTERESTS WERE LONG IDENTrFIED, AND WHO I EVER FOUND GENEROUS AND BRAVE, I DEDICATE THIS UNPRETENDING VOLUME. THE AUTHOR. PREFACE Bravery and heroism have in all times been extolled, and the praises of the self-sacrificing men and women who have risked their own in the saving of others' lives, been faithfully chronicled. Railroad men, too long looked upon as the rougher kind of humanity, have been the subjects of severe condemnatior and reproach upon the occurrence of every disaster, while their skill, bravery and presence of mind have scarcely ever found a chronicler. The writer ventures lo assert, that if the record of their noble deeds were all gathered, and presented in their true light, it would be found that these rough, and weather-worn men were entitled to as high a place, and a fame as lofty, as has been allotted to any other class who cope with disaster. It has been the aim of the w^riter, who has shared their dangerous lot, to present a few truthful sketches, trusting that his labor may tend to a better knowledge of the dangers that are passed, by those who drive, and ride behind the Iron Horse. If he shall succeed in this, and make the time of his reader not appear misspent, he will be satisfied. CONTENTS. Page Running in a Fog, ------- 11 AClose Shave, - - - ~ - - - 17 A Collision, _-___-- 29 Collision Extraordinary, - - - - - - 87 Burning of the Henry Clay, - - - - - 43 The Conductor, -------51 Bravery of an Engineer, - - - - - - 59 The Fireman, - - - - - - - 67 A Dream in the " Caboose," - - • - - - 83 The Bralieman, - - - - - - - 75 An Unmitigated Villain, - - - - - -93 A Proposed Race between Steam and Lightning, - - - 101 An Abrupt Call, - - - - - - 109 The Good Luck of being Obstinate, - - - - 115 Human Lives v. The Dollar, - - - - - 123 Forty-two Miles Per Hour, ^ - - - - - 131 Used up at Last, ------- 139 A Victim of Low Wages, - - - - - - 145 Coroners' Juries v. Railroad Men, - - - - - 153 Adventures of an Irish Railroad Man, . - - - leii A Bad Bridge, - - - - - - - 169 A Warning, - - - - - - - 177 Singular Accidents, - - - - - - -185 Ludicrous Incidents, - - - - - -191 Explosions, - - - - - - - 197 How a Friend was Killed, ------ 203 An Unromantic Hero, - - - - - -213 The Duties of an Engineer, . _ _ - . 219 RUNx^ING IN A FOG EUNNING IN A FOG In the year 185- I was running an engine on the road. My engine was named the Racer, and a "racer" she was, too; her driving-wheels were seven feet in diameter, and she could turn them about as fast as was necessary, I can assure you. My regular train was the " Morning Express," leaving the upper terminus of the road at half past four, running sixty-nine miles in an hour and forty-five minutes, which, as I had to make three stops, might with justice be considered pretty fast travel- ing. I liked this run amazingly — for, mounted on my " iron steed," as I sped in the dawn of day along the banks of the river which ran beside the road, I saw all nature wake ; the sun would begin to deck the eastern clouds with rose- (11) 12 RUNNING IN A FOG. ate hues — rising higher, it would tip the mountain-tops with its glorj — higher still, it would shed its radiance over ever J hill -side and in every valley. It would illumine the broad bosom of the river, before flowing so dark and drear, now sparkling and glittering with radiant beauty, seeming to run rejoicing in its course to the sea. The little vessels that had lain at anchor all night, swinging idly with the tide, would, as day came on, shake out their broad white sails, and, gracefully careening to the morning breeze, sweep away over the water, looking so ethereal that I no longer wondered at the innocent Mexicans supposing the ships of Cortez were gigantic birds from the spirit-land. Some mornings were not so pleasant, for frequently a dense fog would rise and envelop in its damp, unwholesome folds the river, the road, and all things near them. This was rendered doubly unpleasant from the fact that there were on the line numerous drawbridges which were liable to be opened at all hours, but more especially about day- break. To be sure there were men stationed at every bridge, and in fact every half-mile along the road, whose special duty it was to warn approaching trains of danger from open drawbridges, obstructions on the track, etc., but the class of men employed in such duty was not RUNNING IN A FOG. 13 noted for sobriety, and the wages paid were not sufficient to secure a peculiarly intelligent or careful class. So the confidence I was compelled to place in them was necessa- rily burdened with much distrust. These m^n were provided • with white and red signal lanterns, detonating torpedoes and colored flags, and the rules of the road required them to place a torpedo on the rail and show a red signal both on the bridge and at a " fog station," distant half a mile from the bridge, before they opened the draw. At all times when the draw was closed they were to show a white light or flag at this " fog station." This explanation will, I trust, be sufficient to enable every reader to understand the position in which I found myself in the " gray " of one September morning. . I left the starting-point of my route that morning ten minutes behind time. The fog was more dense than I ever remembered having seen it. It enveloped every thing. I could not see the end of my train, which con- sisted of five cars filled with passengers. The " head- light " which I carried on my engine illumined the fleecy cloud only a few feet, so that I was running into the most utter darkness. I did not like the look of things at all, but my " orders " were positive to use all due exertions to 14 RUNNING IN A FOG. make time. So, blindly putting my trust in Providence and the miserable twentj-dollars-a-month-men who were its agents along the road, I darted headlong into and through the thick and, to all mortal vision, impenetrable fog. The Racer behaved noblj that morning ; she seemed gifted with the " wings of the wind," and rushed thunderinglj on, making such *' time " as aston- ished even me, almost " native and to the manor born." Everything passed off right. I had " made up" seven minutes of mj time, and was within ten miles of my jour- ney's end. The tremendous speed at which I had been running had exhilarated and excited me. That pitching into darkness, bhndly trusting to men that I had at best but weak faith in, had given my nerves an unnatural ten- sion, so I resolved to run the remaining ten miles at what- ever rate of speed the Racer was capable of making. I gave her steam, and away we flew. The fog was so thick that I could not tell by passing objects how fast we ran, but the dull, heavy and oppressive roar, as we shot through rock cuttings and tunnels, the rocking and strain- ing of my engine, and the almost inconceivable velocity at which the driving-wheels revolved, told me that my speed was something absolutely awful. I did not care, though. ^RUNNING IN A FOG. 15 I was used to that, and the rules bore me out ; besides, I wanted to win for my engine the title of the fastest engine on the road, which I knew she deserved. So I cried, "On! on!!'' I had to cross one drawbridge which, owing to the intervention of a high hill, could not be seen from the time we passed the " fog station " until we were within three or four rods of it. I watched closely for the " fog station " signal. It was white. " All right ! go ahead my beauty ! " shouted I, giving at the same time another jerk at the " throttle," and we shot into the " cut." In less time than it takes me to write it, we were through, and there on the top of the " draw," dimly seen through a rift in the fog, glimmered with to me actual ghastliness the danger signal — a red light. It seemed to glare at me with almost fiendish malignancy. Stopping was out of the question, even had I been running at a quarter of my actual speed. As I was running, I had not even time to grasp the whis- tle-cord before we would be in. So giving one longing, lingering thought to the bright world, whose duration to me could not be reckoned in seconds even, I shut my eyes and waited my death, which seemed as absolute and inevitable as inglorious. It was but an instant of time, 16 RUNNING IN A FOG. but an age of thought and dread — and then — I was over the bridge. A drunken bridge-tender had, with accursed stupidity, hoisted the wrong light, and my adventure was but a "scare," — but half a dozen such were as bad as death. It was three weeks before I ran again, and I never after " made up time " in a fog. A CLOSE SHAYE A CLOSE SHAVE Several times during my life I have felt the emotions so often told of, so seldom felt by any man, when, with death apparently absolute and inevitable, immediate and inglorious, staring me full in the face, I forgot all fears for myself— dreamed not of shuddering at the thought that I soon must die — that the gates of death were swung wide open before me, and that, with a speed and force against which all human resistance was useless, I was rushing into them. I knew that I was fated with the rest ; but I thought only of those behind me in my charge, under my supervision, then chatting gaily, watch- ing the swift-receding scenery, thinking perhaps how quickly they would be at home with their dear ones, and not dreaming of the hideous panorama of death so soon (]9) 20 A CLOSE SHAVE. to unroll, the tinkle of the bell for the starting of which I seemed to hear ; the first sad scene, the opening crash of which was sickening my soul with terror and blind- ing me with despair. For I knew that those voices, now so gay, now so happy, would soon be shrieking in agony, or muttering the dying groan. I knew that those faces, now so smiling, would soon be distorted with pain, or crushed out of all semblance to humanity; and I was powerless to avert the catastrophe. All human force was powerless. Nothing but the hand of God, stretched forth in its Omnipotence, could avert it ; and there was scarce time for a prayer for that ; for such scenes last but a moment, though their memory endures for all time. I remember well one instance of this kind. I was running on the R. & W. road, in the East. A great Sabbath-school excursion and picnic was gotten up, and I was detailed to run the train. The children of all the towns on the road were assembled ; and, when we got to the grove in which the picnic was to be held, we had eighteen cars full as they could hold of the little ones, all dressed in their holiday attire, and brimful of mirth and gayety. I drew the train in upon the switch, out of the way of passing trains, let the engine cool down, and A CLOSE SHAVE. 21 then went into the woods to participate In the innocent pleasures of the day. The children very soon found out that I was the engineer ; and, as I liked children, and tried to amuse them, it was not long before I had a perfect troop at my heels, all laughing and chatting gaily to '' Mr. Engineer," as they called me. They asked me a thousand questions about the engine; and one and all tried to extort a promise from me to let them ride with me, several declaring to me in the strictest confidence, their intention of becoming engi- neers, and their desire, above all things, that I should teach them how. So the day passed most happily. The children swung in the swings, romped on the grass, picked the flowers, and wandered at their own sweet will all over the woods. A splendid collation was prepared for them, at which I, too, sat down, and liked to have made my- self sick eating philopenas with the Billys, Freddys, Mollies, and Matties, whose acquaintance I had made that day, and whose pretty faces and sweet voices would urge me, in a style that I could not find heart to resist, to eat a philopena with them, or ''just to 22 A CLOSE SHAVE. taste their cake and see if it wasn't the goodest I ever saw." But the day passed, as happy or unhappy days will, and time to start came round. We had some trouble getting so many little folks together, and it was only by dint of a great deal of whistling that all my load was collected. I was much amused to see some of the little fellows' contempt at others more timid than they, who shut their ears to the sound of the whistle, and ran to hide in the cars. Innumerable were the entreaties that I had from some of them, to let them ride on the engine, " only this once ; " but I was inex- orable. The superintendent of the road, who conducted the train, came to me as I was about ready to start, and told me that, as we had lost so much time collecting our load, I had better not stop at the first station, from whence we had taken but a few children, but push on to the next, where we would meet the down train, and send them back from there. Another reason for this was, that I had a heavy train, and it was a very bad stop to make, lying right in a valley, at the foot of two very heavy grades. So, off I started, the children in the cars A CLOSE SHAVE. 