The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1876-11-18 00:00:00

EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURE; In
"RAILWAY TUNNEL:-

Between eight and nine o'clock on Monday night an
old man named James Jones, an inmate of St.Pancras
Workhouse bad a narrow escape from being crushed
to death by the passing trains on the Metropolitan
Underground Railway between King's-cross and
Gower-street stations. About midway in the tunnel
referred to is a small station where a pointsraan is kept
who has a powerful lantern which enables him to set
the points for particular trains. Shortly before nine
o'clock on Monday night this official, in the- perform-
ance of his duty, suddenly in the gloom saw
Jones tottering towards him in the tunnel. He
placed him in safety in his box. He found him
wet to the skin, from the water running down
the walla of the tunnel, against which it appears
he bad squeezed himself to escape the passing
trains. The King's-cross inspector being sent for,
Jones was got to the station. He was at once taken"
to St. Pancras Workhouse, -whenit was ascertained hp
bad formerly been it tradesman in a good Ws/ of bind,
ness for 16 years at Irongate Wharf, Paddington, and
had many friends there, but by miefortnne; had come
to the workhouse: On Monday he obtained special
leave from the workhouse to visit his friends at
Irongate Wharf, and booked from King's-cross and
back. On the „return journey ,a gentleman in the
s3l-119 compartment appeared -to takgesin intetest in
him, and aske4 where he was going just Aft* they
passed Gower-street Station, and on telling him he
was going to St. Pancras Workhouse he said,
you pugu, unv. sub ifIlL;11; brosver-et (Now is
netsspr," (which was a mistake); to teAching! the,
King's-cross Station, and getting out, the old man
mked the gentleman which was the' way to Gower=
street, and the latter, pointing the way of the tunnel
through which the train had just come, said, ".That
way." Jones went in that direction, and, finding there
was an incline leading under the arch,iwent down it,
anii although he found it getting darke—aild darker,
yet seeing wbat he thought were lightsin- the: distance,
he went on, as he knew there were railway arches in
the Pancras-road. As he went on, finding there were
trains running backward and forward, ,he became
bewildered, but, for safety, as far as possible crouched
along close to the wall of the tunnel, 'llnd. Ire-
quently had the greatest difficulty in escaping, as
he felt many of the trains touch him as they
rushed by. He believea that there must have been
as many as 200 trains pass and repass him during
the time he was in the tunnel; but this, of course,
is a mistake. Feeling, however, that his end was
certain, he said he prayed and sang to allay his feare.
although the perspiration rolled off him and he felt wet
to the skin. At the intervals when there was no train
coming he kept groping his way along, and when he
saw one advancing he screwed himself up as close to
the wall as possible. He did not know where he was
going, but presently' he saw a man.with a lantern, and
he felt his deliverance was at hand. Her hastened
towards the man with all the speed his feeble and ex-
hausted state allowed, and fortunately, at the same
time the man saw him. He was perfectly sober, and
could not account for getting into the tunnel except
that he took it for a railway arch leading to Gower-
street, and he was wholly unacquainted with the rail-
way stations.

THE BISHOP OF CHICHESTERFON
TEMPER/1110E.
The Bishop of Chichester, speaking at a meeting
held at the Dome, Brighton' on Monday evening, in
connection with the Church of England Temperante
Society, remarked that he had often had occasionlY
fill the chair at meetings of that kind, but he had
seldom seen a meeting which appeared to him to
embrace to such an extent the very classes they most
desired to attract to the temperance cane& He
spoke of them as the classes they desired •to
attract, because it was very certain that in-
temperance had been to a very great degree
banished from the upper classes .of English
society, but yet had a firm and desperate hyld-upon_a.
very large amount of our population. Thêj ciculd not
but regard this as a stain and disgrace to our common
ccuntry. They saw the evils which intemperance was
continually producing, and while they were not at all
prepared to say there was no sin or no vice more fatal
than intemperance, yet they did assert that intemper-
ance snapped the very vitals of the nation, and made
us to Europe the spectacle of a sin of which .we ought to
be as a nation most heartily ashamed. Heregarded this
as a deplorahle state of things, and all the more because
they -saw that as the wages of the labouring classes
had very greatly increas“l—and very deservedly so be-
cause every one would wish that the labourer should be
paid according to the amountof the work he performed—
their families had not benefited in an equal degree. Zbey
might well organise themselves and attempt to do squad-
thing to stem the evil, and he thought that the
Church wisely established this matter on the'breadest
possible foundations. She would not repudiate any
help which might assist her in the warfare she had
to carry out ; she welCoined cheerfully the tptal
abstainer; but she was not prepared at any rate to
reject there who were not total abstainers. Ile was
not himself a total abstainer, but he had all his life
lot g persevered in a moderate use of fermented
liquors. He made this avowal because he thought they
should understand what his principles were. He looked
with the greatest respect upon the total abstainer—
he believed that in many cases his remedy was the
only remedy for the degraded and apparently hopeless
drunkard (applause), but he was not prepared, and he
did not believe this enlightened country was prepared,
to make all men and women in the country total ab-
stainers by act of parliament or any other legislative
device whatsoever. (Cheers). He believed any such
attempt would be greatly injurious to their cause, be-
cause it would do away with that opinion of their
moderation which was essential to all progress in this
land, where men weigh prir &pies and measures calmly
and deliberately. They would not have in that dam,
he thought the enlightened and reasonable part of our
legislators with them. (Loud applause).