The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-09-03
A MIRACULOUS ESCAPE.
Tho Conductor Tells a Thrilling Tale Q.
Danger on the Track.

Danger on the Track.
eyes" said the conductor, biting of
the tip OF cigar and scratching q match
on his leg. GIVE seen great deal of rail
road life that's interesting and exciting in
the 20 years that I've been twisting brakes
and slamming doors for living.
give 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 new made grave, wherein she must
bury the idol of her lonely old heart.
Wealth and pinching poverty ride on
the same train, and the merry laugh of the
joyous, healthy child is mingled with the
despairing sigh Of the aged. The great
antipodes of life are familiar to the con-
ductor, for every day the extremes of the
world are meeting beneath his eyes
GIVE mutilated the ticket of many q
blackleg and handled the passes of all of
our most eminent deadheads. don't
know what walk Of life is more crowded
with thrilling incidents than mine"
''Ever have any smash ups?''
''Smash ups? Oh, yes, several of them.
Nome however, that couldn't have been a
good deal worse.
''There is one incident of my railroad
life,' continued the conductor running
his tongue carefully over a broken place
in the wrapper of his cigar, "that never
| spoke of before to any one. It has caused
| me more misery and Indebtedness than
any one thing that ever happened to me
in my official career.
Sometimes even now, after the lapse
of many years, 1 awake in the night with
the cold drops of agony on my face and
the horrible nightmare upon me, with it's
! terrible surroundings, as plain as on the
! memorable night it occurred
81 was running extra on the Union
| Pacific for conductor who was an old
friend of mine and who had gone south
! on vacation for his health.
cat about 2. 80 O'Clock, as near as I can
remember, we were sailing along all COM
! Portable one evening, with a straight
! stretch of track ahead for 10 or Is miles,
| running on time and everybody feeling
! tiptop, as overland travellers do who get
acquainted with each other and feel con-
| genial All at once the train suddenly
| slowed down, ran in on an old siding and
stopped.
''Of course got out and ran ahead of
! the engine to see what the matter was.
! Old Thompson, the engineer, had got down
and was on the main track looking ahead
to see where, twinkling along about six or
seven miles down the road apparently, was
the headlight of an approaching train. 1t
was apparently wild, for nothing was
7 due that we knew of at that hour.
However. we had been almost miracu-
lousy saved from a frightful wreck by the
engineers watchfulness, and every body
went forward and shook old Thompson by
the hand and cried and thanked him till it
was the most affecting scene for while
that ever witnessed. It was as though
we had stopped on the very verge of a bot
tomless chasm, and every body was laugh
i17r of rT1QQ
of a cross between a revival and picnic.
''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, cold, clammy suspicion be-
gan to bore itself into my intellect. The
more thought of it the more unhappy !
felt. I almost wished that were dead.
Cold streaks ran up my back, followed by
hot ones. l wanted to go home, where
the prying eyes of the great throbbing
world could not see me.
81 called Thompson to one side and said
something to him. He swore softly to
himself and kicked the ground and looked
at the headlight still glimmering in the
distance. Then he got on his engine, and
yelled, All aboard' In few moments
we were moving again, and the general
impression was that the train ahead was
sidetracked and waiting for US, although
except the one we had just left.
SIT was never exactly clear to the pas
sengers where we passed that wild train,
but I didn't explain it to them. was toe
much engrossed with my surging thoughts
81 never felt my own inferiority so much
as did that night. never so fully realized
what a mere speck man is upon the bosom
of the universe.
"When 1 surveyed the starry vault Of
heaven and considered its illimitablt
space, where beyond and stretching on
and on forever, countless suns are placed
as centers, around which solar systems
are revolving in their regular orbits, eact
little world peopled perhaps with its TEEN
ing millions of struggling humanity, ant
with other and mightier systems of world!
revolving about these systems, till the
mind is dazed and giddy with the mighty
thought, and then when compared al
this universal magnifcence this brillian
aggregation of worlds and systems o
worlds, with one poor, groveling worm O
the dust, only a little Insignificant atom
only a poor, weak, erring, fallible, blind
cropping railroad conductor, with my trail
peacefully side tracked in the gathering
gloom and patiently waiting for the plane
Venus to pass on the main track, there
was something about the whole sombel
picture that has overshadowed my whole
life and made me unhappy and wretcheC
| while others were gay.
Sometimes old Thompson and mysel
meet at some liquid restaurant and SILENT.
take something in mefnory of our grea
sorrow, but never mention it, We neve
tear open the old ranking wound or laugh
over the night we politely gave the mali
. track to Venus while we stood patientl.
on the siding. ''-Chicago Inter Ocean.
Different