23 swinging a dozen handkerchiefs from every window, all happy. As I had good running-ground, and unless I hurried, was going to be quite late in reaching my journey's end, I pulled out, and let the engine do her best. So we were running very fast — about forty-eight miles an hour. Before arriving at the station at which I was not to stop, I passed through a piece of heavy wood, in the midst of which was a long curve. On emerging from the woods, we left the curve, and struck a straight track, which extended toward the station some forty rods from the woods. I sounded my whistle a half mile from the station, giving a long blow to signify my intention of passing without a stop, and never shut off; for I had a grade of fifty feet to the mile to surmount just as I passed the station, and I wanted pretty good headway to do it with eighteen cars. I turned the curve, shot out into sight of the station, and there saw what almost curdled the blood in my veins, and made me tremble with terror : a dozen cars, heavily laden with stone, stood on the side track, and the switch at this end was wide open ! I knew it was useless, but I whistled for brakes, and reversed my 24 A CLOSE SHAVE. engine. I might as well have thrown out a fish-hook and line, and tried to stop by catching the hook in a tree ; for, running as I was, and so near the switch, a feather laid on the wheels would have stopped us just as soon as the brakes. I gave up all. I did not think for a moment of the painful death so close to me ; I thought only of the load behind me. I thought of their sweet faces, which had so lately smiled on me, now to be distorted with agony, or pale in death. I thought of their lithe limbs, so full of animation, now to be crushed, and mangled, and dabbled in gore. I thought of the anxious parents watching to welcome their smil- ing, romping darlings home again ; doomed, though, to caress only a mangled, crushed, and stiffened corpse, or else to see the fair promises of their young lives blasted forever, and to watch their darlings through a crippled life. 'Twas too horrible. I stood with stiffened limbs and eyeballs almost bursting from their sockets, frozen with terror, and stared stonily and fixedly, as we rushed on — when a man, gifted, it seemed, with super- human strength and activity, darted across the track right in front of the train, turned the switch, and we were saved. I could take those little ones home in A CLOSE SHAVE. 25 safety . I never run an engine over that road after- wards. The whole thing transpired in a moment; but a dozen such moments were worse than death, and would furnish terror and agony enough for a lifetime. A COLLISION A (JU LLISION. Of the various kinds of accidents that may befall a railroad -man, a collision is the most dreaded, because, generally, the most fatal. The man who is in the wreck of matter that follows the terrible shock of two trains colliding, stands indeed but a poor chance to escape with either life or limb. No combination of metal or wood can be formed strong enough to resist the tremendous momentum of a locomotive at full or even half speed, suddenly brought to a stand -still ; and when two trains meet the result is even more frightful, for the momentum is not only doubled, but the scene of the wreck is length- ened, and the amount of matter is twice as great. The two locomotives are jammed and twisted together, and the wrecked cars stretch behind, bringing up the rear of the (29) 30 A COLLISION. procession of destruction. I, myself, never had a coUipion with another engine, but I did collide with the hind end of another train of fortj cars, which was standing still, at the foot of a heavy grade, and into which I ran at about thir- ty-five miles an hour, and from the ninth car of which I made my way, for the engine had run right into it. The roof of the car was extended over the engine, and the sides had bulged out, and were on either side of me. The cars were all loaded with, flour. The shock of the colli- sion broke the barrels open and diffused the " Double Extra Genesee " all over ; it mingled with the smoke and steam and floated all round, so that when, during the sev- eral minutes I was confined there, I essayed to breathe, I inhaled a compound of flour, dust, hot steam and chok- ing smoke. Take it altogether, that car from which, as soon as I could, I crawled, was a httle the hottest, most dusty, and cramped position into which I was ever thrown. To -add to the terror-producing elements of the scene, my fireman lay at my feet, caught between the ten- der and the head of the boiler, and so crushed that he never breathed from the instant he was caught. He was crushed the whole length of his body, from the left hip to the right shoulder, and compressed to the thinness of A COLLISION. 31 my hand. In fact, an indentation was made in the boiler where the tender struck it, and his body was between boiler and tender ! The way this accident happened was simple, and easily explained. The freight train which I was to pass with the express at the next station, broke down while on this grade. The breakage was trifling and could easily be repaired, so the conductor dispatched a man (a green hand, that they paid twenty-two dollars a month) to the rear with orders, as the night was very dark and rainy, to go clear to the top of the grade, a full mile off, and swing his red light from the time he saw my head light, which he could see for a mile, as the track was straight, until I saw it and stopped, and then he was to tell me what was the matter, and I, of course, would proceed with caution until I passed the train. The con- ductor was thus particular, for he knew he was a green hand, and sent him back only because he could be spared, in case the train proceeded, better than the other man ; and he was allowed only two brakemen. Well, with these apparently clear instructions, the brakfeman went back to the top of the grade. I was then in sight ; he gave, according to his own statement, one swing of the lamp, and it went out. He had no matches, and what to do he 82 A COLLISION. didn't know. He had in his pocket, to be sure, a half a dozen torpedoes, given to him expressly for such emergen- cies, but if he ever knew their use, he was too big a fool to use the knowledge when it was needed. He might, to be sure, have stood right in the track, and, by swinging his arms, have attracted my attention, for on dark nights and on roads where they hire cheap men, I generally kept a close lookout ; and if I saw a man swinging his arms, and, apparently trying to see how like a madman he could act, I stopped quick, for there was no telling what was the mat- ter. But this fellow was too big a fool for that even. He turned from me and made towards his own train, bellow- ing lustily, no doubt, for them to go ahead, but they were at the engine, and its hissing steam made too much noise for them to hear, even had he been within ten rods of them. But a mile away, that chance was pretty slim, and yet on it hung a good many lives. I came on, running about forty-five miles an hour, for the next station was a wood and water station, and I wanted time there. I discovered the red light, held at the rear of the train, when within about fifteen rods of it. I had barely time to shut off, and was in the very act of reversing when the collision took place. The tender jumped up on the foot- A COLLISION. 83 board, somehow I was raised at the same tune, so that it did not catch my feet, but the end of the tank caught my hand on the " reverse lever," which I had not time to let go, and there I was fast. The first five cars were thrown clear to one side of the track, by the impetus of my train ; the other four were crushed like egg-shells, and in the ninth, the engine brought up. I was fast ; it all occurred in a second, and the scene was so confusing and rapid that I hardly knew when my hand was caught; I certainly should not have known where but for the locality of the piece of it afterwards found. My pain was awful, for not only was my hand caught, but the wood from the tender, as I crouched behind the dome, gave my body a most hor- rible pummeling, and the blinding smoke and scalding steam added to the misery of my position. I really be- gan to fear that I should have to stay there and undergo the slow, protracted torture of being scalded to death ; but with a final efibrt I jerked my hand loose, and groped my way out. My clothes were saturated with moisture. The place had been so hot that my hands peeled, and my face was blistered. I did not fully recover for months. But at last I did and went at it again, to run into the doors of death, which are wide open all along every mile of a 3 34 A COLLISION. railroad, and into which, even if nature does not let you go, some fool of a man, who is willing to risk his own worthless neck in such scenes for twenty-five dollars a month, will contrive, ten chances against one, by his stupid blundering to push you. COLLISION EXTRAORDINARY. COLLISION EXTRAORDINARY. One morning, in the year 185-, I was running the Morning Express, or the Shanghse run, as it was called, on the H. road in New York state. The morning was foggy, damp and uncomfortable, and by its influence I was de- pressed so that I had the " blues" very badly ; I felt weary and tired of the life I was leading, dull and monotonous always, save when varied by horror. I got to thinking of the poor estimate in which the class to which I belonged was held by the people generally, who, seated in the easy- cushioned seats of the train, read of battles far away — of deeds of heroism, performed amid the smoke and din of bloody wars, — and their hearts swell with pride, — they glow with gladness to think that their own species are ca- le of such daring acts, and all the while these very (37) 38 COLLISION EXTRAORDINARY. readers are skirting the edges of precipices, to look down which would appall the stoutest heart and make the strong- est nerved man thrill with terror; — they are crossing deep, narrow gorges on gossamer-like bridges ; — they are passing switches at terrific speed, where there is but an inch of space between smooth-rolling prosperity and quick destruction ; — they are darting through dark, gloomy tun- nels, which would be turned into graves for them, were a single stone to be detached from the roof in front of the thundering train ; — they are dragged by a fiery-lunged, smoke -belching monster, in whose form are imprisoned death-dealing forces the most terrific. And mounted upon this fire-fiend sits the engineer, controlling its every mo- tion, holding in his hand the thread of every life on the train, which a single act — a false move — a deceived eye, an instant's relaxation of thought or care on his part, would cut, to be united nevermore ,- and the train thunders on, crossing bridges, guUies and roads, passing through tunnels and cuts, and over embankments. The engineer, firm to his post, still regulates the breath of his steam-de- mon and keeps his eye upon the track ahead, with a thou- sand things upon his mind, the neglect or a wrong thought of either of which would run the risk of a thousand lives ; COLLISION EXTRAORDINARY. 