The new North-west. [volume] (Deer Lodge, Mont.) 1869-1897, 1882-04-21
A pHiLIsTiEE DIARY.
George Alfred Towpsend's First Free Pass
S. y. Chronicle.

thing Of the world was through free pass on
railroad. The abuses of free passes have
been much written of, and I can freely adj
NIT that in some directions they plumber the
railroads and suppress the laws and the
news, but there Is q good deal of poetry at
tached to the right of a railroad to give
poor fellow lift. 1t would be almost as
cruel to pass a law that q man driving .
buggy or hay wagon on the turnpike should |
not take up some poor fellow trudging along,
as to say railroad with its mighty capaci- |
ties to educate and delight must reserve its |
cars for rich people or for emptyne 81, INSTEAD
Of saying now and then TO an invalid, or per-
haps poet:
"Get up here and look at your country and
become inspired with Its great breadth and
scenery"
About 1857, at the age of seventeen, was
editing for patent medicine man little
imitation magazine, my salary being about
| So a month, which would have been low If
there had been any reading matter to speak
of in the work, which he published to OBJ
tain his advertising exchange list.
The hot summer with its annual holiday
approached, and felt great desire to get
out of Philadelphia aud see some Of the
country had read about-the mountains,
for instance, which had never seen at all,
having been brought up in country as fiat
as the palm of your hand. Some one said to
me:
"Why can't you get free pass? News
paper people generally ride free. Go down
to the Pennsylvania Railroad and ask for
one"
The Pennsylvania Railroad was not then
the formidable consolidation II now Is, but a
single line reaching from Philadelphia to
Pittsburg, and l think it was single track
much of the way.
Its Offices were at the corner of vii lings
alley and Third street, In the vicinity Of the
celebrated residence of William Bingham,
one of the early United States Senators of
Pennsylvania, whose fortune, the largest in
the country at that time, went to his son-in-
law, Francis Barring, the banker, and is built
into the wealth of that famous house.
ASKING FOR PASS.
walked up the stairs Of the Pennsylvania
Railroad office, feeling sm aller and smaller
IS went higher, till came into the resti-
bule of President Thompson's Office, and
asked where could find that officer. was
motioned onward, and in square office of a
: very respectable character 1 observed one
gentleman writing at table
and another walking up and down the floor
with his hands behind his back, and the lat
ter wore white necktie, and seemed to be
a Bishop with worldly eye in his head. /
. said to the man at the desk:
(which is the President"
: He nodded his head toward the Bishop.
The Bishop deferred me before he looked at
= me, but there was no way to get cut, so
stuck up my little publication, which always
looked very bare and cheap, but on that oc-
casion looked positively guilty, and l said :
L "Mr. President, can / have pass over
your railroad for notice in my magazine?'
Is Scarcely looking at me he pointed to the
. man at the table, whom l recollect to have
seemed tallish man, with long face and
an oldish, benevolent style. To him l re-
: ferred the miserable little serial with its
patent medicine notices on the back and
asked If / could not have q pass on account
of that publication, to look over the railroad.
:. at don't seem to me-" said the gentle
man, "that an advertisement in this would
be of much benefit to u.s."
Then looking at me and seeing the sensi-
tive lines around my mouth, he said:
"Are you printer"
"No," said /; 81 edith for another man."
With another look, in which I have no
doubt he comprehended the whole story,
with the mind of a Christian and a gentle
man, he pulled out his pass-book and said I:
"Did you say two persons?"
1t had barely crossed my mind that
could have free ride myself, but the idea
of two so overcame me that could not re-
ply at all, and he took my silence to mean
two.
SUPREME FELICITY.
So with thanks the man could never
measure i stepped out of that Office with a
pass for myself and the young gentleman
whose sister afterward married, to 60 all
the way to Pittsburg, $50 miles and back
again, stopping off where we liked.
1t was a coincidence TO me, though did
not know 1t for more than twenty years,
that the officer who gave me that free pass
: was the brother Of Stephen Foster, the writ
er Of the beautiful negro and sentimental
melodies. Mr.. Fosters mother, from whom
he was said to get his artistic mature, came
: from the Eastern shore of Maryland, the
: seat of my family for two hundred years,
and his father went from the State of Dele
ware, In which was born. They reared q
distinguished family at Pittsburg, in which
the song writer and composer was, of course,
the poorest in purse. One of his brothers
had risen to be the vice-presdent of the
Pennsylvania Railroad and gave me that
, ticket, which was TO my ear as melodious as
II he had composed the most beautiful song.
have the picture Of Stephen Foster, sent
me by his brother Morrison Foster, but /
think would value as much that of the
good Vice-President who set such bad ex-
ample to all the moralists and reformers in
the country by giving poor little rat ride
in his ship across the State Of Pennsylvania.
Curious Case of Circumstantial Evidence.
| An av,;nanf Enoi;eb iur;sf opa eatd.