Chapter XI: Part 11

At a banquet in Paris attended by Americans in celebration of the late Fourth of July, Mr. Walker’s speech in reply to the toast of the material prosperity of the United States and France, and the establishment of closer commercial relations between them, was especially striking and interesting. He remarked, “In 1870 the cost of transporting food and merchandise between the Western and Eastern States was from a cent-and-a-half to two cents a ton a mile. I well remember a conversation which I had in 1870 or 1871 with Mr. William B. Ogden, of Chicago, one of the modest railway kings of that primitive period. In a vein of sanguine prophecy, Mr. Ogden exclaimed to me, ‘Mr. Walker, you will live to see freight brought from Chicago to New York at a cent a ton a mile!’ ‘Perhaps so,’ I replied; ‘but I fear this result will not be reached in my time.’ In 1877 or 1878 the cost had fallen to three-eighths of a cent a ton a mile, and although this price was not remunerative, I was told by one of the highest authorities in railway matters that five-eighths of a cent would be perfectly satisfactory. The effect of this reduction in the cost of transportation is precisely as though the unexhaustible grain fields and pastures across the Mississippi had been moved bodily eastward to the longitude of Ohio and Western New York. It is estimated that it takes a quarter of a ton of bread and meat to feed a grown man in Massachusetts for a year. The bread and meat come to him from the far west, and I have no doubt that it will astonish you to be told, as it lately astonished me, that a single day of this man’s labour, even if it be of the commonest sort, will pay for transporting his year’s subsistence for a thousand miles.”

TAY BRIDGE ACCIDENT.

Dec. 28, 1879. A fearful disaster occurred in Scotland. As the train from Edinburgh to Dundee was crossing the bridge, two miles in length, which spans the mouth of the Tay, a terrible hurricane struck the bridge, about four hundred yards of which was, with the train, dashed into the sea below. About seventy persons were in the train, of whom not one escaped, nor, when the divers were able to descend, could a single body be found in the carriages, or among the bridge girders, and some days elapsed before any were recovered. No conclusive evidence could be produced to show whether the train was blown off the rails and so dragged the girders down, or whether the bridge was blown away and the train ran into the chasm thus made. The night was intensely dark, and the wind more violent than had ever been known in the country.

_Annual Register_, 1879.

AN EXTRAORDINARY WAIF.

The following is a translation from the Norwegian newspaper _Morgenbledet_, dated Feb. 20th:—“By private letter from Utsue, an island on the western coast of Norway, is communicated to Dapposten the intelligence that on the 12th inst. some fishermen pulled on the Firth to haul their nets, and had hardly finished their labour when they sighted an extraordinary object some distance further out. The superstitious fears of sea monsters which have been written a good deal about lately held them back for some time, but their curiosity made them approach the supposed sea monster, and, to their great surprise, they found that it was something like a building. As the sea was calm they immediately commenced to tow it to shore, where it was hauled up on the beach, and was then found to be a damaged railway wagon. The wheels were off, the windows smashed, and one door hanging on its hinges. By the name on it, “Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway,” it was at once surmised that it must have been one of the wagons separated from the train which met with the disaster on the Tay Bridge. In the carriage was a portmanteau containing garments, some of them marked ‘P.B.’ The wagon was sent, on the 14th, to Hangesund, to be forwarded thence to Bergen.”

A RAILWAY SLEEPER.

A railway pointsman, caught napping at his post and convicted of wilful negligence, said to the gaoler who was about to lock him up, “I always supposed that the safety of a railroad depended on the soundness of its sleepers?” “So it does,” replied the gaoler, “but such sleepers are never safe unless they are bolted in.”

NOT TO BE CAUGHT.

The following incident is said to have occurred on the North London Railway:—Some time ago a passenger remarked, in the hearing of one of the company’s servants, how easy it was to “do” the company, and said, “I often travel from Broad Street to Dalston Junction without a ticket—anyone can do it—I did it yesterday.” When he alighted he was followed by the official, who asked him how it was done. For a consideration he agreed to tell him. This being given, “Now,” said the inquirer, “how did you go from Broad Street to Dalston Junction yesterday without a ticket?” “Oh,” was the reply, “I walked.”

THE DOCTOR AND THE OFFICERS.

The following is rather a good story from the Emerald Isle:—A doctor and his wife got into a train near—well, we will not say where. In the same carriage with the doctor were two strange officers. The doctor’s wife got into another compartment of the same train, the doctor not having seen his wife in the hurry, neither knew that they were travelling by the same train until both had got into different carriages. Said one of the officers to his companion, “That is the ugliest woman I ever saw.” “She is,” replied the Son of Mars. “I should not like to be obliged to kiss her,” responded the first speaker. “I should not mind doing it,” sullenly said the doctor. “You never would, sir, think of such a thing,” said the officer. “I’ll bet you a sovereign I will,” answered the man of “pills and potions.” “Done,” said the officer. So when they all got out at the station, the doctor went forward and kissed his wife, and won his sovereign—the easiest-earned fee he had ever received. The officers looked rather astonished when he presented his wife to them.

THE BOTHERED QUEEN’S COUNSEL.

Mr. Merewether, Q.C., got into the train one morning with a whole batch of briefs and a talkative companion. He wanted to go through his briefs, but his companion would not let him work. He tried silence, he tried grunting, he tried sarcasm. At length, when they came to Hanwell, the gossip hit upon the unfortunate remark, “How well the asylum looks from the railway!” “Pray, sir,” replied Mr. Merewether, “how does the railway look from the asylum?” The man was silent.