39 ' — and these readers in the cars are still absorbed with the daring deeds of the Zouaves under the warm sun of Italy, but pay not a thought to the Zouave upon the engine, who every day rides down into the '' valley of death' ^ and charges a bridge of Magenta. But to return to this dismal, foggy morning that I be- gan to tell you of. It was with some such thoughts as these that I sat that morning upon my engine, and plunged into the fog-banks that hung over the river and the river- side. I sat so '• Absorbed in guessing, but no syllable expressing -' of whether it must always be so with me ; whether I should always be chilled with this indifference and want of appreciation in my waking hours, and- in my sleep have this horrible responsibility and care to sit, ghoul-like, upon my breast and almost stifle the beating of my heart ; — when with a crash and slam my meditations were interrupt- ed, and the whole side of the " cab," with the " smoke- stack," "whistle-stand" and "sand-box" were stripped from the engine. The splinters flew around my head, the escaping steam made most an infernal din, and the " fire- box" emitted most as infernal a smoke, and I was ea* 40 COLLISION EXTRAORDINARY. tirely ignorant of what was up or the extent of the dam- age done. As soon as I could stop, I of course, after see- ing that every thing was right with the engine, went back to see what was the cause of this sudden invasion upon the dreary harmony of my thoughts, and the com- pleteness of my running arrangements, when lo ! and be- hold it was a North River schooner with which I had collided. It had, during the fog, been blown upon the shore, and into its " bowsprit," which projected over the track, I had run full tilt. I think that I am justified in calling a collision between a schooner on the river and a locomotive on the rail, a collision extraordinary. Readers, do not you ? BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. There is one reminiscence of my life as a " railroad man" that dwells in mj memory with most terrible vivid- ness, one that I often think of in daytime with shuddering horror ; and in the night, in dreams of appalling terror, each scene is renewed in all the ghastliness of the reality, so that the nights when I dream of it become epochs of miserable, terrible helplessness. It was on a clear, bright day in August. The fields were covered with the maturity of verdure, the trees wore their coronal of leaves perfected, the birds sang gaily, and the river sparkled in the sun ; and I sat upon my en- gine, looking ahead mostly, but occasionally casting my eyes at the vessels on the river, that spread their white sails to the breeze and danced over the rippling waters, (43) 44 BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. looking too graceful to be of earth. Among the craft upon the river I noticed the steamboat " Henry Claj ;" another and a rival boat was some distance from it, and from the appearance of things I inferred that they were racing. I watched the two as closely as I could for some- time, and while looking intently at the " Clay," I saw a dark column of thick black smoke ascending from her, " amidships," just back of the smoke-pipe. At first I paid little heed to it, but soon it turned to fire, and the leaping flames, like serpents, entwined the whole of the middle portion of the boat in their terrible embrace. She was at once headed for the shore, and came rushing on, trailing the thick cloud of flame and smoke. She struck the shore near where I had stopped my train, for, of course, seeing such a thing about to happen, I stopped to enable the hands and passengers to render what assist- ance they could. The burning boat struck the shore by the side of a little wharf, right where the station of " Riv- erdale" now stands, and those who were upon the forward part of her decks escaped at once by leaping to the shore ; but the majority of the passengers, including all of the women and children, were on the after- part of the boat, and owing to the centre of the boat being entirely en- BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. 45 wrapped by the hissing flames, they were utterly unable to get to the shore. So they were cooped up on the ex treme after-end of the boat, with the roaring fire forming an impassable barrier to prevent their reaching the land, and the swift-flowing river at their feet, surging and bub- bhng past, dark, deep, and to most of them as certain death as the flames in front. The fire crept on. It drove them inch by inch to the water. The strong swimmers, crazed by the heat, wrapped their stalwart arms about their dear ones, and leaped into the water. Their mutual struggles impeded each other ; they sank with words of love and farewell bubbling from their lips, unheard amidst the roar of the flames and hiss of the water, as the burn- ing timbers fell in and were extinguished. Women raised their hands to Heaven, uttered one piercing, despairing scream, and with the flames enwrapping their clothing, leaped into the stream, which sullenly closed over them. Some craAvled over the guards and hung suspended until the fierce heat compelled them to loose their hold and drop into the waves below. Mothers, clasping their children to their bosoms, knelt and prayed God to let this cup pass from them. Many, leaping into the water, almost gained the shore, but some piece of the burning wreck would fall 46 BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. upon them and crush them down. Some we could see kneeling on the deck until the surging flames and blind- ing smoke shrouded them and hid them from our sight. One little boy was seen upon the hurricane roof, just as it fell. Entwined in each other's embrace, two girls were seen to rush right into the raging fire, either deUrious with the heat or desirous of quickly ending their dreadful suffer- ings, which they thought must end in death. And we upon the shore stood almost entirely powerless to aid. Death-shrieks and despairing cries for help, prayer and blasphemy, all mingled, came to our ear above the roaring and crackling of the flames, and in agony and the terror of helplessness we closed our ears to shut out the horrid sounds. The intense heat of the fire rendered it impossible for us to approach near the boat. The many despairing creatures struggling in the water made it almost certaic death for any to swim out to help. No boats were near, except the boats of a sloop which came along just as the fire was at its highest and were unable to get near the wreck, because of the heat. The scene among the sur- vivors was most terrible. One little boy of about seven, was running around seeking his parents and sisters. Poor fellow ! his search was vain, for the scorching flames had BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. 47 killed them, and the rapid river had buried them. A mother was there, nursing a dead babe, which drowned in her arms, as, with almost superhuman exertions, she strug- gled to the shore. A young lady sat by the side of her father, lying stark and stiff, killed by a falling beam, within twenty feet of the shore. A noble Newfoundland dog stood, sole guardian of a little child of three or four, that he had brought ashore himself, and to whom we could find neither kith nor kin among the crowd. His dog, play- mate of an hour before, was now the saviour of his life and his only friend. I left the scene with my train when convinced that a longer stay was useless, as far as saving life went. I returned that afternoon, and the water had given up many of its dead. Twenty-two bodies lay stretched upon the shore — but one in a coffin, and she a bride of that morning, with the wedding-dress scorched and blackened, and clinging with wet, clammy folds to her stiff and rigid form. Her husband bent in still despair over her. A little child lay there, unclaimed. His curly, flaxen hair that, two hours before, father and sisters stroked so fondly, was matted around his forehead, and begrimed with the sand, over which his little body had been washed to the 48 BURNING OF THE HENRY CLAY. river-bank. His little lips, that a mother pressed so lately, now were black with the slime of the river-bed in which he went to sleep. An old man of seventy was there, sleeping calmly after the battle of life, which for him cul- minated with horror at its close. In short, of all ages they were there, lying on the sand, and the scene I shall never forget. Each incident, from the first flashing out of the flame to the moment when I, with reverent hands, helped lay them in their coj95ns and the tragedy closed, is photographed forever upon my mind. THE CONDUCTOR THE CONDUCTOR A EECENT case in the courts of this county, has set me to thinking of some of the wrongs heaped upon railroad men so much, that I shall devote this article exclusively to a review of the opprobrium bestowed upon all men con- nected with railroads, by the people who every day travel under their control, with their lives subject to the care and watchfulness of these men, for whose abuse they leave no opportunity to escape. Docs a train run off the track, and thereby mischief be worked, every possible circumstance that can be twisted and distorted into a shape such as to throw the blame upon the men connected with the road, is so twisted and distorted. The probabil- ity of any accident happening without its being directly caused by the scarcely less than criminal negligence of (51) 52 " THE CONDUCTOR. some of tlie railroad men, is always scouted by the dis- cerning public ; most of whom scarcely know the differ- ence between a locomotive and a pumping engine. An accident caused by the breaking of a portion of the ma- chinery of a locomotive engine on the Hudson River Rail- road, which did no damage except to cause a three hours' detention, was by some enterprising and intelligent (?) penny-a-liner dignified into a proof of the general incom- petency of railroad men, in one of our prominent literary periodicals, and the question was very sagely asked why the railroad company did not have engines that would not break down, or engineers that would not allow them so to do ? The question might, with equal propriety, be asked, why did not nature form trees, the timber of which would not rot ? Or, why did not nature make rivers that would not overflow ? Let two suits be brought in almost any of our courts, each with circumstances of the same aggravation, say for assault and battery, and let the parties in one be ordinary citizens, and in the other, let one party be a railroad man and the other a citizen, with whom, for some cause, the railroad man has had a difficulty, and you will invariably THE CONDUCTOR. 