The Bloomfield times. [volume] (New Bloomfield, Pa.) 1867-187?, 1872-12-24

How She Did IL.

Some years ago widow living on the
line of the Ohio and Mississippi Railroad,
about one hundred miles from st. Louis,
owned young COW, Of which she was par
ticularly proud. AS the woman was not
possessed of much Of this worlds goods,
the COW was an important source of in
come to her, as she made butter for sale
and also sold some milk in the neighbor-
hood. One day the express train came
laundering along and struck and killed the
Widows COW as it stood eliminating on the
track.
The widow applied to the station agent
for pay for the animal, and was told to send
in bill to the general officer of the road.
She did so, but received no reply, and after
writing several times without effect, called
on the paymaster the next time he went
through the town to pay the section hands.
The paymaster was very busy, and ans
wered the old woman so abruptly that she
became offended and concluding that the
road did not intend to make good her loss,
swore vengeance. Little attention was
paid to her threats until about week af-
ter, when the morning passenger train,
bound west, came along.
The station-house of Glora is situated at
the top of gentle slope, about half mile
in length, and which the passenger trains
always ran up at the regular speed of
twenty miles an hour. 1t was fine,
frosty morning and the sun was just rising,
and the engineer noticed what he supposed
to be frost glistening ON the rails. He
sounded his whistle for the station, and,
putting on more steam, started up the
slope. The speed at which the train was
approaching carried it about half the way
up the rise, but the driving-wheels of the
locomotive spun round on the rails without
pulling an ounce.
The train came to dead stop and then
began to slide backward. The engineer
whistled ''down brakes" and got off to in
spect the rails. He found, as he expected
that they were artistically covered with
soft soap, and as he had some previous ex-
perience of that kind, knew exactly what
to do.
He backed down the track about half
mile, and putting the full head of steam
on, charged at the rise with full speed.
When he found the speed slackening he
opened his Sandwiches and allowed the
sand in the boxes to glide through the pipes
and on the rails in front of the driving
wheels. This, to some extent, counteract-
ed the effect of the soap, and the train got
nearly fifty yards further than it did be-
fore.
1t finally stopped again, and the engineer
backed out and again charged the slope.
The process was repeated several times,
and would have finally been successful had
not the sand given out. The soil in the
; neighborhood was a soft, dark loan, and
where the railroad cut was made, stiff,
yellow clay was turned up.
No sand could he procured anywhere,
and finally the whole force of train men
went to work to remove the soap. This
they succeeded in doing after half hours
hard work, and nearly an hour behind
time the train reached the station. A few
days after a similar difficulty was experien-
ced, and the road officials began to get de-
cidedly angry.
An attorney was sent out there to dis
cover and prosecute the perpetrator, but
soon after his arrival was oon6dentially in
formed that the road would have no trouble
in future if the widow was paid for her cow.
He took the hint, telegraphed to the presi-
dent and receiving the necessary authority
paid for the animal and left the place. The
track was never soaped afterward, and the
widow bought another COW.