A BRAVE ENGINE DRIVER.

An American contemporary says:—“John Bull, of Galion (Ohio), ought to have his name recorded in an enduring way, for few have ever behaved so nobly as that engine driver of the New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio railroad. As he was driving a passenger train last month he found that, through somebody’s blunder, a freight train was approaching on the same track, and a collision was inevitable. He could have saved his own life by leaping from the engine, but, dismissing all thoughts of himself, he resolved to try and save the passengers committed to his care. So he reversed the engine and set the air-brakes, and then put on full steam, started the locomotive ahead, broke the coupling attached to the train, and dashed on to receive the shock of the collision. The passengers escaped all injury, while the brave engineer was so badly hurt that he died in a few hours. Such heroism as this should not go unnoticed.” The _Cincinnati Inquirer_ says: “He remained in the car until the engine leaped into the air and was dashed into the ditch, when he attempted to spring to the ground, but had his foot caught between the frames of the engine and tender, striking his head on the ground and causing the fatal injuries. Railroad men say that the act of detaching the engine as he did, not even derailing the baggage car with his engine at the high rate of speed, and all in 150 feet, is without parallel in railroading. A purse of 500 dollars was raised by the grateful passengers. The body has been shipped to Galion for burial.”

AN INDUSTRIOUS BISHOP.

In noticing the “Life of the Rt. Rev. Samuel Wilberforce, D.D., Lord Bishop of Oxford, and afterwards of Winchester,” a writer in the _Athenæum_ remarks:—“Busy he was, both in Oxford and in London, and his correspondence with all kinds of people was unusually large. A large proportion of his letters were written in the railway train, and dated from ‘near’ this town, or ‘between’ this and that. We remember to have heard from one who was his companion in a railway carriage that before the journey was half-finished the adjoining seat was littered with envelopes of letters which he had read, and with the answers he had written since he started. All this undeniably shows energy and determination, and power to work.”

COOL IMPUDENCE AND DISHONESTY.

Some days since, the trains of the North London Railway were all late, and consequently every platform was crowded. At one of the stations an unfortunate passenger attempted to enter an already over-crowded first-class compartment, but one of the occupants stoutly resisted the intrusion. Thereupon, the unfortunate one said, “I will soon settle this,” and called the guard to the carriage door. He then requested the official to ask two of the occupants to produce their tickets, which proved to be third-class ones. In spite of the delinquents protesting there was no room in the train elsewhere, they were ejected, and the unfortunate one took their place. The other passengers were naturally rather indignant; and, seeing this, the successful intruder quietly said, “I am very sorry to have had to turn those two gentlemen out, especially as I have heard them say they were already late for an important engagement in the city; and I am all the more sorry, seeing that I only hold a third-class ticket myself.”

—_Truth_.

THE BOOKING-CLERK AND BUCKLAND.

Mr. Frank Buckland had been in France and was returning via Southampton, with an overcoat stuffed with natural history specimens of all sorts, dead and alive. Among them was a monkey, which was domiciled in a large inside breast-pocket. As Buckland was taking his ticket, Jocko thrust up his head and attracted the attention of the booking-clerk, who immediately—and very properly—said, “You must take a ticket for that dog, if it’s going with you.” “Dog,” said Buckland, “it’s no dog, it’s a monkey.” “It is a dog,” replied the clerk. “It’s a monkey,” retorted Buckland, and proceeded to show the whole animal, but without convincing the clerk, who insisted on five shillings for the dog-ticket to London. Nettled at this, Buckland plunged his hand into another pocket and produced a tortoise, and laying it on the sill of the ticket window said, “Perhaps you’ll call that a dog too.” The clerk inspected the tortoise. “No,” said he, “we make no charge for them—they’re insects.”

REMARKABLE RESCUE OF A CHILD.

An engineer on a locomotive going across the western prairie day after day, saw a little child come out in front of a cabin and wave to him, so he got in the habit of waving back to the child, and it was the day’s joy to see this little one come out in front of the cabin door and wave to him while he answered back. One day the train was belated, and it came on to the dusk of the evening. As the engineer stood at his post he saw by the headlight that little girl on the track, wondering why the train did not come, looking for the train, knowing nothing of her peril. A great horror seized upon the engineer. He reversed the engine. He gave it in charge of the other man, and then he climbed over the engine, and he came down on the cowcatcher. He said though he had reversed the engine, it seemed as though it were going at lightning speed, faster and faster, though it was really slowing up, and with almost supernatural clutch he caught the child by the hair and lifted it up, and when the train stopped, and the passengers gathered around to see what was the matter, there the old engineer lay, fainted dead away, the little child alive and in his swarthy arms.

FEMALE FRAGILITY.