53 see the railroad man's case decided against him, and in the other case the defendant be acquitted, to go scot-free. Why is this ? Simply, I think, because every individual who has ever suffered from the hands of any railroad em- ployee, treasures up that indignity, and lays it to the ac- count of every other railroad man he meets, making the class suffer in his estimation, because one of them treated him in a crusty manner. If a man's neighbor or friend offend him, he tries to forgive it — earnestly endeavors to find palhating circum- stances ; but, in the case of railroad men, all that would palliate the offense of rudeness and want of courtesy, such as is sometimes shown, is studiously ignored, or, at the mildest, forgotten. I knew a school teacher once, who said that the most barbarous profession in the world was that of teaching, because it drove from a man all humanity. He got into such a habit of ruling, that it became impossible for him to understand how to obey any one himself. The same thing might be said of a railroad conductor ; for, ever}^ day in his life, he takes the exclusive control of a train full of passengers of as different dispositions as they are of different countenances. Now, he meets 54 THE CONDUCTOR. with a testy, quarrelsome old fellow, who is given to fault- finding, and who blows him up at every meeting. Now, with a querulous old maid, who is in continual fear lest the train run off the track, the boiler burst, or the con- ductor palm off some bad money on her. Now, with a gent of an inquisitive turn of mind, who is continually asking the distance to the next station, and the time the train stops there, or else pulling out an old turnip of a watch and comparing his time with the conductor's. Then, a stupid, dunderheaded man is before him, who does not know where he is going, nor how much money he has got. Then, somebody has got carried by, and scolds the con- ductor for it, or else angrily insists that the train be im- mediately backed up for his especial accommodation. The next man, maybe, is an Irishman, made gloriously happy and piggishly independent, by the aid of poor whiskey, who will pay his fare how he pleases, and when he pleases ; who is determined to ride where he wants to, and who will at once jump in for a fight, if any of these rights of his are invaded ; or, mayhap, he will not pay his fare at all, deeming that his presence (scarcely more en- durable than a hog's) is sufficient honor to remunerate the company for his ride ; or perhaps his " brother Tiddj, THE CONDUCTOR. 55 or Pathrick, or Michael, or Dinnis works upon the thrack," and " bedad, he'll jist ride onjway." All these char- acters are found in any train, and with them the conduc- tor has to deal every day. How do you know, when he speaks harshly to you, but that he has just had a confab with one of these gentry, who has sorely tried his pa- tience, and riled his temper? How do you think you would fill his place, were you subjected to such annoy- ances all the time ? Would you be able at all times to maintain a perfectly correct and polite exterior — a Chris- tian gravity of demeanor — and never for an instant for- get yourself, or lose your temper, or allow your manner to show to any one the slightest acerbity? You know you could not ; and yet, for being only thus human, you are loud in your denunciation of conductors and all rail- road men, and, perhaps honestly, but certainly with great injustice, believe them to have no care for your wants, no interest in your comfort. Treat railroad men with the same consideration that you evince towards other business companions. Consider always that they are only human — have not saintly nor angelic tempers, any of them, and that every day's experience is one of trial and provoca- 56 THE CONDUCTOR. tion. By so doing, you will be only rendering them sim- ple justice, and you will yourself receive better treatment than if you attempt to make the railroad man your meni- al, or the pack-horse for all your ill-feeling. BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. The presence of mind shown bj railroad men is a great deal talked about ; but few, I think,, know the trying circumstances under which it must be exercised, because they have never thought of, and are not familiar enough with the details of the business, and the common, every- day incidents of the lives of railroad men. If any thing does happen to a train of cars, or an engine, it comes so suddenly, and is all over so quickly, that the impulse, and effort, to do something- to prevent it, must be instan- taneous, or they are of no avail. The mind must devise, and the hands spring to execute at once, for the man is on a machine that moves like the wind-blast, and will snap bands and braces of iron or steel as easily as the wild horse would break a halter of thread. (59) 60 BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. The engine, while under the control of its master, moves along regularly and with the beauty of a dream ; its wheels revolve, glancing in the sun ; its exhausted steam coughs as regularly as the strong man's heart beats, and trails back over the train, wreathing itself into the most fantas- tic convolutions ; now sweeping away towards the sky in a grand, white pillar, anon twining and twisting among the gnarled limbs of the trees beside the track, and the train moves on so fast that the scared bird in vain tries to get out of its way by flying ahead of it. Still the engineer sits there cool and calm ; but let him have a care, — let not the exhilaration of his wild ride overcome his pru- dence, for the elements he controls are, while under his rule, useful and easily managed, but broken loose, they have the power of a thousand giants, and do the work of a legion of devils in almost a single beat of the pulse. , A man can easily retain his presence of mind where the danger depends entirely upon him; that is, where his maintaining one position, or doing one thing resolutely, will avert the catastrophe ; but under circumstances such as frequently beset an engineer, where, to do his utmost, he can only partially avert the calamity, then it is that the natural bravery and acquired courage of a man is BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. 61 tried to the utmost extent. I remember several instances of this kind, where engineers, in full view of the awful danger which threatened them, knowing too well the ter- rible chances of death that Avere against them and the passengers under their charge, even if they did main- tain their positions, and, by using all their exertions, suc- ceeded in slightly reducing the shock of the collision, which could only be modified — not averted — still stuck to their posts, did their utmost, and rode into the other train and met their death, amid the appalling scenes of the chaotic ruin which followed. George D was running the Night Express on the road. I was then running the freight train, v/hich laid over at a station for George to pass. One night — ii was dark and dismal — the rain had been pouring down in torrents all night long; I arrived with my train, went in upon the switch and waited for George, who passed on the main track without stopping. Owing to the storm and the failure of western connections, George was some thirty minutes behind, and of course came on, intending to run though the station pretty fast — a perfectly safe proceeding, apparently, for the switches could not be turned wrong without changing the lights, and these be- 62 BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. ing '• bull's-eye" lanterns elevated so that they could be seen a great distance on the straight track which was there, no change could be made without the watchful eye of the engineer seeing it at once. So George came on, at about thirty-five miles an hour, as near as I could judge, and I was watching him all the time. He was within about three times the length of his train of the switch — was blowing his whistle — when I saw, and he saw the switchman run madly out of his " shanty,'' grab the switch and turn it so that it would lead him directly into the hind end of my train. I jumped, instinctively, to start my en- gine — I heard him whistle for brakes, and those that stood near said that he reversed his engine — but my train was too heavy for me to move quickly, and he was too near to do much good by reversing, so I soon felt a heavy concus- sion, and knew that he had struck hard, for, at the other end of forty-five cars, it knocked me down, and the jar broke my engine loose from the train. He might have jumped from his engine with comparative safety, after he saw the switch changed, for the ground was sandy there and free from obstructions ; and he could easily have jumped clear of the track and escaped with slight bruises. But no! Behind him, trusting to him, and resting in BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. 68 comparative security, were hundreds to whom life was as dear as to him ; his post was at the head ; to the great law of self-preservation, that most people put first in their code of practice, his stern duty required him to forswear allegiance, and to act on the principle, " others first, my- self afterwards." So, with a bravery of heart such as is seldom found in other ranks of men, he stuck to his iron steed, transformed then into the white steed of death, and spent the last energies of his life, the strength of his last pulse, striving to mitigate the suffering which would follow the collision. His death was instantaneous ; he had no time for regrets at leaving life and the friends he loved so dearly. When we found him, one hand grasped the throttle, his engine was reversed, and with the other hand he still held on to the handle of the sand-box lever. The whole middle and lower portion of his body was crushed, but his head and arms were untouched, and his face still wore a resolute, self-sacrificing expression, such as must have lit up the countenance of Arnold Winkle- ried, when crying, " Make way for liberty ^^^ he threw him- self upon a sheaf of Austrian spears and broke the col- umn of his enemies. I find in nearly every cemetery that I visit, monuments 64 BRAVERY OF AN ENGINEER. and memorial-stones to some brave man who fell and died amid the smoke and flame and hate of a battle-field ; and orators and statesmen, ministers and newspapers, exhaust the fountains of eloquence to extol the " illustrious dead.'' But George D , who spent his life in a constant bat tie with the elements, who waged unequal war with time and space, who at last chose rather to die himself than to bring death or injuries to others, sleeps in the quiet of a country church-yard. The waihng wind, sighing through the few trees there, sings his only dirge ; a plain stone, bought by the hard won money of his companions in life, alone marks his resting-place. The stranger, passing by, would scarcely notice it ; but who shall dare to tell me that there resteth not there a frame, from which a soul has flown, as noble as any that sleeps under sculptured urn or slab, over which thousands have mused, and which has been the text of hundreds of exhortations to patriotism and self-forgetfulness ? THE FIREMAN THE FIREMAN. The fireman, the engineer's hft-hsmd man, his trump card, without whom it w^ould be difficult for him to get over the road, is seen but little, and thought but little of. He is usually dirty and greasy, wearing a ragged pair of overalls, originally blue, but now embroidered so with oil and dust, that they are become a smutty brown. Just before the train leaves the station, you will see his face, down which streams the perspiration, looking back, watch- ing for the signal to start ; for this is one of his many duties. His head is usually ornamented (in his opinion) with some outlandish cap or hat ; though others regard it as a fittingly outrageous cap-sheaf to his general dirty and outre appearance. But little cares Mr. Fireman ; he runs the fire-box of that " machine." He feels pride in the whole engine ; and when he sees any one admiring its (67) 68 THE FIREMAN. polished surface, gleaming so brightly in the sun, flashing so swiftly by the farm-houses on the road (in each of which Mr. Fireman has acquaintance of the opposite sex, to whom he must needs swing his handkerchief), he feels a glow of honest satisfaction ; and the really splendid manner in which his eiforts have caused it to shine — which is evidently one great reason for the admiration be- stowed upon it — so fills him with seif gratulation that, in his great modesty, which