The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1877-04-05
THE OUTSIDE CARRIAGE.
A Railway Reminiscence.

Often, going home by the night train,
it is my lot to travel alone for q great
part of the way. 1t is a slow, often
stopping train that so by, and people
get in and out; but generally, before the
journey is finished, find myself alone
and sitting with my face to the engine,
in q corner by the window. 1 look out
into the dark night and watch the car
riage outside-a specter carriage, that is
empty like this, except for some one sit
ting in the corner, close by my elbow,
the brim of whose hat L can just see
as lean forward. Perhaps, if cared to
look round the corner, L might see his
face, but that don't wish to know. Let
him be a mystery.
The carriage travels patiently but
swiftly alongside. Its light fiickers like
beacon among the trees. It's windows
and its seats are like ours; but it is n
part of the landscape, too, and anything
we pass mixes itself up with it. Some
times in dark overhanging cutting the
carriage outside shines forth quite real
and distinct; sometimes in the open
country it becomes dim and uncertain,
and only its lamp, like stars, indicates
it is still there. Then it comes into sud
der being again, marked with the brick
work and dripping walls of some dark
tunnel, and then vanishes altogether,
broken up and destroyed among the
faring lights of a station; but it is wait
ing for us still outside, as we know full
well, and when we pass once more into
darkness appears as before.
One night, on my journey home from
London, tired and depressed, my heart
being heavy with forebodings of evil,
aud no comfort for me anywhere, dark
ness and gloom encompassed me. All
alone in the carriage, 1 sat gloomily
thinking, with my eyes vacantly fixed on
the carriage outside.
How much better your lot, thought,
than mine, my friend whose hat brim 1
can just see the point of; how much I
would give to be you, looking in at this
carriage of wood and leather, with its
Pickering greasy lamp and its sad, sor-
did passenger-you, who travel outside
among the trees and twinkling stars
What do you know of the ills of life, of
its loneliness and oppression ? You do
not care for its doledout joys, for its
troubles that come in double handfuls.
There may be truth for you, looking
out from non-being to being; there be
none for me, looking out from that which
is to that which is not
| grew quite in love with the thought
of sitting in the carriage outside; but
there was no way to it that L could see;
I could only gaze into it longingly and
observe its light, now shining among the
dark trees, for we were passing through
wood.
Suddenly l discerned in the further
window of the carriage outside, a human
face, pale and ghastly, pressed against
the shadow of the glass.
1t was there but moment, and when
turned to look in the real window of
the real carriage l could see nothing. 1
let down the glass of the opposite door
and looked out, thinking that somebody
must have been standing there on the
foOt-board; but there was no one.
Presently the train came shrieking
into junction station, where there were
lights and passengers waiting, and bar
maids in towering hair, chatting at the
refreshment bars with young men; and
| lost sight of the carriage outside, and
almost forgot the face that | had seen.
But when once again in the darkness
the face reappeared, peering in at the
window of the carriage outside, and this
time it staid moment longer; but once
more, when turned to the real window,
there was nothing there.
Then | saw no more of it, and l reach
ed home and didn't think any further Of
the phantom face, having so many other
troubles that were not phantom at all,
but real and urgent.
On the very next night was travelling
home from London by the same train, 1
remembered when l took my seat that 1
had this delusion, as / thought, about
the face, and looked out for a carriage
that was well filled. AS we rode along,
however, passenger after passenger left,
and l found myself alone. Coming to
the pine wood, turned my eyes reso-
lutely away from the glass; but as the
train flashed through it, 1 thought it
would be better that I should no longer
avoid the scene, but look boldly into the
glass, and thus dissipate the idea that