The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1890-12-25

A Chapter of Accidents. Z.
Said a ginger whiskered Russian to a very pretty
Come and take ride inside this drosky."
She nibbled at a candle. smacked her lips and
said.
"Petrolovitch Hamsankovitch. come otf.ky."
Of course the every night railway acci
dent is counted out at once. Everyone who
has ever lived in suburb knows what it is
to 60 home early to supper and find himself
twenty miles from his home in the morning.
and furthermore. finding that the station is
jealousy locked up and on climbing the
pailings to find a policeman waiting for you
on suspicion of till lifting-that sort of ac-
cident's just nothing.
Once on visit to friend. the conductor
called out the station should have alighted
at three miles before we were there. There
was no cab, didn't know the way, it was
raining and L fell in the river twice. What
benedictiOns were showered on that con-
ductOr you can guess.
Let me hurriedly pass over the fact of my
hearing some person. sex not remembered,
remark that he or she had got a cold
through travelling in the same car with a
wet nurse. That person dlmly suspect
was an untruther.
The first regular railway accident that
happened to me was across the herring
pond. 1t was Xmas time and another under
40
dodge the horrors of plum pudding and
home festivities by stopping up to read.
We stopped and we read-the papers.
But the low meadows round the town were
frozen over and we had some glorious skat-
ing. We were sitting cheerfully at night
before blazing fire. when in rushed our
scout with the news of the accident Off
went the slippers; on went the boots. Then
the pal had an inspiration.
1.-The quickest way will be to skate across
the meadows"
Right you are, and we will take restor-
atives for the wounded"
'NOble thought"
So we filled every flask we could find in
the place with stimulants, and started. 1t
was rather exciting skating in the dark
over the rotten ice. and we passed con-
siderable part of the time in pitching base
over apex and-taking refreshers.
When we got there we found bad ac-
cident had happened. The car behind the
engine had cracked an axle and had broken
loose and every other car had come busting
on as hard as it could follow, and the whole
lot went tOppling down an embankment.
We did what we could in the way of lug
ging the manned out of the debris and
gained considerable kudos (thanks).
But
Yes but we had chewed up all those re-
storatives for the injured" on the road so
that piece of philanthrophy was a frost.
By the way, l just want to mention that
our scout, whose name was Dick Lear, had
the biggest mug on him of any man ever
saw. and it must have been heredity for on
a tombstone in an old English church yard
may be seen this epitaph:
"Here lyeth ye body of.Richard Lear
Whose mouth did stretch from ear to ear
Reader. treade lightly DER ye ground
For if he gapes yell never be found"
This is a solemn fact.
My next railway experience was of less
narrowing character. 1t was somewhere
near goodness knows where. and the fog
was trife thicker than the inside of cow
and my only fellow traveller was a partly
intoxicated farmer who kept reiterating the
wholly uninteresting and irrelevant fact
that he was ''man Of temp'rate habits and
mod'rate wants." Presently the train
stopped and the following cOlloquy took
place between the conductor and engineer:
81 can't see the blooming signals"
''And I'm darned if l know where we
aro