he fears will be overcome if he stays there much longer watching people as they admire his handiwork, and he be led to tell them all about it, how he scrubbed and scoured to bring her to that pitch of per- fection — he turns away, and begins to pitch the wood about in the most reckless manner imaginable ; yet every stick goes just where he wants it. His aspirations (and he has them, my lily-handed friend, as well as you, and perhaps, though not so ele- vated, more honorable than yours) are, that he may, by attending to his own duties, so attract the attention of the ones in authority that he may be placed in positions where he can learn the business, and, by and by, himself have charge of an engine as its runner. It does not seem a very high ambition ; but, to attain it, he undergoes a THE FIREMAN. by probation seldom of less than three, frequently of seven or eight years, at the hardest kind of work, performed, too, where dangers are thick around him, and his chances to avert them very slim. His duties are manifold and various ; but long years of attendance to them makes them very monotonous and irksome, and he would soon weary of them, did not the hope of one day being himself sole master of the " iron horse," actuate him to renewed dili gence and continued efforts to excel. He is on duty longer than any other man connected with the train. He mast be on hand before the engine comes out of the shop, to start a fire and see that all is right about the engine. Usually he brings it out upon the track ; and then, when all is ready, he begins the laborious work of throwing vfood ; which amounts to the handling of from four to seven cords of wood per diem, while the engine and ten- der are pitching and rolHng so that a " green- horn" would find it hard work to stand on his feet, let alone having, while so standing, to keep that fiery furnace supplied with fuel. The worse the day, the more the snow or rain blows, the harder his work. His hands become calloused Yy^ith the numerous wounds he receives from splinters on the wood. He it is who has to go out on the runboard 70 THE FIREMAN. and oil the valves, while the engine is running full speed. "No matter how cold the wind may blow, how rain, hail, sleet, or snow may beat down upon him, covering every thing with ice, nor how dark the night, out there he must go and crawl along the slippery side of the engine to do his work. At stations he must take water, and when at last the train arrives at its destination, and others are ready to go home, he must stay. If a little too much wood is in the fire-box, he must take it out, and then go to work cleaning and scouring the dust and rust from off the bright work and from the boiler. Every bit of cleaning in the cab and above the runboard, including the cylinders and steam-chest, must be done by him ; and any one who will look at the fancy-work on some of our modern loco- motives, can judge something of what he has to do after the day's work on the road is done. Every thing is brass, or covered with brass ; and all must be kept polished like a mirror, or the fireman is hauled over the coals. For performing these manifold duties, he receives the magnificent sum of (usually) thirty dollars per month ; and he knows no Sundays, no holidays — on long roads, he scarcely knows sleep. He has not the responsibility rest- ing on him that there is upon the engineer ; but it is re- THE FIREMAN. 71 quired of him, when not otherwise engaged with his duty of firing, to assist the engineer in keeping a lookout ahead. His position is one of the most dangerous on the train, as is proved by the frequent occurrence of accidents, where only the fireman is killed ; and his only obituary, no matter how earnest he may have been, how faithful in the performance of his duties, is an item in the tele- graphic reports, that a fireman was hilled in such a rail- road smash. He may have been one of nature's noble- men. A fond mother and sweet sisters may have been dependent on his scanty earnings for their support. No matter ; the great surging tide of humanity that daily throngs these avenues of travel, has not time to inquire after, nor sympathy to waste upon, a greasy wood-passer, whom they regard as simply a sort of piece in the ma- chinery of the road, not half so essential as a valve or bolt, for if he be lost, his place can be at once supplied ; but if a bolt or other essential piece of the iron machinery give out, it will most likely cause a vexatious delay. Once in a while a fireman performs some heroic act that brings him into a momentary notoriety, and opens the eyes of the few who may be cognizant of the case, to the fact that, on a railroad, all men are in danger, and that 72 THE FIREMAN. the most humble of them may perform some self-sacrifi- cing deed that will, at the expense of his own, save many other lives. In a collision that occurred at a station on one of the roads in New York state, the engineer, a relative of some of the managers of the road, who had fired only half so long as the man then firing for him, jumped from the en- gine, leaving it to run at full speed into the hind end of a train standing on a branch track, of which the switch was wrong ; not doing a single thing to avert or mitigate the calamity ; fearing only for his own precious neck, which a hemp cravat would ornament, to the edification of the world. The fireman sprang at once to the post vacated bj the engineer, reversed the engine, opened the sand-box valve, and rode into the hind end of that train ; losing, in so doing, a leg and an arm. He has been most muni- ficently rewarded for his heroism, being now employed to attend a crossing and hold a flag for passing trains, and receiving the princely compensation of twenty-five dollars per month ; while the engineer, who deserted his post and left all to kind Providence^ is running on the road at a salary of seventy-five per month. THE BRAKEMAN THE BRAKEMAN. A VERY humble class of railroad men, a class that gets poorer pay in proportion to the work they do and the dan- gers they run than any other upon a road, are the brake- men. Though perhaps less responsibility rests upon them, they are placed in the most dangerous position on the train ; they are expected to be at their posts at all times, and to flinch from no contingency which may arise. The man- agers of a railroad expect and demand the brakemen to be as prompt in answering the signals of the engineer as the throttle-valve is obedient to his touch. Reader, were you ever on a train of cars moving with the wings of the wind, skimming over the ground as rapidly as a bird flies, darting by tree and house, through cuttings and over embankments ? and did you ever feel a (75) 76 THE BRAKEMAN. sudden jar that almost jerked you from your seat ? At the same time did you hear a sharp, sudden blast of the whistle, ringing out as if the hand that pulled it was nerved by the presence of danger, braced by a terrible anxiety to avoid destruction ? It frightened you, did it not ? But did you notice the brakeman then ? He rushed madly out of the cars as if he thought the train was go- ing to destruction surely, and he wished, before the crash came, to be out of it. No, that was not his object. He caught hold of the brakes and, with all the force and en- ergy he was capable of exerting, applied them to the swift-revolving wheels, and when you felt the gradual re- duction of the speed under the pressure of the brakes, you began to feel easier. But what thought the brake- man all the time ? Did he think that, if the danger ahead was any one of a thousand which might happen ? if another train was coming towards them, and they should strike it ? if a disabled engine was on the track, and a fool, to whom the task was intrusted, had neglected to give your train the signal ? if the driving rain had raised some little stream, or a spark of fire had lodged in a bridge and the bridge was gone ? if some loosened rock had rolled down upon the track ; or if the track had slid ; THE BRAKEMAN. 77 or if some wretch, wearing a human form over a hellish soul, had lifted a rail, placed a tie on the track, to hurl en- gine and car therefrom ? — if any of these things were ahead and the speed of your train be too great to stop, and go plunging into it, did he realize that he was the first man to be caught ; that those two cars between which he stood, straining every nerve to do his share to avert the catastrophe, would come together and crush him, as he would crush a worm beneath his tread ? If he did, he was doing his duty in that dangerous place, risking his life at a pretty cheap rate — a dollar a day — wasn't he ? And still these men do this every day for the same price and at the same risk, while the passengers regard them as necessary evils, who will be continually banging the doors. So they pass them by, never giving them a kind word, scarcely ever thanking them for the many little services which they unhesitatingly demand of them, and, if the passenger has ridden long, and the jolting and jarring, the want of rest, or wearisome monotony of the Ions; ride has made him peevish, how sure he is to vent his spite on the brakeman, because he thinks him the most humble, and therefore the most unprotected man on the train. And the brakeman endures it all ; for if he answers back 78 THE BRAKEMAN. a word, if he asserts his manhood — which many seem to think he has sold for his paltry thirty dollars a month — why, he is reported at the office, a garbled version of the affair is given, and the brakeman is discharged. But have a care, ! most chivalrous passenger, you who fly into such a passion if your dignity is offended by a short answer. You may quarrel with a man having a soul in him beside which yours would look most pitifully insignificant ; one who, were the dread signal to sound, would rush out into the danger, and, throwing himself into the chasm, die for you, amid all the appalling scenes of the chaotic wreck of that train of cars, as coolly, as de- terminately, as unselfishly as the Stuart queen barred the door with her own fair arm, that her liege lord might escape. And then, methinks, you would feel sad when you saw his form stretched there dead, all life crushed out of it — once so comely, now so mangled and unsightly — and thought that, with that poor handful of dust from which the soul took flight so nobly, you had just been picking a petty quarrel. If you have read the accounts of railroad accidents as carefully and with such thrilling interest as I have, you will remember many incidents where brakemen were THE BRAKEMAN. 