Evening star., 1897-06-12
A PECULIAR TRAIN.
A Travelling MSA's Experienoe In .
Georgia Country Houso.

A Travelling MANA Experience In q
Georgia Country Ho1se.
speaking 81 things remarked q Phila-
delphia DRUMMER. II had strange thing
happen to fis about Month ago ID Georgia.
1t didn't exactly happen to ME. either. but
| 1t was in my Hearing. t had attempted to
drive acroes country tc catch train at a
station which could hot have reached
otherwise. except by long and tiresome
detour over a miserable piece of road-and
when a railroad In Georgia is bad 1t Is
bad with any sort Of an adjective for en-
phasis you choose. 1t was twelve miles
nearly dark when started I wound up by
getting lost and going the Lord knows
where till struck very fair two-story
house that looked like 1t might have been
a summer hotel once upon time.
Il asked the man who responded to my
call how far 1t was to the railroad. and
he told me ten miles. and l had better
light and stay at. at night, I 1ighted' and
drink of 'moonshine' I weht to bed. tired
enough to have slept on q picket fence. It
was then II O'Clock, and about two hours
later was awakened from my slumbers
by hearing q train whistle apparently a
mile or less away, and then rumble along.
coming nearer and nearer and nearer until
suddenly 1t stopped, and 1 heard no more.
I was too sleepy to give 1t much thought.
and rolling over I went to sleep again
wondering why my host had told me 1t was
ten miles to the railroad, unless 1t was to
deceive me out of the price of nights
lodging.
'In the morning at breakfast mentioned
the fact to him. and he laughed in an un-
easy kind of a way and assured me that
it was ten miles to the railroad, and l
would think 1t was three times that far
after ! had driven over it. The noise had
heard, he said, was probably the wind
blowing down the chimney and banging
around the house, which was old and open
in many places. L hadn't any more to say,
and went on my way to the railroad, reach h
ing there in three hours, and noticing all
the way that an old roadbed with the ties
and rails still on 1t in places lay near the
wagon road all the way to the station.
"At the station, while waiting for my
train. 1 got to talking with the station
agent, who was bright sharp chap and
incidentally 1 asked him about that rail-
road train. He looked at me quick as a
wink and asked me the particulars, which
told him.
"Tt's han't,' he said. Last night was
was first built here there was a branch
that run back UP in that country to a
place about two or three miles beyond
that house, to kind of summer resort
up there. Mineral springs and waterfall.
Excursions for a day used to go UP there
from towns down the road from here and
up the other way. Ten years ago tonight
an excursion was coming back from there
house the engineer saw an obstruction on
the track that was going to throw the
whole shebang over the bank, and whistling
down brakes and cutting his engine loose
he went straight for it and knocked 1t of
the track. OF course he and his engine
went with it, and neither Of them was
ever any more use after that racket; but
the train was saved, and that was enough
for a man to die for, because there were
two hundred women and children in the ex-
cCrsion.
"It was shown that some Of the people
in the neighborhood had attempted to
wreck the train and 1t spoiled the excur-
sion business There was coal on the
branch that kept the last nine or ten miles
of it In operation for few years longer
but there never was another passenger
train to go over the place where the en-
gineer was killed. That is to say. never
another train that anybody. ever saw; but
there has been one go over the spot, or
rather go to 1t and stop, one night in every
year for the past ten years. I have heard
it, and so have the men in that house and
you. but no more that know of. because
his nearest neighbor Is three miles away
and nobody ever gets in that neighborhood
to stay all night. 1 suppose 1 would not
have been there if he had not asked me as
friend to come up on one of the anniver-
sary nights and hear it, so he could talk
TO me about it and advise with me whether
to move away or stick 1t out. l advised
him to stay and had very nearly forgotten
all about it, for really the subject hasn't
come to my notice in four or five years,
and you can wager money never went
back there to listen to 1t any more. I'll be
blamed If l couldn't see that engineer and
his engine whirling to destruction the night
stayed there, because knew what to ex-
pect and sat up to wait for 1t with every
nerve at it's highest tension. Darn queer
kind of ghost, isn't it?'
Il told him 1 thought it was" concluded
the drummer. "and when I suggested to
him that I might perhaps tell the story
to some one else and it might get into the
newspapers, he laughed and said that was
just the same as keeping it a dead secret,
for nobody In that neighborhood took q
newspaper or could read one II he did,