The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1871-12-22
OHa Locomotive.

O1 - AAoNVAAWhAfOe
We never saw more graphic sketch
ofthe sensation of riding on an engine
than one contributed to the IIldcpe75-
dent, by the Rev. T. Dewitt Tai
madge, who tried the experiment
while jOurneyiDg in the Rocky
Mountains. He says:
MAY / get on with you?" / asked
an engineer On the Pacific Railroad.
at station six or seven thousand feet
above the level of the sea. Certain
ly,' ne said; Hbut hold tight, or you
may fall off,
''Toot. toOt." went the whistle. and
the long anaconda OF raii-train first
went crawling along the rocks, but
soon took on fearful momentum. Sit
ting in "Pullman's g Palace Carr look
ing out at the window, the passenger
gets no idea of the speed of the train ;
! but close by the engineer, and feeling
the nervous quiver and jump of the
iron cOurser, you see the mountains
skip like rams, and the little hills like
lambs"
The door of the locomotive furnace
clangs open and the flames rave as
though they would leap out to devOur,
and the fireman jars the coal into the
idALAlS Jaws VI lIlC IDODSJbi. he
engineer has his hand on the iron bit
that controls the speed, and seems to
use no moro exertiOn than a doctor
feeling the pulse of a child. Indeed
the locomotive, to the engineer, Is
not a machine, but animate. He
| talks to it, seems almost to pat it
lovingly on the neck. He is proud Of
it. There is q warm understanding
between the two, and in occasional
spurts of steam the locomotive seems
to take voice and answer its rider. An
engine never hurts its master, save i'll
the effort to throw the passengers.
But the engineer, sitting so placid,
is wide awake. He is kept on duty
four hours in the day, and all the en-
ergies of body and soul cluster in his
vigilant eye and quick thumb. Two
hundred lives hang on his wrist.
We plunge into the snoW-shed with
infinite clatteT, every board and beam
beating back the deafening roar Of
the Pacific Express. As We rush on,
the prairie-dogs skUlk into their holes,
or sit on their hind quarters, with
fore feet lifted, as much as to say,
"what next" The antelopes scamper
over the plain. We ride unimpeded,
where, less than two years ago, the
buffalOes stopped the train as the
herds scampered across the track; and
along here the savages careered on
their ponies. You see here and there
groups of Red men, with long hair,
and cheeks daubed with war paint,
ringed ears and suPerfiuity OF dirt
that buTies your last romantic notion
about the "nOble red men of the
forest" The air IS laden with the
breath of the cedar, madrOna, man
passing through what seem the ruins
of castles and temples and cities, and
calling up to mind Petra and POmpeii
and Nineveh and Thebes; but these
ruins on either side of our track must
have been VasteT abodes. where giants
might have lived till the Titans began
here to play leap frog; and turn SOM
ersault. Now the whistle lets off
wild scream; a COW and q calf are on
the track. The COW we cut into halves,
and the calf with broken legs tum-
bles into the ditch. ! wonder if that
man just ahead Will get off in time.
Perhaps he is deaf Perhaps he is
crazy aud wants to be run over.
Neither. In time to save himself, he
switches off and rObs the coroner.
Hold your breath! Ravinc thou
sand feet deep on this side! Embank-
ment q thousand feet up on the other!
AS we turn the curve the engineer
pulls the steam valve, and the silence
that reigned here for six thousand
years lets slip all its sounds of echo
and reverberation.
Hew! how we fly! If bolt break,
or truck fall, or rock dislOdge, we
are in eternity! lRnumerablc varieties
of flowers break their alabaster at the
foot Of the cliffs; but yondeT the noun
tain tops are blooming into the white
lily of everlasting snow. Bridges,
high, narrow, and tremendous, that
creak and tremble under the pressure
Of the train. A tunnel! InlI-blacl1,
midnight doubled, dampness that
never saw the sun; while far ahead is
a tint of sunlight peering through a
hole that looks about the size of the
arch of a mouse trap, but which
widens till at last it is large enough to
| let a whole train escape into the gOl
den day.
Out there is the old emigrant road,
with occasionally the skeleton of a
COW or horse, or the wreck of wagon
that hOpelessly broke down on the
way in the days gone by; and here &
mound, and a rough stone at the head
of ii, that show where some worn
traveller finished his Journey, in those
times when in one year across these
heights went five thousand wagons,
pulled by seven thousand yoke Of
oxen.
And now the night hegins to fall,
and the train goes ploWing through
the darkness. The great burning eye
of the locomotive peers through, and
flashes far ahead upon the wild scene.
The grizzly bear the panther, the
nighthawk, the cormOTant, the peli-
can, the grosbeck, the eagle, that
kept aloOf while the day shone, may
venture nearer now. if they dare. Oh,
how we fly. The rush OF the wind,
the iamming of the car-coupling, the
cIang of the wheels, the steam hiss,
the fierce shower of sparks that set
the night on fire, the shooting past Of
rocks five hundred feet high followed
by q precipice a thousand feet deep,
make the Breath short, and the very
heart thump, and the very scalp lift!
How the shadows shuttle. How
the crags shiver! How the echoes
rave! An. express train at night on
the Rocky Mountains. The irresisti-
! ble trampling the immOvable! Yet
! the way smOothed down by human
engineering. Then il will not be SO
( difficult tOprepare the way for grand
/ er- coming when the mountains SHALL
I be made low, and the crooked straight,
and the rough places plain, aud the
glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see il together.
Mr.. Spillman mad Just married a
/ second wife. On the day after the
Z wedding Mr.. SDiflinau remarked. 81