79 killed while at their post, discharging their duty. Sev- eral have come under my immediate observation. On the H. R. R. one night I was going over the road, " extra," that is, I was not running the engine, but riding in the car. I heard a sharp whistle, but thought it was not of much consequence, for I knew the engineer's long avowed in- tention, to never ball the brakemen to their posts when the danger could be avoided ; he said he w^ould give them a little chance, not call them where they had none. The brakemen all sprang to their posts ; the one in the car where I was I saw putting on his brake ; the next instant, with a shock that shook every thing loose and piled the seats, passengers, stove, and pieces of the roof all into a mass in the forward end of the car, the engine struck a rock, the cars were all piled together, and I was pitch- ed mto the alley up close to the end which was all stove in. I felt blood trickling on my hands, but thought it was from a wound I had received on my head. I soon found that it was from Charley McLoughlin, the brake- man with whom I had just been talking, and whom I saw go to his post at the first signal of danger. The whole lower part of his body was crushed, but he yet lived. We got him out as soon as possible and laid him be- 80 THE BRAKEMAN. side the track on a door, then went to get the rest of the dead and wounded. We found one of the brakemen dead, his head mashed flat ; the other one, Joe Barnard, was hurt just as Charley was, and as they were insepa- rable companions, we laid them together. I took their heads in my lap — we did not try to move them, as the physicians said they could not live — and there for four long hours I sat and talked with those men whose lives were surely, but slowly ebbing away. In life they were as brothers, and death did not separate them, for they de- parted within fifteen minutes of each other. But notice this fact — the brakeman who was found dead, still held in his hand the shattered brake-wheel, and Joe Barnard was crushed with both hands still grasping his. Yet these men were " only brakemen ! " A DREAM m THE " CABOOSE." A DREAM IN THE "CABOOSE." A FIRST thought of the life of an engineer would be that it was a life peculiarly exhilarating ; that in the mind of an engineer the rush and flow of strong feeling and emo- tion would constantly be felt ; that the everj-day incidents of his life would keep his nerves continually on the stretch, and that lassitude would never overtake him. But such is not the case. I know of no life that a man could live which would more certainly produce stagnation than it. Every day, in sunshine or storm, cold or heat, light or darkness, he goes through the same scenes, bearing the same burdens of care and responsibility, facing the same dangers, braving grim death ever and all the time until he loses fear, and the novelty of the at first exhilarating effort to conquer space and distance, and make time of no account, wears away, till danger becomes monotonous, and (83) 84 A DREAM m THE " CABOOSE." only an occasional scene of horror checkers the unchang- ing current of his everj-day Hfe. He knows every tie on the road ; he knows that here is a bad curve, there a weak bridge, from either of which he may at any time, by the most probal^e of possibiHties, be hurled to his death ; and still every day he rides his " iron horse," of fiery heart and demon pulse, over the weak places and the strong, posted at the very front of the procession, which any one of a thousand contingencies would make a funeral train. He passes the same stations, blows his whistle at the same point, "sees the same men at work in the same fields, with the same horses that they used last year and the year before. Two lines of iron stretch before him, to demand and receive his earnest scrutiny every day, precisely as they have every day for years. He meets the same men on other trains at the same places, and bids them " hail " and " good-bye " with the same uncertainty of ever seeing them again that he has always felt, and which has grown so sadly wearisome. He alone knows and appreciates the chances against him, but bis daily bread depends upon his running them, so with a resolute will that soon gets to be the merest trusting to luck, he goes ahead, controlled by the same A DREAM m THE " CABOOSE." 85 rules, which always have the same dreary penalties at- tached to them when violated, — a maimed and disfigured body for the balance of his days, or a sudden and inglo- rious death. If one of his intimate companions gets killed, he can only bestow a passing thought upon it, for he has not been unexpectant of it, and he knows full well that the same accident may at the same place make it his turn next, as he passes over the same road every day, running the same chances, as did his friend just gone. I had, while I was on the H road, a particular friend, an engineer. We were inseparable, and were both of us, alike, given to fits of despondency, at which times we would, with choking dread, bid each other fare- well, and " hang around" the telegraph office to hear the welcome "OK" from the various stations, signifying that our trains had passed " on time" and " all right." One Saturday night, when my engine was to " ky over" for the Sunday at the upper end of the road, I determined to go back to N . The only train down that night, was the one o'clock " night freight," which Charley, my friend, was to tow with the " Cumberland," a heavy, clumsy " coal-burner." I went to the engine-house, and 86 sat down with Charley, to smoke and talk till his " leav- ing time" came. He had the blues that night, and after we had talked awhile, I had them too. So we sat there slowly pujffing our pipes, recalling gloomy tales of our own, and of others' experience; telling of unlucky engines (a favorite superstition with many engineers), and of unlucky men, and of bad places on the road, weak bridges, loose rails, shelving rocks, and bad curves, until we had got ourselves into the belief that nothing short of a miracle could possibly enable even a hand-car to pass over the road in any thing like safety. Had any of the passengers who daily passed over the road, in the compar- ative safety of its sumptuous coaches, been there and heard our description of the road, I guess they would have tak- en lodgings at the nearest hotel, sooner than have ridden over the road that night, towed by that engine, which Charley had more than once characterized as a " death- trap" and " man-killer," and proven her right to the name by alluding to the four men she had killed. At length the hours had dragged themselves along, and the " Cumberland" was coupled to the train. As I started for the " Caboose," Charley said to me, " The ' Cum- berland' always was and always will be an unlucky 87 engine, and blamed if I know but she will kill me to- night, so let's shake hands, and good-bye.'' We shook hands, and I clambered into the " Caboose," having, it must be confessed, a sneaking kind of good feeHng to think that I was at the rear instead of the front end of those forty cars, especially as the engine was one that, despite my reason and better judgment, I more than half-believed was " cursed" with "ill-luck;" by which I mean, she was pe- culiarly liable to fatal accidents. Well, I curled myself up on one of the seats and prepared for sleep ; not, though, in just the frame of mind I would choose in order to secure " pleasant slumbers" and " sweet dreams." At first my sleep was fitful ; the opening of the door, as the hands frequently went out or came in ; the cessation of the jar and rumble when the train stopped ; the chang- ing of position as I tossed about in my fitful sleep — these all would wake me. At last, however, I dropped to sleep, and slept long and soundly. Strange dreams, fraught with terror, filled with wild and fantastic objects, danced over and controlled my mind. I w^as placed in positions of the most awful dread ; I was on engines of inconceiva- ble power, powerless to control them, and they ran with 88 A DEEAM IN THE the velocity of light into long trains laden with smiling women and romping children, whose shrieks mingled with the curses of their husbands and fathers, who said it was mj fault, and cursed me to lingering tortures. Then the scene would change. I would be on a long straight track, mounted on an engine which seemed a devil broken loose, and bent on a mission of death which I could not stir to stop; while away in the distance was another engine, coming towards me, and I felt, by intuition, that it was Charley, and then I would see his white and pallid face, clammy with the sweat of terror, and his long black hair swept back from his forehead, while agony, despair, and the miserable, hopeless fear of instant and horrible death shone with lurid, fierce, unnatural fire from his dark blue eye, and I seemed to know that every one I held dear was on his train ; that my sisters were there looking out of the window, gaily laughing and watching for the next station, where my train was to meet theirs, and my mother sat smilingly by, looking on, while other friends that I loved were saying kind words of me, who, in another instant, would be upon them with a fiendish, fiery engine of death. I would shut my eyes, and the A DREAM IN THE " CABOOSE." 89 scene would change again. I would be skirting the edges of deep, dark precipices, and while I looked, shuddering, down into the dark and sombre depths, my whole train ivould go over the bank and down, down — still farther down it plunged — till I seemed to have gone far enough for the nether depths. A sudden tremendous jar woke me, and I sprang to my feet from the floor to which I had been hurled, and found myself in utter darkness. For an instant I did not know where I was, but I soon re- called myself and started out of the " Caboose," fully convinced that some awful calamity had happened to the train, and bound to know, in the shortest possible time, whether Charley or any of the rest of the hands were hurt. I soon saw a light, and hallooed to know what was the matter. " Nothing," answered Charley's well-known voice. " Well," says I, " you make a deuce of a fuss do- ing nothing." I told him how I was awakened, and we started back to see what was the matter. We found that, in throwing the " Caboose" in upon the branch track, he had given it too much headway, and there being no brake- man on it to check its speed, it had hit the tie laid across the rail with sufficient force to throw me from the seat 90 A DREAM IN THE and put out the only lamp in the car. So we went home, laughing heartily ; but I never prepared myself for an- other midnight ride in the " Caboose" of a freight train by telling horrid stories just before I started. AN UNMITIGATED VILLAIN. KS UNMITIGATED VILLAIN, Everybody knows mean men. Everybody knows people that they think are capable of any mean act, who would, did opportunity present itself, steal, lie, cheat, swear falsely, or do any other act which is vicious. But do any of my readers think that they know any one who would be guilty of deliberately placing an obstruction on a railroad track, over which he knew that a train, laden with human passengers, must soon pass ? Yet such men are plenty. Such acts are frequently done, and often with the sole view of stealing from the train during the excitement which must necessarily ensue after such an accident. Some- times such deeds are done from pure revenge, because the man who does it imagines that the railroad company has done him some injury, and he thinks that by so doing he will (93) 94 AN UNMITIGATED VILLAIN. reap a rich harvest of vengeance. What kind of a soul can such a man have ? The man who desires to steal, wishes to get a chance to do so when people's minds are so occupied with some other idea that their property is not thought of. So he goes to the railroad track and lifts up a rail, places a tie or a T rail across the track, or does something that he thinks will throw the train from the track ; and then lies in wait for the accident to happen, calmly and with deliberate purpose awaiting the event ; expecting, amid the carnage which will probably follow, to reap his reward ; calculating, when it comes, to fill his pockets with the money thus obtained^, and when it does happen, and the heavy train, in which, resting in security, are hundreds of passengers, goes off the track, is wrecked, and lies there with every car shattered, and out of their ruins are creeping the mangled victims, who rend the air with their horrid shrieks and moans of agony ; when the dead and the mangled are mixed up amidst the appalling wreck ; when little children, scarce able to go alone, are so torn to pieces that they linger only for a few moments on earth ; when famihes, that a few moments before were unbroken and happy, are separated forever by the death of the father who lies in sight of the remaining ones, a AN UNMITIGATED VILLAIN. 