There was a time when American women prided themselves on their fragility. To be healthy, strong or plump was thought to be the height of vulgarity, and refinement was held to be inseparable from leanness and consumption. These views still obtain—so it is said—in Boston, and especially in Bostonian literary circles; but elsewhere the American woman is growing plump and healthy, and is actually proud of it. While wise men are heartily glad of this change in female sentiment and tissue, it must be admitted that there is one form of feminine fragility which has its value. There is a rare condition of the bony system in which the bones are so fragile that the slightest blow is sufficient to break them. A baby thus afflicted cannot be handled, even by the most experienced mother, without danger; and a man with fragile bones is so liable to be broken, that there is sometimes no safety for him outside of a glass case. The late Mrs. Baker—for that was her latest name—was not so fragile that she could not be handled by a careful man, but still a very light blow would usually break her. She did not share the Bostonian opinion of the vulgarity of strength, but she was, nevertheless, very proud of her fragility, and by its aid her husband managed to amass a comfortable fortune within three years after their marriage. She is perhaps the only fragile woman on record of whom it can be said that her whole value consisted in her fragility, but, as her story shows, her fragility was the sole capital invested in her husband’s business. In January, 1870, Mrs. Baker—then a single woman, as to whose maiden name there is some uncertainty—was married to Mr. Wheelwright—James G. Wheelwright, of Worcester, Mass. Her husband married her on account of her well-known fragility, but he treated her with such kindness that in the whole course of their married life he never once broke her, even by accident. In February, 1870, the Wheelwrights removed to Utica, N.Y., and one day Mr. Wheelwright took his wife to the railway station, and had her break her leg in a small hole on the platform. He at once sued the railway company for 10,000 dols., being the value set by himself on his wife’s leg, and ten days afterwards accepted 5,000 dols. as a compromise, and withdrew the suit The Wheelwrights left Utica in June, 1870, and in the following August the dutiful Mrs. Wheelwright, who now called herself Mrs. Thomas, broke her other leg in a hole in the platform of the railway station at Pittsburg. Again her husband sued the railway company for 15,000 dols., and compromised for 6,500 dols. The leg was mended successfully, and in July, 1871, we find the Thomases, now passing under the name of Mr. and Mrs. Smiley, at Cincinnati, where Mr. Smiley, after long searching, discovered a piece of ragged and uneven sidewalk, upon which his wife made a point of falling and breaking her right arm. This time the city was sued for 15,000 dols., and Mr. Smiley proved that his wife was a school teacher by profession, and that the breaking of her arm rendered it impossible for her to teach, for there as on that she could not wield a rod or even a slipper. The city paid the 15,000 dols. and the Smileys, having by honest industry thus made 26,500 dols., removed to Chicago, and entered their names on the hotel register as Mr. and Mrs. McGinnis, of Portland, Me. On the second day after their arrival at the hotel, Mr. McGinnis found an eligible place on the piazza for Mrs. McGinnis to break another leg, which that excellent woman promptly did. The usual suit of 15,000 dols. was brought, and the hotel-keeper, fearing that the notoriety of the suit would injure his hotel, was glad to compromise by paying 8,000 dols. By this time, it is understood, Mrs. McGinnis was willing to retire from business, but her husband had set his heart on making 50,000 dols., and like a good wife she consented to break some more bones. It should be said that there was very little pain attending a fracture of any one of the lady’s bones, and that she did not in the least mind the monotony of lying in bed while the broken bones knitted themselves together. There can, therefore, be no charge of cruelty brought against her husband. Indeed, she herself entered with a hearty goodwill into the scheme of making a living with her bones, and would go out to break a leg with as much cheerfulness as if she was going to a theatre. In March, 1872, Mrs. Wilkins—hitherto known as Mr. McGinnis—walked into an open trench in a street in St. Louis and broke another leg. This time the suit brought by Mr. Wilkins against the city did not succeed, and the inquiries which were put on foot as to the antecedents of the Wilkinses fairly frightened them out of the city. They turned up a month later in Detroit, where the weather was still cold, and much snow had recently fallen. There were still 16,000 dollars to be made before the industrious pair would have the whole of their desired 50,000 dollars, and it was decided that Mrs. Wilkins—who had changed her name to Mrs. Baker—should fall on the icy pavement and break both arms. This, it was estimated, would be worth at least 8,000 dols., and it was hoped that the subsequent judicious breakage of two legs on the premises of a Canadian railway would bring in 8,000 dols. more, after which the Bakers intended to retire from business. Early one morning Mr. Baker took his wife out and had her fall on a nice piece of ice, where she broke both arms. Unfortunately, she fell more heavily than was necessary, and, in addition, broke her neck and instantly expired. The grief of Mr. Baker naturally knew no bounds, and he sued for 25,000 dols., all of which he recovered. He had thus made 59,500 dols. by the aid of his fragile wife, and demonstrated that as a source of steady income a woman who breaks easily is almost priceless. Still, nothing could console him for the loss of his beloved partner, and he is to-day a lonely and unhappy man.

—_New York Times_.

TAKING HIM DOWN A PEG.

A guard of a railway train, upon the late occasion of a _hitch_, which detained the passengers for some time, gave himself so much importance in commanding them, that one old gentleman took the wind out of his sails by calling him to the carriage door, and saying, “May I take the liberty, sir, of asking you what occupation you filled previous to being a railway guard?”

A REMARKABLE NOTICE.

On a certain railway, the following notice appeared:—“Hereafter, when trains moving in opposite directions are approaching each other on separate lines, conductors and engineers will be required to bring their respective trains to a dead halt before the point of meeting, and be very careful not to proceed till each train has passed the other.”

FLUTTER CAUSED BY THE MURDER OF MR. BRIGGS.

