Prescott journal. [volume] (Prescott, Wis.) 1861-1871, 1871-02-22
MARK Tw AIN.
The Danger of Lying I'm Bed.

The man in the ticket office said:
| Have an accident insurance ticket al
sol?
No. l said, after studying the mat
ter over little. No, believe moi; |
am going to be travelling bv rail all
day. However, o,morrow don't trav-
el. Give me one for to morrow
The man looked puzzled He said.
But it is for accident insurance. and
if YOU are going to travel by rail
If am going to travel by rail- |
shan't need it. Living ut home in bed
is the thing am afraid Of
had been looking into this matter
Last year l Travelled twenty thou sand
miles almost entirely s.r by Eaj !ae, u ysar
aud miles, half by sea and half BY rail;
AMI in the year before that | travelled in
the neighborhood of ten thousand miles,
exclusively by rail. | suppose if | put
in all the little odd journeys here and
there, | may sa, have travelled sixty
thousand miles during the three years
have mentioned. Aad never an acci
dent
For a good while | said to myself ev-
cry morning: Now have escaped so
far, and the chances are just as much in
creased that | shall catch 1t this time
| will he shrewd and buy an accident
ticket And To a dead moral certainty
drew n blank and went to bed that
nigh. without a joint started or a bone
splntered. got tired Of that sort of
daily bother, and fell to buying accident
tickets that were COED for a month /
said to myself. A man can't buy thnty
| blanks IN a bundle
But | was mistaken. There was never
a prize in4he lot. | could real Of rail
way accidents every ,!ay-the newspaper
o>phere was foggy with them; but
somehow they never came in my way
found bad spent good deal of M n
! ey in the accident business, aud hat moth
Ing to show for it NV suspicious were
aroused, and began to hunt for some
body who Lad won in this lottery |
found plenty Of people who had invest
ed, but not an individ cal thGt had ever
had an accident or ever made cent =
| stopped buying accident tickets and
went TO cyphering. The result was as
founding. TIE peril lag not an travel
ing bat an staying at home.
hu..ted up statistics. aud was amazed
TO find that after all the glaring newspa
per headings concerning railroad disas
| ters, less than three hundred peonle had
really lost their lives by those disasters
in the preceding tweIve months. The
/ Erie Road wa set down rs the most
ty.six-or twenty six. | do not remem
! Der exactly which, but know the uum-
her was double that Of any other road.
But the fact, straigh'way suggested itsS
| that the Erie Was an immensely long
road, and did more business than any
other line in tho country; SO the double
number of killed ceased to be q matter
for surprise.
Bg further figuring. it appeared that
between New York and Rochester the
Erie ran eight passenger trains each way
every dav-sixteen every day. and carr
ried daily average of six thousand per
sons. That is about a million in six
months the population of New York
city. Well, the Erie kills from thirteen
to twenty three persons out of It's mil
lions in six months; and in the same
time thirteen thousand of New York's
million die in their beds! Ms flesh crept
my hair stood on end This is apps!-
Iing' said. The danger isn't in
TRAVELLING by rail, but in trusting to those
deadly beds; will never sleep in bed
again.
| had figured on considerably less
than one half of the length of the Erie
Road. 1t was plain that The entire road
must transport at least eleven or twelve
Thousand people every day. There are
many abort roads running out of Bostor
that do fully bsf as much;a great man.
such roads. There ere a great nssry