95 crushed and bleeding mass, or by the loss of the mother, who, caught by some portion of the wreck, is held, and there, in awful agony, slowly frets her life away, right in sight of all that are dear to her ; or, maybe, a husband, who is hurrying home to his dear one lying at the point of death, and anxiously awaiting his coming, that, before she dies, she may bid him good-bye, he is caught and mangled so that he cannot move farther, and the wife dies alone. Maybe a child, long time absent, is hastening home to meet the aged mother or father, and bid them good-bye ere the long running sands are run out entirely ; but here he is caught, and his last breath of life goes out with a heart-rending, horrible scream of agony, and only his mangled corpse can go home. All ties may be rudely sundered. The infant at its mother's breast may be killed, and its mother clasp its tiny, bleeding form to her bosom, but it shall smile on her nevermore ; its cooing voice shall not welcome her care again on earth. The mother too may be killed, and the moaning child may sob and sigh for the accustomed kiss, but all in vain. The mother, mangled and slain, only holds the child in the stiff embrace of death. The author of it all — where is he ? he that did the deed ? Is he rummaging the baggage or the pockets 96 AN UNMITIGATED VILLAIN. of the dead to find spoil ? If he is, surely every cent he gets will blister his fingers through all time and in hell. The wail of the dying and the last gasp of the dead will, through all time, surely ring in his ears with horrible dis- tinctness, and with a sound ominous of eternal torture. The horrible sight of the mangled, bleeding bodies, the set eyes, and jaws locked from excessive torture, will surely fasten on his eye forever, and blister his sight. Hor- rid dreams, wherein jibing fiends shall mock at him and the wail of the damned ring forever in his ears, shall surely visit his pillow and haunt him every night. Each voice that he hears amid the carnage shall seem, in after-time, to be the voice of an accusing angel telling him of his guilt. So we would think, and yet men do it. Some in order to have a chance to steal, others as revenge for some petty injury ; and they live, and, if detected, are sent for ten or twenty years to the penitentiary, as if that were punish- ment enough ! It may be that I feel too strongly on the subject, but it seems to me that an eternity in hell would scarce be more than sufficient punishment for such a dam- nable deed. I think I could coolly and without compunction tread the drop to launch such a being to eternity; for surely no good influence that earth affords would be suf- AN UNMITIGATED VILLAIN. 97 ficient to reclaim such a man from the damnable deprav- ity of his nature. Surelj a man capable of such a deed, is a born fiend fit only for the abiding place of the accurs- ed of God, whose voice should ever be heard howling in sleepless, eternal agony in the sulphurous chambers of the devil's home. I do feel strongly on this subject, for I have stood by and seen many a horrid death of this kind ; I have held the hands of dear friends and felt their last con- vulsive pressure amid such scenes, whose deaths were caused by the diabohcal malignity of some devil, who, for the nonce, had assumed human shape, and in revenge for the death of a cow, or for the unpaid occupation of land, or to get a chance to rob, had placed something on the track and thrown the cars therefrom. I have seen things placed on the track, rails torn up, and other traps, the ingenuity of whose arrangement could only have been begotten by the devil ; and I have shut my eyes and thought that I had taken my last look at earth and all its glories ; but I have escaped. I never caught one of these wretches, and I never want to ; for if I should, I am afraid I would become an instrument for riddyig the earth of a being who had secured good title (and could not lose it) to an abode in the nethermost hell. 7 A PROPOSED RACE STEAM AND LIGHTNING A PROPOSED RACE BETWEEN STEAM AND LIGHTNING. Old Wash. S is known by almost every railroad engineer, at least by reputation. A better engineer, one who could make better time, draw heavier loads, or keep his engine in better repair, I never knew. But Wash. had one failing, he would drink ; and if he was particu- larly elated with any good fortune, or was expecting to make a fast run, he was sure to get full of whiskey ; and though in that state never known to transgress the rules of the road by running on another train's time, or any thing of that sort, still he showed the thing which con- trolled him by running at a terrible rate of speed. At one time they purchased a couple of engines for the E. road, on which Wash, was running. These engines were very large, and were intended to be very fast, being put (101) 102 A PROPOSED RACE up on seven feet wheels. From the circumstance of their being planked between the spokes of their " dri- vers," that is, having a piece of plank set in between the spokes, the " bojs" used to call them the " plank-roaders." They were tried, and though generally considered capa- ble of making " fast time" under favorable circumstances, they didn't suit that road ; so they were condemned to " the gravel-pit," until they could receive an overhauling, and be "cut down" a foot or two. Wash, had always considered that these engines were much abused, and had never received fair treatment ; so he obtained permission of the Superintendent to take one of them into the shop and repair it. At it he went, giving the engine a thor- ough overhauling, fixing her valves for the express pur- pose of running fast, and making many alterations in mi- nor portions of her machinery. At last he had the job completed, and took her out on the road. After running one or two trips on freight trains to smooth her brasses, and try her working, he was " chalked" for the fastest train on the road, the B. Express. All the " boys" on the road were anxious for the result, for it was expected that " Old Wash." and the " plank-roader" would " as- BETWEEN STEAM AND LIGHTNING. 103 tonish the natives," that trip. Wash, imbibed rather freely, and was somewhat under the influence of liquor when the leaving time of his train came, though not enough to be noticed ; but as minute after minute passed, and the train with which it connected did not make its appearance, Wash., who kept drinking all the time, grew tighter and tighter, till at last, when it did come in, an hour and a half " behind time," Wash, was pretty comfortably drunk ; so much so that some of the men who had to go on the train with him looked rather " skeery," for they knew that they might expect to be " towed " as fast as the engine could run. How fast that was no one knew, but her seven feet wheels promised a near ap- proach to flying. At last tHey started, and I freely confess that I never took as fast a ride in my life. (Wash, had got me to fire for him.) Keeping time was out of the question as far as I was concerned, for I had my hands full to keep the "fire-box" full, and hold my hat on. We had not run more than ten miles, before the brakemen, order- ed by the conductor, put on the brakes, impeding our speed somewhat, but not stopping us, for we were on a 104 A PROPOSED RACE heavy down grade, and Wash, had her " wide open,'* and working steam at full stroke. At last the con- ductor came over and begged Wash, not to run so fast, for the passengers were half scared out of their senses. Wash, simplj pointed to the directions to use all " due exertion" to make up time, and never shut off a bit. So on we flew to B., forty miles from where we started, and the first stopping place for the train. Here the conductor came to Wash, again and told him if he did not run slower, the passengers were going to leave. Wash, said, " Let them leave," and gave no promises. Some of them did leave, so also did one of the brakemen, and the bag- gageman, but away we went without them to 0., where a message from head-quarters was awaiting us, telling them to take Wash, from the engine and put another man on in his place. I told him of the message, and picking up his coat, he gob off and staggered to a bench on the stoop of the depot, where he laid down, seemingly to sleep. I started back to the engine, but Wash, called after me, and asked me " how we got the orders to take him off ? " I told him " by telegraph." " Humph," said he, rolling over, " wish Fd known that, the confounded dispatch never shoidd have passed me J /" BETWEEN STEAM AND LIGHTNING. 105 Wash, of course was not reinstated, but the " plank- roader" never made the running time of any of the fast trains with any other man on the " foot-board." AN ABRUPT "CALL." AN ABRUPT "CALL." " Hi White," as he was familiarly called, was an engineer on the same road with me. He has been run- ning there for over ten years, and, although Hi is one of those mad wags who are never so happy as when " run- ning a rig" on some of their cronies, he was univer- sally acknowledged to be one of the most competent and careful men that ever " pulled a plug " on a locomotive. In Hi's long career as a runner, he, of course, has met with innumerable hair-breadth 'scapes; some of them terribly tragic in their accessories ; others irresistibly comic in their termination, although commencing with fair prospect for a fearful end. Of this latter kind was an adventure of his, which he used to call " making a morn- ing call under difficulties." Hi used to run the (109 ) 110 AN ABRUPT " CALL." Morning Express, or, as it was called, the " Shanghae run," which left the Southern terminus of the road at 6 o'clock A.M. It was a " fast run," making the length of the road (one hundred and forty-one miles) in three and a half hours. Hi ran the engine Columbia, a fast " machine," with seven feet driving wheels, and a strong inclination to mount the rail and leave the track on the slightest provocation. About midway of the road there was a large brick house, standing but a rod or two from the track and on the outside of a sharp curve. As Hi was passing the curve one day, running at full speed, some slight obstruction caused the Columbia to leave the track, breaking the coupling between it and the train, thus leaving the cars on the track. Away went the Columbia, making the gravel fly until she met with an obstruction in the shape of this very brick house, which the engine struck square in the broad-side, and, with characteristic contempt of slight obstacles, crashed its way through the wall and on to the parlor floor, which, being made for lighter tread, gave way and precipitated the en- gine into the cellar beneath, leaving only the hind end of the tender sticking out of the breach in the wall. Hi, who had jumped off at the first symptom of this furious on- AN ABRUPT " CALL." Ill slaught, looked to see if there were any dead or wounded on the field of this " charge of his heavy brigade." Seeing that he and his fireman were both safe, he turned his attention to the Columbia, which he found " slightly in- jured but safely housed," lying coolly among pork barrels, apple bins and potato heaps, evidently with no present probability of continuing its course. By this time the people of the house, who were at breakfast in the farther part of the building when the furious incursion upon their domestic economy took place, came rushing out, not knowing whether to prepare to meet friend or rebel foe. Yery naturally the first question put to Hi (who was renewing vegetable matter for present rumina- tion, i. e, taking a new chew of tobacco), was, '' What's the m.atter ? " This question was screamed to Hi, with the different intonations of the various members of the family. Hi coolly surveyed the frightened group and rephed, " Matter— nothing is the matter. I only thought T would call on you this morning, and pray," said he, with the most winning politeness, " donH put yourself to any trouble on my aceounty THE GOOD LUCK OF BEING OBSTINATE. THE GOOD LUCK