My vocations led me to travel almost daily on one of the Great Eastern lines—the Woodford Branch. Every one knows that Müller perpetrated his detestable act on the North London Railway, close by. The English middle class, of which I am myself a feeble unit, travel on the Woodford branch in large numbers. Well, the demoralization of our class,—which (the newspapers are constantly saying it, so I may repeat it without vanity) has done all the great things which have ever been done in England,—the demoralization of our class caused, I say, by the Bow tragedy, was something bewildering. Myself a transcendentalist (as the _Saturday Review_ knows), I escaped the infection; and day after day I used to ply my agitated fellow-travellers with all the consolations which my transcendentalism and my turn for French would naturally suggest to me. I reminded them how Julius Cæsar refused to take precautions against assassination, because life was not worth having at the price of an ignoble solicitude for it. I reminded them what insignificant atoms we all are in the life of the world. Suppose the worse to happen, I said, addressing a portly jeweller from Cheapside,—suppose even yourself to be the victim, _il n’y a pas d’homme nécessaire_. We should miss you for a day or two on the Woodford Branch; but the great mundane movement would still go on, the gravel walks of your villa would still be rolled, dividends would still be paid at the bank, omnibuses would still run, there would still be the old crush at the corner of Fenchurch street. All was of no avail. Nothing could moderate in the bosom of the great English middle class their passionate, absorbing, almost blood-thirsty clinging to life.

—Matthew Arnold’s _Essays in Criticism_.

AN EXTRAORDINARY BLUNDER.

A correspondent, writing from Amélia les Bains, says:—A very singular blunder was committed the other day by the officials of a railway station between Prepignan and Toulon. A gentleman who had been spending the winter here with his family, left last week for Marseilles, taking with him the body of his mother-in-law, who died six weeks ago, and who had expressed a wish to be buried in the family vault at Marseilles. When he reached Marseilles and went with the commissioner of police—whose presence is required upon these occasions—to receive the body from the railway officials, he noticed to his great surprise that the coffin was of a different shape and construction from that which he had brought from here. It turned out upon further inquiry that a mistake had been committed by the officials, who had sent on to Toulon the coffin containing his mother-in-law’s body, believing that it held the remains of a deceased admiral, which was to be embarked for interment in Algeria, while the coffin awaiting delivery was the one which should have been sent on. The gentleman who was placed in this awkward predicament, having requested the railway officials to communicate at once with Toulon by telegraph, proceeded thither himself with the coffin of the admiral, but the intimation had arrived too late. He ascertained when he got there that the first coffin had been duly received, taken on board, amid “the thunder of fort and of fleet,” the state vessel which was waiting for it, and despatched to Algeria. He at once called upon the maritime prefect of Toulon, and explained the circumstances of the case, but though a despatch-boat was sent in pursuit, the other vessel was not overtaken. He is now at Toulon awaiting her return, and I believe that he declines to give up the coffin containing the deceased admiral until he regains possession of his mother-in-law’s remains.

A CURIOUS RACE.

In July, 1877, a carrier-pigeon tried conclusions with a railway train. The bird was a Belgian voyageur, bred at Woolwich, and “homed” to a house in Cannon Street, City. The train was the Continental mail-express timed not to stop between Dover and Cannon Street Station. The pigeon, conveying an urgent message from the French police, was tossed through the railway carriage window as the train moved from the Admiralty Pier, the wind being west, the atmosphere hazy, but the sun shining. For more than a minute the bird circled round till it attained an altitude of about half-a-mile, and then it sailed away Londonwards. By this time the engine had got full steam on, and the train was tearing away at the rate of sixty miles an hour; but the carrier was more than a match for it. Taking a line midway between Maidstone and Sittingbourne, it reached home twenty minutes before the express dashed into the station; the train having accomplished seventy-six-and-a-half miles to the pigeon’s seventy, but being badly beaten for all that.

—_All the Year Round_.

A GREENLANDER’S FIRST RAILWAY RIDE.

Hans Hendrik, a native of Greenland, thus describes his first journey by rail in America:—“Then our train arrived and we took seats in it. When we had started and looked at the ground, it appeared like a river, making us dizzy, and the trembling of the carriage might give you headache. In this way we proceeded, and whenever we approached houses they gave warning by making big whistle sound, and on arriving at the houses they rung a bell and we stopped for a little while. By the way we entered a long cave through the earth, used as a road, and soon after we emerged from it again. At length we reached our goal, and entered a large mansion, in which numbers of people crowded together.” He likens the people going out of the railway-station to a “crowd of church-goers, on account of their number.”

—_Good Words_, April, 1880.

A NOVEL ACTION.

Will bad table manners vitiate legal grounds of action? A collision recently occurred while an Italian commercial traveller was eating a Bologna sausage in a railway train. The shock of the collision drove the knife so violently against his mouth as to widen it. He brought suit for damages. The defence was that the injuries were caused by the knife; that the knife should never be carried to the mouth, and that the plaintiff, having injured himself by reason of his bad habit of eating, must take the consequences and pay his own doctor’s bill. The case is not yet finally decided.

—_Echo_, Oct. 1st., 1880.

A KISS IN THE DARK.

