The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1882-10-20
THE STORY OF A HEADLIGHT.
A THRILLING EPISODE IN THE CAREER OF !
UNION PACIFIC CoNpUCroR.

A THBILLNG EPISODE IN THE CAREER OF A
UNION PACIFIC CONDUCTOR.
Yes" said the conductor, biting of she
tip Of cigar and slowly scratching a mattel
on his leg. "I've seen good deal of railroad
life that's interesting and exciting in the
twenty years that I've been twisting brakes
and slamming doors for living
I've seen all kinds of sorrow and all
kinds Of joy; seen the happy bridal couple
starting out on their wedding tour with the
bright and hopeful future before them, and
the black robed mourner on her way to a
new made grave, wherein she must bury the
idol of her lonely old heart.
wealth and pinchfng poverty on the
same train, and the merry laugh Of the Joy To-
Gus child is mingled with the despairing sigh
OF the aged. The great antipodes of life are
familiar to the conductor. for every day the
extremes of the world are meeting beneath
his eye.
1--WE mutilated the ticket of many a
blackleg, and handled the passes of all our
most eminent deadheads. 1 don't know
what walk in life is crowded with more
thrilling incidents than mine"
Ever have any smash-ups 90
''Smash-ups? Oh, yes, several. None,
however, that might not have been wOIse.'
"There is one incident in my railroad life, D"
continued the conductor running his tongue
carefully over a broken place in the wrapper
of his cigar, "that l never spoke Of before TO
any one. 1t has caused me more misery and
wTetchedness than any one thing that ever
happened to Inc in my official career.
a -r..s.
many years, awake in the night with cold
drops OF agony standing on my face and the
horrible nightmare upon me with its terrible
surroundings, as plain as ON the memorable
night it occurred.
Il was running extra on the Union Pacific
for a conductor who was an old friend of
mine, and who had gone South on a vacation
''At about 80, as near as l can remember,
we were sailing along all comfortable one
evening, with a straight stretch of track
ahead for ten or fifteen miles running on
time, and everybody feeling tip-top, as over
land travellers do who are acquainted with
each other and feel congenial. All at once
the train suddenly slowed down, ran into an
old sliding and stopped.
'Of course got out and ran ahead of the
engine TO see what the matter was. Old
Antifat, the engineer, had gone down, and
was on the main track looking ahead to
where, twinBling along about six OF seven
miles down the road apparently was the
headlight of an approaching train. 1t was
evidently wild for nothing was due that
we knew Of at that hour.
However, we had been almost miracu-
lousy saved from frightful wreck by the
engineers watchfulness. and everybody
went forward and shook old Antifat by the
hand. and cried and thanked him, till it was
the most affecting scene for awhile that 1
ever witnessed. 1t was as though we had
stopped at the verge Of bottomless chasm,
and everybody was crying a. once, till it was
kind Of cross between a revival and pic
mic
after we had waited about half an hour.
[ should say, for the blasted train to come
up and pass US, and apparently she was no
nearer, a cold, clammy suspicion began to
bore itself into the adamantine shell of nv
intellect. The more Thought Of it the more
unhappy 1 felt. l almost wished that was
dead. Cold streaks ran up my back follow
by hot ones. 1 wanted to 60 home want
ed to be where the hungry, prylng eyes of
the great, throbbing work. day world could
not see me.
Z calledAntifat to one side and said some
thing to him. He swore softly to himself
and kicked the ground, and looking at the
headlight still glimmering in the distance. -
Then he got on the engine, and / yelled,
All aboard . In a few moments we were
moving again. and the general impression
was that the train ahead was side tracked
and waiting for US, although there wasn't a
side track within twenty miles, except the
one we had Just left
'It was never exactly clear to the passen-
gers where we passed that wild train, but 1
didn't explain to them. 1 was too much en-
crossed with my suTging thoughts.
81 never felt my own infeTiority so much
as | did that night. l never so fully realized
what a mere speck man is upon the bosom
of the universe.
"When l surveyed the starry vault Of
heaven and considered its ilhmitable space,
where, beyond and stretching on and on for
ever, countless suns are placed as centers,
around which solar systems are revolving in
their regular orbits, each little world peO-
pied, perhaps, and then other and mightier
systems of worlds revolving about these
systems till the mind is dazed and glddy with
the mighty thought; and then when l COM
pared all this universal magnificeuce, this
brilliant aggregation of worlds and systems
of worlds, with one poor, grOvelinr worm of
the dust only little insignificant atom, only
a poor, weak erring, worthless, fallible,
blind, cropping railroad conductor, with my
train peacefully side tracked in the gather
ing gloom and patiently waiting for the
planet Venus to pass on the main track,
there was something about the whole SON.
Der picture that has OvershadOwed my whole
life. and made me unhappy and wretched
while others were gay.
Sometimes ADtifat and myself meet at
some liquid restaurant and silently take
something in memory of our great sorrow,
but never mention it. We never tear open
the ranking wound nor laugh over the night
we politely gave the main track to Venus
while we stood patiently on the siding. -
Laramie boomerang.
WISE WoRDs.-Hope is fatigue ending
in deception.
Flattery is effective only with weak, vain
man.
Man pardons and forpets vvC,man Dardons