Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1862-01-13
&c. Look out for the heavy grades" he re-

&c Look out for the heavy grades" he re.
piled, and went inside of the car
"The next six miles rose gradually from
level, the frst, to ten and half feet grade
the last, which lay between us and the next
station. My fireman kept her full; and now
she began to get hot The furnace door was
red, and the steam raised continually; so that
she kept her speed, and passed the station like
streak Of lightning in FIVE minutes
Now came nine miles like the last; over
which she kept pace with her time, and passed
the station in seven minutes.
" Here, for ten miles, we had twenty foot
grade to encounter; but the worst of it all was,
at this place we would be obliged to stop for
wood was just going to speak to Roberts
about it, when / looked around and saw him
filling the tender from the coach, with wood
which had been placed there before starting,
while he was gone after me. arT
/" believe he would have made his ten miles
at the same speed as before; but through the
carelessness of the fireman the fountain valve
on the left hand side Of the engine got ope n -,
and the water rose in the boiler. so far as to
run the steam down to one hundred pounds,
before l discovered where the difficulty Law.
cat first Roberts didn't appear to notice the
decrease of speed, and kept at work at the
wood as if for dear life. But presently he
looked up, and seeing that the speed had de-
creased, he shouted
said:
Why, here we have been ten minutes on
the last ten miles, and believe we will come
to dead stand if something is not done The
speed is continually slackening. What is the
matter?"
81 explained the cause. He was apparent
having tied down the safety-valve, he climbed
oack over the tender exhorting me to put her
through for Gods sake, or W. are beggars to-
gether
just then we passed the next station, hay.
ing taken nine minutes for eight miles We
were now more than half over the road, and
we had lost nearly ten minutes time, and had
telt only tWenty-seven minutes to do thirty
four miles in
I" had shut the water off from nv pumps
little back, when discovered what was the
matter, and she was now making steam finely
down a slight grade. From less than one hum
dred, with which We started over the ten mile
stretch, she had two hundred before we finished
II; and as the gage indicated no higher than that
ana he valve was tied down, could not tell
now much over two hundred pounds she carried:
but she certainly carried none less the rest of
the journey. And well might she carry such
an enormous head of steam; for after passing
over that ten miles in eight minutes, there lay
ten miles OF i've feet up grade, and fourteen
miles stwenty-to-the-mile depression betw cen
US and C, and it was now eleven O'Clock
and forty-seven minutes
Now the engine was hot in earnest. The
furnace door, smOke-arch, and chimney, all
were red, while she seemed to fy onward as if
the very evil one himself operated her ma
chinery.
Six minutes carried us over that ten miles
and we darted by the last station that had lain
between US and c.. Now we had fourteen
miles to go, and my time showed ii O'Clock
and htty-three minutes.
IF live said J IN ,c,ysoIf sI will make
it, and We plunged down the twenty feet gtaddes
with all steam on. Persons who saw the train
on that wild run say that it was soon after they
heard the first sound of her approach, when
the strange object, which looked as if it was a
flame Of fire, darted by, and then the sound Of
its travelling died away in the distance, that
they could hardly convince themselves that
they had seen anything. 1t seemed more like
a creature Of a wild dream than sober reality
"And new let me tell you that no engineer
never beat the time that we made on those
fourteen miles. Those great wheels, eleven
feet in diameter, spun around so swiftly that
you could not begin to count the revolutions
The engine barely seemed to touch the track
as she few along, and although the track was
as true as it could be, she swayed fearfully
and sometimes made such prodigious jolts that
it required some skill for enc to keep bis feet
No engine could hold together if crowded to a
greater speed.
"Well, just as came to a stand at the depot
in C., the big clock doomed out twelve, and
the steamboat was getting her steam on. Rob-
erts got on board in time, and nothing to spare.
"And he saved the money, did he? asked,
when 1 saw that my friend had finished his
story.
"Yes! he found it hid away In some old
boxes, as Aldrich had Indicated
" If you are passenger for c." said q
waiter, "the bus is ready
So 1 thanked my friend for his story and
bade him good bye.-Litsrdry Emporium.