On one of the seats in a railway train was a married lady with a little daughter; opposite, facing them, was another child, a son, and a coloured “lady” with a baby. The mother of these children was a beautiful matron with sparkling eyes, in exuberant health and vivacious spirits. Near her sat a young lieutenant, dressed to kill and seeking a victim. He scraped up an acquaintance with the mother by attentions to the children. It was not long before he was essaying to make himself very agreeable to her, and by the time the sun began to decline, one would have thought they were old familiar friends. The lieutenant felt that he had made an impression—his elation manifested it. The lady, dreaming of no wrong, suspecting no evil, was apparently pleased with her casual acquaintance. By-and-by the train approached a tunnel. The gay lieutenant leaned over and whispered something in the lady’s ear. It was noticed that she appeared as thunderstruck, and her eyes immediately flamed with indignation. A moment more and a smile lighted up her features. What changes? That smile was not one of pleasure, but was sinister. It was unperceived by the lieutenant. She made him a reply which apparently rejoiced him very much. For the understanding properly this narrative, we must tell the reader what was whispered and what was replied. “I mean to kiss you when we get into the tunnel!” whispered the lieutenant. “It will be dark; who will see it?” replied the lady. Into earth’s bowels—into the tunnel ran the train. Lady and coloured nurse quickly change seats. Gay lieutenant threw his arms around the lady sable, pressed her cheek to his, and fast and furious rained kisses on her lips. In a few moments the train came out into broad daylight. White lady looked amazed—coloured lady, bashful, blushing—gay lieutenant befogged. “Jane,” said the white lady, “what have you been doing?” “Nothing!” responded the coloured lady. “Yes, you have,” said the white lady, not in an undertone, but in a voice that attracted the attention of all in the carriage. “See how your collar is rumpled and your bonnet smashed.” Jane, poor coloured beauty, hung her head for a moment, the “observed of all observers,” and then, turning round to the lieutenant, replied: “_This man kissed me in the tunnel_!” Loud and long was the laugh that followed among the passengers. The white lady enjoyed the joke amazingly. Lieutenant looked like a sheep-stealing dog, left the carriage at the next station, and was seen no more.

—_Cape Argus_.

THE GRAVEDIGGER’S SUGGESTION.

The Midland Railway, on being extended to London, was the occasion of the removal of a vast amount of house property, also it interfered to a certain extent with the graveyard belonging to Old St. Pancras Church. The company had purchased a new piece of ground in which to re-inter the human remains discovered in the part they required. Amongst them was the corpse of a high dignitary of the French Romish Church. Orders were received for the transmission of the remains to his native land, and the delicate work of exhuming the corpse was entrusted to some clever gravediggers. On opening the ground they were surprised to find, not bones of one man, but of several. Three skulls and three sets of bones were yielded by the soil in which they had lain mouldering. The difficulty was how to identify the bones of a French ecclesiastic amid so many. After much discussion, the shrewdest gravedigger suggested that, being a Frenchman, the darkest coloured skull must be his. Acting upon this idea, the blackest bones were sorted and put together, until the requisite number of rights and lefts were obtained. These were reverently screwed up in a new coffin, conveyed to France, and buried with all the pomp and circumstance of the Roman Catholic Church.

AN AMUSING INCIDENT.

An American correspondent writes:—“I have just finished reading a most amusing incident, and, as it occurs in a book not likely to fall into the hands of many of the members, I am tempted to relate it, although it might prove to be ‘stale.’ Well, to begin: It tells of a maiden lady, who, having arrived at the mature age of 51 without ever having seen a railway train, decides to visit New York. The all-important day having arrived, she seats herself calmly on the platform of the country station, and gazes with amazement as the train draws up, takes on its passengers, and pursues its journey. As she stares after it the stationmaster asks her why she did not get on if she wishes to go to New York. ‘Get on,’ says Miss Polly, in surprise, ‘get on! Why, bless me, if I didn’t think this whole concern went!’ Being placed on the next train, she proceeds on her way, when, finally, having seen so many wonderful things, she concluded not to be astonished, whatever may happen. A collision occurs and the gentleman next to her is thrown to the end of the car among a heap of broken seats. She supposes it to be the usual manner of stopping, and quietly remarks: ‘Ye fetch up rather sudden, don’t ye?’”

A LITTLE BOY’S COOLNESS.

The suit of William O’Connor against the Boston and Lowell Railroad at Lawrence has resulted in a verdict for the plaintiff in $10,000, one-half the amount sued for. This suit grew out of an accident which occurred August 27th, 1880. The plaintiff was the father of a child then between five and six years old. He and his brother, three years older, were crossing a private way maintained by the railroad for the Essex Company, and the younger boy, while walking backward, stepped between the rail and planking of the roadway inside and was unable to extricate his foot. At that moment the whistle of a train was heard within a few hundred feet and out of sight around a curve, and it appeared from the evidence that the older brother, finding himself unable to relieve his brother, ran down the track toward the train; but finding that he could not attract the attention of the trainmen to his brother’s condition, and that he must be run over, ran back to him, and, telling him to lie down, pulled him outward and down and held him there until the train had passed. Both feet of the little fellow were cut off or mangled so that amputation was necessary. The theory of the defence was that the boy was not caught, but while running across the track, fell and was run over. But the testimony of the older brother was unshaken in every particular. It would be difficult to match the nerve, thoughtfulness, and disregard of self displayed by this boy, who at that time was less than nine years old.

PHOTOGRAPHING AN EXPRESS TRAIN.

