Chicago eagle. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1889-19??, 1890-02-01
LOVE BEGOTrEN IN A SNOW DRIFT.
The Remarkable wooing OF a kan>a, Maid

The Remarkable Woeing OF a Kansas Maid
In Which a snow Plough Assisted.
Speaking of marriages, said the Con-
gregational minister, zone of the briefest
and most exciting cour. ships on record
was that Of an acquaintance of mine who
found his wife IN Kansas. Ii was in the
winter of lS7S-i9, and TIE fall OF snow
vas phenomenal in that section. Begin
ming with Christmas, there was good
sleighing for five weeks, and huge drifts
covered the prairies for much longer.
The snow had entirely stopped trains on
the Kansas City, Burlington and Santa
Fe Road, and across a section of country
known as the French Ridge the farmers
had been using the cut made through the
hills by the railroad company as a short
and extremely good roadway to town.
Long after the snow had melted from
the dirt highway teams were driven down
this valley, and one night this young man
of whom 1 speak took a neighbor girl
out for what threatened to be the last
sleigh ride of the season. They had
never met half a dozen times in their
lives, but that did not seriously embar-
rass them, and they drove down the rail
i way track on the well-beaten snow. 1t
happened the railroad company had Sc
! cured an immense snow plough with
which they meant that night to open the
| road from Ottawa to Burlington. They
! had two engines behind it, and came
| laundering down to French Ridge ut a
| great rate, aud the couple in the sleigh
heard with dsmay the roar and clang OF
| the huge machine behind them.
The little ravine between the hills was
| too narrow to allow them to turn out, and
there was nothing for it but to run. SO
| the horses were urged to the hjghe st
| speed, and the sleigh went tearing over
| the snow with the monster behind, and
| gaining every instant OF course, the
engineer could see nothing ahead through
the tossing mass of snow, and certainly
did not expect anything alone on that
! desOlate plain, especially after nightfall.
! All that hOrSehesh could do was invoked,
but it was not enough, for right at the
deepest place in the cut the great plOw
struck them, tossing team, sled. and
shrieking riders high into the air. They
landed, in a mass more or less confused,
high up the bank with snow about them
so thick they could not fall back on the
track. AS the train rushed past the
horses hOundered out and pulled away
the fragments of the sled. The young
woman stood up, shook the snow from
her muff, which she had unconsciously
kept in her hand, pushed her way to the
bare railroad, and said, calmly:
Well, We can walk bomen
"A view so philosophic in view of the
remarkable loss they had suffered quite
won the young mans heart. He also
waded out of the snowdrift, waded ont tc
where she stool, and put the question di.
rect
"'Will You marry me-
I'll think about, responded the hero
inc; and she did, with the result of finally
accepting the young man, collapsed
sleigh and all. They live in Kansas City
now, and told me last winter when Wis
tied theirpaStor that they never had amo
ment's reason to regret the sleigh ride
the tossing received at the hands of the
ow-plow. or the informal manner il
which their destinies we're united. CAj-
cdgO Heroid.