OF BEING OBSTINATE. I THINK people generally look upon railroad men as a distinct species of the genus homo. Thej seem to regard them as a class who have the most utter disregard for human hfe, as perfectly careless of trusts imposed upon them, and as being capable of distinctly understanding rules the most obscure, and circumstances the most com- plicated. They seem to think a railroad man is bound to make time an}^ way, in the face of every difficulty, and to hold him absolutely criminal if he meets with any accident, or fails to see his way safe out of any trouble into which their urging may force him. My impression is that they are wrong, that railroad men have but human courage, but human foresight, and should be spared the (115) 116 THE GOOD LUCK OF BEING OBSTINATE. most of the indiscriminate censure heaped upon them when an accident happens. If one were to judge from the words of the press and the finding of coroners' juries, he would infer that a pure accident, one unavoidable bj human foresight, was a thing unknown ; but if he will only think, for a moment, of all the circumstances, consider the enormous velocity at which trains move, the tremendous, strain thus thrown upon every portion of the road-bed and the machinery, I think the wonder will be why there are not more accidents. Think, for a moment, of one or two hundred tons' weight impelled through the air at a velocity of from one hundred to two hundred and forty feet per second, and tell me if you do not consider that the chances for damage are pretty nu- merous. I remember once being detained at a way-station with the Up Express, waiting for the Down Express to pass me. We were both, owing to snow and ice on the rails, sadly behind time, and I had concluded just to wait where I was, until we heard from the other train, though a liberal construction of the rules gave me the right to proceed "with due caution;" but I was afraid that, if any thing did happen, there would be two opinions as to what THE GOOD LUCK OF BEING OBSTINATE. 117 " due caution" meant, so I held still. The passengers were all uneasy, as they always are, and stormed and fretted up and down, now coming to me and demanding, in just about such tones as we would imagine a newly caught she-bear to use, whether we intended " to keep them there all night?" whether I supposed "the traveling public would tamely submit to such outrages ? " if I thought they "had no rights in the premises?" etc. These and similar questions were put to me, some peevishly, some in a lordly manner, evidently with the intention of bullying me into a start. I generally maintained the, dirty but independent dignity of my position of " runner of that kettle ; " but these latter Sir Oracles, I told that I was too well used to dealing with fire, water, steam and rock to be scared by a little " wind." After a while there came a telegraphic dispatch, unsigned, undated, but say- ing, " Come ahead;" this raised a terrible " hillabaloo." The passengers crowded into the cars and looked for an immediate start. The conductor came to me and said that he thought we had better start. I told him " No : " that I infinitely preferred to run on good sohd rails rather than telegraph wires, at all times, and more especially when the wires brought such lame orders as these "Very 118 THE GOOD LUCK OP BEING OBSTINATE. well," savs he, ^' I don't know but jou are right, but I shall leave you to console these passengers— I'm off to hide," and away he went. Pretty soon out they came by twos, threes, dozens and scores ; and I declare they need- ed consolation, for a madder set I never saw. Pshaw ! talk about '' hornets" and " bob-tailed bulls in fly-time ; " they ain't a circumstance to a passenger on a railroad train which is an hour behind time. Well, they blustered and stormed, shook their fists at me, and about twenty took down my name with the murderous hitent of " re- porting" me at head-quarters, and •' seeing about this thing" generally. At last some individual, bursting with wrath, called for an indignation meeting. The call was answered with alacrity. I attended as a disinterested spectator, of course ; a President and Secretary were ap- pointed, several speeches were made, overflowing with eloquence, and all aimed at me, but carrying a few shots for every body on the train, even to the boy that sold pa- pers. This much had been done, and the committee on "resolutions which should be utterly annihilating," had just retired, when a whistle was heard up the track, and down came an extra engine, running as fast as she could, carrying no light, but bringing news that the " down THE GOOD LUCK OF BEING OBSTINATE. 119 train" was oif the track eleven miles above, and bringing a requisition for all the doctors in town to care for the wounded, who were numerous. The " resolution commit- tee" adjourned sine die. I was never reported, for they all saw that, had I done as they wished me to, I would have met this extra engine and rendered a few more doc- tors necessary for my own train. The blunder of the telegraph was never explained, but blunder it was, and the more firm was I never to obey a telegraphic dispatch without it was clear and distinct, " signed, sealed and delivered." HUMAN LIVES vs. THE DOLLAR HUMAN LIVES vs. THE DOLLAR. Cattle and horses on the track are a continual source of annoyance to engineers, and have been the occasion of many serious accidents. On the W. & S. Railroad, not many years since, an accident occurred, with the cir- cumstances of which I was familiar, and which I will re- late. George Dean was one of the most accomplished and thorough engineers that I ever knew. He was run- ning the Night Express, a fast run ; while I was running the through freight, and met him at C station. I arrived there one night " on time," but George was con- siderably behind ; so I had to wait for him. Just before George arrived at the station, he had to cross a bridge of n23) 124 HUMAN LIVES V. THE DOLLAR. about 200 feet span ; it was a covered bridge, and the rails were some 30 feet from the w^ater below. I had been there waiting for him to pass, for over half an hour, when I heard his whistle sound at a " blind crossing" about a mile distant ; so I knew he was com- ing ; and as George was a pretty fast runner, I thought T would stand out on the track and see him come, as the track was straight, there, for nearly a mile. I saw the glimmer of his head-light w^hen he first turn ed the curve and entered upon the straight track, and pulled out my v/atch to time him to the station, through which he was to pass without stopping. The light grew brighter and brighter as he advanced with the speed of the wind, and he was within sixty feet of the bridge, when I saw an animal of some kind, I then knew not what it was, but it proved to be a horse, dart out on the track, right in front of the engine. George saw it. I know, for he gave the whistle for brakes, and a series of short puffs to scare the horse from the track ; but it was of no use : the horse kept right on and ran towards the bridge. Arrived there, instead of turning to one side, it gave a jump right on to the bridge, and fell down between the ties, and there, of course, he hung. On came George's ponderous engine, HUMAN LIVES V. THE DOLLAR. 125 and striking the horse, was thrown from the track into the floor timbers of the bridge, which gave way beneath the weight and the tremendous concussion, and down went the engine standing upon its front, the tender dropped in behind it, and the baggage car and one passenger car were heaped together on top of them both. I saw them drop, heard the crash, and at once, with the other men of my train, started to relieve any that might be caught in the wreck. Leaping down the embankment forming the approach of the bridge, I v/aded througli the stream to where the engine stood, my fireman following close be- hind me. Looking up, we saw George caught on the head of the boiler. He was able to speak to us, and told us that he was not much hurt, but his legs were caught so that he could not move, and from the heat of the boiler he was literally roasting to death. We cHmbed up to where he was caught, to see if we could move him or get him out ; but alas ! he could not be helped. His legs lay right across the front of the boiler, and on them were resting some timbers of the broken baggage car, while the passenger car was so wedged into the bridge that there was no prospect of lifting it so as to get George out for many hours. I went and got him some water, and with 126 HUMAN LIVES V. THE DOLLAR. it bathed his forehead and cooled his parching lips ; he talking to me all the time and sending word to his wife and children. For a few minutes, he bore up under the pain most manfully ; but at last, it grew too intolerable for anv human being to bear, and George, than whom a braver soul never existed, shrieked and screamed in his agony. He begged and prayed to die. He entreated us to kill him, and put an end to his sufferings — he even cursed us for not doing it, asking us how we could stand and see him roast to death, knowing, too, as we did and he did, that he could not be saved. He begged for a knife to kill himself with, as he would rather die by his own hand at once than to linger in such protracted, awful agony. Oh ! it was terrible, to stand there and see the convulsive twitchings of his muscles, to hear him pray for death, to v/atch him as his eyes set vfith pain, and hear his agonized entreaties for death any way, no matter how, so it was quick. At last it was ended, the horrible drama closed, and he died ; but his shrieks will never die out from the memory of those who heard them. The next day, when we got him out, we found his legs were literally jammed to pieces and then baked to a cinder. The fireman we found cauizht between the trucks of the HUMAN LIVES V. THE DOLLAR. 127 tender and the driving-wheel of the engine, and apparent- ly not a bone left whole in his bodj ; he was utterly smashed to pieces. You could not have told, only from his clothing, which hung in bloody fragments to his corpse, that he had ever been a human being. We got them out at last and buried them. Sadly and solemnly we followed them to the grave, and thought, with much dread, of when it would be our turn. They lie together, a plain stone marking their resting-place, and no railroad man ever visits their graves without a tear in tribute to their memory. Thus they died, and thus all that knew them still mourn them. But the noise of the accident had scarcely ceased echoing amidst the adjoining hills, ere the owner of the horse was on the ground wishing to know if any one was there who was authorized to pay for his horse ; this, too, in the face of the fact, afterward proven, that he himself had turned the horse upon the track, there to filch the feed. FORTY-TWO MILES PER HOUR, FORTY-TWO MILES PER HOUR. Nearly every person that we hear speak of travel by rail, thinks that he has, on numerous occasions, traveled at the rate of sixty miles an hour ; but among engineers this is known to be an extremely rare occurrence. I my- self have run some pretty fast machines, and never had much fear as to " letting them out," and I never attained that speed for more than a mile or two on a down grade, and with a light train, excepting on one or two occasions. Supposing, however, reader, that we look a little into what an engine has to do in order to run a mile in a minute, or more time. Say we go down to the depot, and take a ride on this Morning Express, which goes to Columbus in one hour and thirty-five minutes, making two stops. We will get aboard of the Deshler, one of the smartest (131) 182 FORTY- TWO MILES PER HOUR. engines on the road, originallj built by Moore & Richard- son, but since then thoroughly overhauled, and in fact re- juvenated, by that prince of m