An interesting application of the instantaneous method of photography was recently made by a firm of photographers at Henley-on-Thames. These artists were successful in photographing the Great Western Railway express train familiarly known as the “Flying Dutchman,” while running through Twyford station at a speed of nearly sixty miles an hour. The definition of this lightning-like picture is truly wonderful, the details of the mechanism on the flying locomotive standing out as sharply as the immovable telegraph posts and palings beside the line. The photographers are now engaged, we believe, in constructing a swift shutter for their camera which will reduce the period of exposure of the photographic plate to 1-500th of a second. The same artists have also executed some charming pictures of the upper Thames, with floating swans and moving boats, which cannot but win the admiration of artists and all lovers of the picturesque.

—_Cassell’s Family Magazine_, Nov. 1880.

NERVOUSNESS.

Surely people are far more _nervous_ now than they used to be some generations back. The mental cultivation and the mental wear which we have to go through tends to make that strange and inexplicable portion of our physical construction a very great deal too sensitive for the work and trial of daily life. A few days ago I drove a friend who had been paying us a visit over to our railway station. He is a man of fifty, a remarkably able and accomplished man. Before the train started, the guard came round to look at the tickets. My friend could not find his; he searched his pockets everywhere, and although the entire evil consequence, had the ticket not turned up, could not possibly have been more than the payment a second time of four or five shillings, he got into a nervous tremor painful to see. He shook from head to foot; his hand trembled so that he could not prosecute his search rightly, and finally he found the missing ticket in a pocket which he had already searched half-a-dozen times. Now contrast the condition of this highly-civilized man, thrown into a painful flurry and confusion at the demand of a railway ticket, with the impassive coolness of a savage, who would not move a muscle if you hacked him in pieces.

—_Fraser’s Magazine_.

A PROFITABLE RAILWAY.

The shortest and most profitable railway in the world is probably to be seen at Coney Island, the famous suburban summer resort of New York. This is the “Marine Railway,” which connects the Manhattan Beach Hotel and the Brighton Beach Hotel. It is 2,000 feet in length, is laid with steel rails, and has a handsome little station at each end. Its equipment consists of two locomotives and four cars, open at the sides, and having reversible seats; and a train of two cars is run each way every five minutes. The cost of this miniature road, including stations and equipment, was 27,000 dols., and it paid for itself in a few weeks after it was opened for business. The operating expenses are 30 dols. a day, and the average receipts are 450 dols. a day the entire season, 900 dols. being sometime taken in. The fare charged is five cents. The property paid a profit last year of 500 dols. per cent on its cost.

THE POLITE BRAHMIN.

Owing to the various dialects in the South of India, as a matter of convenience the English language is much used for personal communication by the natives of different parts of the Presidency of Madras. Mr. Edward Lear, who has travelled much in that part of the country, gives the following interesting account of a journey:—“I was in a second-class railway carriage going from Madras to Bangalore. There was only one other passenger beside myself and servant, and he was a Brahmin, dressed all in white, with the string worn over the shoulder, by which you may always recognise a Brahmin. He had a great many boxes and small articles, which took up a great deal of room in the compartment, and when at the next station the door was opened for another passenger to get in, the guard said:—

“‘You cannot have all those boxes inside the carriage; some of them must be taken out.’

“‘Oh, sir,’ said the Brahmin in good English, ‘I assure you these articles are by no means necessary to my comfort, and I hope you will not hesitate to dispose of them as you please.’

“Accordingly, therefore, the boxes were taken away. Then the newcomer stepped in; he was also a native, but dressed in quite a different manner from the Brahmin, his clothing being blue, green, red, and all the colours of the rainbow, so that one saw at once the two persons were from different parts of India. Presently he surprised me by saying to the Brahmin,

“‘Pray, sir, excuse me for having given you the trouble of removing any part of your luggage; I am really quite sorry to have given you any inconvenience whatever.’

“To which the Brahmin replied, ‘I beg sir, you will make no apologies; it is impossible you can have incommoded me by causing the removal of those trifling articles; and, even if you have done so, the pleasure of your society would afford me perfect compensation.’”

MR. FRANK BUCKLAND AND HIS BOOTS.

Mr. Spencer Walpole furnishes some interesting and amusing gossip about the late Mr. Frank Buckland, describing some of his many eccentricities, and telling many stories relative to his peculiar habits. He had, it seems, a great objection to stockings and boots and coats, his favourite attire consisting of nothing else than trousers and a flannel shirt. Boots were his special aversion, and he never lost an opportunity of kicking them off his feet.

“On one occasion,” we are told, “travelling alone in a railway carriage, he fell asleep with his feet resting on the window-sill. As usual, he kicked off his boots, and they fell outside the carriage on the line. When he reached his destination the boots could not, of course, be found, and he had to go without them to his hotel. The next morning a platelayer, examining the permanent way, came upon the boots, and reported to the traffic manager that he had found a pair of gentleman’s boots, but that he could not find the gentleman. Some one connected with the railway recollected that Mr. Buckland had been seen in the neighbourhood, and, knowing his eccentricities, inferred that the boots must belong to him. They were accordingly sent to the Home Office, and were at once claimed.”

DRINKING FROM THE WRONG BOTTLE.

An incident has occurred on one of the suburban lines which will certainly be supposed by many to be only _ben trovato_, but it is a real fact. A lady, who seemed perfectly well before the train entered a tunnel, suddenly alarmed her fellow-passengers during the temporary darkness by exclaiming, “I am poisoned!” On re-emerging into daylight, an awkward explanation ensued. The lady carried with her two bottles, one of methylated spirit, the other of cognac. Wishing, presumably, for a refresher on the sly, she took advantage of the gloom; but she applied the wrong bottle to her lips. Time pressed, and she took a good drain. The consequence was she was nearly poisoned, and had to apply herself honestly and openly to the brandy bottle as a corrective, amidst the ironical condolence of the passengers she had previously alarmed.

—_Once a Week_.

HORSES VERSUS RAILWAYS.

A horse for every mile of road was the allowance made by the best coachmasters on the great routes. On the corresponding portions of the railway system the great companies have put a locomotive engine per mile. If a horse earned a hundred guineas a year, out of which his cost had to be defrayed, he did well. A single locomotive on the Great Northern Railway (and that company has 611 engines for 659 miles of line) was stated by John Robinson, in 1873, to perform the work of 678 horses—work, that is, as measured by resistance overcome; for the horses, whatever their number, could not have reached the speed of fifty miles an hour, at which the engines in questions whirled along a train of sixteen carriages, weighing in all 225 tons. There are now upwards of 13,000 locomotives at work in the United Kingdom, each of them earning on the average, £4,750 per annum. But we have at the same time more horses employed for the conveyance of passengers than we had in 1835. In omnibus and station work—waiting upon the steam horse—there is more demand for horseflesh than was made by our entire coaching system in 1835.

A SLIGHT MISTAKE.

An Irish newspaper is responsible for the following:—“A deaf man named Taff was run down and killed by a passenger train on Wednesday morning. He was injured in a similar way about a year ago.”

EXPENSIVE CONTRACTS.

An interesting glimpse into the inner working of State, and especially Russian, Government railways was afforded in a recent discussion on railway management in Russia, published by the _Journal_ of the German Railroad Union. During this debate it appears that the details were published of the famous contract of the late American Winans with the Government concerning the Nicholas Railroad. By the use of considerable money, Winans succeeded in making a contract, to extend from July 1st, 1866, for eight years, by which the Government was to pay him for oiling cars and small car repairs at an agreed rate per passenger and per ton mile. In addition to this he received a fixed sum of about £15,000 (78,000 dols.) per year for painting and maintaining the interior of the passenger cars; £6,000 for keeping up the shops, and finally £8,000 yearly for renewing what rolling stock might be worn out. The St. Nicholas line was eventually taken over by the Great Russian Company, which in 1872 succeeded in making the Government annul the contract by paying Winans a penalty of £750,000, which the Great Russian Company paid back with interest within four years. If the contract had been continued it would have cost the company more than one-third of its net earnings, since the saving amounts to nearly £523,000 per annum. Another contract which the Government had made for the same road with a sleeping-car company was settled shortly afterward by the Government taking from the company the few cars it had on hand, and paying £75,000 for them and £10,000 a year for the unexpired seven years of the contract.

MR. BRASSEY’S STRICT ADHERENCE TO HIS WORD.

The following is one of such stories, illustrative of one phase of Mr. Brassey’s character—his strict adherence to his word, under all circumstances.

When the “Sambre and Meuse” was drawing towards completion, Mr. Brassey came along as usual with a staff of agents inspecting the progress of the work. Stopping at Olloy, a small place between Mariembourg and Vireux, near a large blacksmith’s shop, the man, a Frenchman or Belgian, came out, and standing up on the bank, with much gesticulation and flourish, proceeded to make Mr. Brassey a grand oration. Anxious to proceed, Mr. Brassey paid him no particular attention, but good naturedly endeavoured to cut the matter short, with “Oui, oui, oui,” and at length got away, the Frenchman apparently expressing great delight.

“Well, gentlemen, what are you laughing at, what is the joke?” said he to his staff as they went along.

“Why, sir, do you know what that fellow said, and for what he was asking?”

“No, indeed, I don’t; I supposed he was complimenting me in some way, or thanking me for something.”

“He _was_ complimenting you, sir, to some tune, and asking, as a souvenir of his happy engagement under the Great Brassey, that you would of your goodness make him a present of the shop, iron, tools, and all belonging!”

“Did he, though! I did not understand that.”

“No sir, but you kept on saying, ‘Oui, oui, oui,’ and the fellow’s delighted, as he well may be, they’re worth £50 or £60.”

“Oh, but I didn’t mean that, I didn’t mean that. Well, never mind, if I said it, he must _have_ them.”

It must be borne in mind, that at that time, at best, Mr. Brassey knew very little French, and his staff were well aware of the fact.”

Sep. 13, 1872.

S. S.

EXTRAORDINARY ACCIDENT.

In a leading article in the _Birmingham Post_, Nov. 12th, 1880, the writer remarks:—“The report of Major Marindin on the collision which took place between two Midland trains, in Leicestershire, about a month ago, has just been published, but it adds nothing to the information given at the time when the accident happened. The case was, as the report says, one of a remarkable, if not unprecedented nature, for the collision arose from a passenger train running backwards instead of forwards nearly half-a-mile, without either driver or stoker noticing that its movement was in the wrong direction. Shortly after the train had passed the village station of Kibworth, where it was not timed to stop, the driver observed a knocking sound on his engine. He pulled up the train in order to ascertain the cause of this, and finding that nothing serious was the matter, proceeded on his journey again, or rather intended to do so, for, by an extraordinary mistake, he turned the screw the wrong way, so as to reverse the action of the engine, and to direct the train back to Kibworth. There, a mineral train was making its way towards Leicester, and as the line was on a sharp incline the result might have been a most destructive collision. It was, however, reduced to one of a comparatively mild description by the promptness and efficiency with which the brakes were applied to both the trains. Had not the mineral train been pulled up, and the passenger train lowered from a speed of twenty to three or four miles an hour, probably the whole of the passengers would have been crushed between the two engines. The passengers, therefore, owed their safety to the excellent brake-power which was at command. The excuse offered by the driver of the passenger train for turning the engine backwards was the shape of the reversing screw, which was of a construction not commonly used on the Midland line, though many of the company’s engines were so fitted. The fireman had also his apology for making the same oversight. He said he was at the time stooping down to adjust the injector. Major Marindin, though admitting that the men were experienced, careful, and sober, refuses to accept either of these excuses; but he can supply no better reason himself for the amazing oversight they committed. The only satisfactory part of the report is that in which the working of the brake mechanism is spoken of. The passenger train had the Westinghouse brake fitted to all the carriages, and such was its efficiency that, had it extended to the engine and tender as well, Major Marindin believes the accident would have been entirely prevented.”

REMARKABLE MEMORY FOR SOUNDS.

Among strange mental feats the strangest perhaps yet recorded are the following singular feats of memory for sound, related in the _Scientific American_. In the city of Rochester, N. Y., resides a boy named Hicks, who, though he has only lately removed from Buffalo to Rochester, has already learned to distinguish three hundred locomotive engines by the sound of their bells. During the day the boy is employed so far from the railway that he seldom hears a passing train; but at night he can hear every train, his house being near the railroad. To give an idea of his wonderful memory for sounds (and his scarcely less wonderful memory for numbers also) take the following cases. Not long ago young Hicks went to Syracuse, and while there, he, hearing an engine coming out of the round-house, remarked to a friend that he knew the bell, though he had not heard it for five years: he gave the number of the engine, which proved to be correct. Again, not long since, an old switch-engine, used in the yards at Buffalo, was sent to Rochester for some special purpose. It passed near Hicks’ house, and he remarked that the engine was number so and so, and that he had not heard the bell for six years. A boarder in the house ran to the railroad, and found the number given by Hicks was the correct one. To most persons the bells on American locomotives seem all much alike in sound and _timbre_, though, of course, a good ear will readily distinguish differences, especially between bells which are sounded within a short interval of time. But that anyone should be able in the first place to discriminate between two or three hundred of these bells, and in the second place to retain the recollection of the slight peculiarities characterising each for several years, would seem altogether incredible, had we not other instances—such as Bidder’s and Colburn’s calculating feats, Morphy’s blindfold chess-play, etc.—of the amazing degree in which one brain may surpass all others in some special quality, though perhaps, in other respects, not exceptionally powerful, or even relatively deficient.

—_Gentleman’s Magazine_, March 1880.

A DISINGENUOUS BISHOP.

Max. O’Rell, the French author, in his book _John Bull at Home_, writes English people are very great on words; lying is unknown. I was travelling by rail one day with an English bishop. There were five in our compartment. On arriving at a station we heard a cry, “Five minutes here!” My lord bishop, with the greatest haste, set to work to spread out travelling-bag, hat-box, rug, papers, &c. A lady appeared at the door, and asked, “Is there room here?” “Madam,” replied the bishop, “all the seats are full.” When the poor lady had been sent about her business, we called his lordship’s attention to the fact that there were only five of us in the carriage, and that, consequently all the seats were not taken. “I did not say that they were,” answered my lord; “I said that they were _full_.”

DROPPING THE LETTER “L.”

In an advertisement by a railway company of some unclaimed goods, the “l” dropped from the word “lawful,” and it reads now, “People to whom these packages are directed are requested to come forward and pay the _awful_ charges on the same.”

THE SAFEST SEAT IN A RAILWAY CARRIAGE.

The _American Engineer_, as the result of scientific calculations and protracted experience, says the safest seat is in the middle of the last car but one. There are some chances of danger, which are the same everywhere in the train, but others are least at the above-named place.

RAILWAYS A JUDGMENT.

In _White’s Warfare of Science_ there is an account of a worthy French Archbishop who declared that railways were an evidence of the divine displeasure against innkeepers, inasmuch that they would be punished for supplying meat on fast days by seeing travellers carried by them past their doors.

CLAIM FOR GOODWILL FOR COW KILLED ON THE RAILWAY.

A farmer living near the New York Central lost a cow by a collision with a train on the line; anxious for compensation he waited upon the manager and after stating his case, the manager said, “I understand she was thin and sick.” “Makes no difference,” replied the farmer. “She was a cow, and I want pay for her.” “How much?” asked the manager. “Two hundred dollars!” replied the farmer. “Now look here,” said the manager, “how much did the cow weigh?” “About four hundred, I suppose,” said the farmer. “And we will say that beef is worth ten cents a pound on the hoof.” “It’s worth a heap more than that on the cow-catcher!” replied the indignant farmer. “But we’ll call it that, what then? That makes forty dollars, shall I give you a cheque for forty dollars?” “I tell you I want two hundred dollars,” persisted the farmer. “But how do you make the difference? I’m willing to pay full value, forty dollars. How do you make one hundred and sixty dollars?” “Well, sir,” replied the farmer, waxing wroth, “I want this railroad to understand that I’m going to have something special for the goodwill of that cow!”

THE INSURANCE AGENT.