The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1898-01-26
"HARVEY CHEYNE'S RIDE
Rudyard KipIing's Tale of a Desert
Flight Over the Santa Fe.

Flight Over the Santa Fe.
In Rudyard Kiplng's story, Captain
Courageous recently published in
book form, a chapter is devoted to the
description of the flying trip of mil
lionaire railway magnate from San
Diego to Boston.
AS almost the entire description is de-
voted to the trip over the Santa Fe line
from San Diego to Chicago, the chapter
has been reprinted on a flyer and is
now being used as advertising matter
by the Santa Fe passenger depart
ment.
In the story Harvey Cheyne, the rail-
road king, makes the trip with his sick
wife in his private car to meet their
only son, who washed overheard from
an Atlantic liner while accompanying
his mother to Europe several months
before, and is supposed to have been
drowned.
The boy instead, was picked up by a
fishing schooner, and, after living with
reaches Boston and telegraphS his faith
er in California. The flight across the
continent is made in response to the
telegram, and the description of the
trip over the Santa Fe is as follows:
THE six foot drivers were hamInering
their way to San BernardinO and the
MOhave wastes, but this was no grade
for speed. That would come later. The
heat of the desert followed the heat of
the hills as they turned east to the
Needles and the Colorado river. The
car cracked in the utter drOuth and
glare and they put crushed ice to Mrs
Cheyne's neck and toiled up the long, Z
long grades, past Ash Fork, towards
FlagStaff, where the forests and quar-
ries are under the dry remote skies The
needle of the speed indicator ficked and
wagged to and fro; the cinders ratified
on the roof and a Whirl of dust sucked
after the whirling wheels. The crew of
the combination sat on their hunks,
painting in their shirt sleeves, and
Cheyne found himself among them
shouting Old old stories Of the railroad
that every trainman knows, above the
roar of the car.
He told them about his son, and how
the sea had given up its dead, and they
nodded and spat, and rejo1ced with
him: asked after her back there and
whether she could stand it if the engi-
neer let her out a piece and Cheyne
thought she could. Accordingly, the
great fire horse was let out from Flag
staff to WinslOw, till a division Superln-
tendent protested.
But Mrs. Cheyne, in the boudoir
state room, where the French maid,
sallow white with fear, chung to the
silver door handle, only moaned a lit
tie and begged her husband to bid them
hurry
And so they dropped the dry hills
and moon struck rocks of Arizona be-
hind them, and grilled on till the crash
of the couplings and the Wheeze of the
brakehose told them they We're at
Coolidge, by the Continental d.
s1Three bold and experienced men
cool, confident and dry when they be-
gan; white, quivering and wet Wheh
they finished their trick at those terri
BILE wheels-swung her over the great
dips and falls from albuquerque TO
GIorietta and beyond Springer, up ana
up to the Ration tunnel on the state nne
whence they dropped rocking into La
Junta had sight of the ArkanSaW, and
tore down the long slope to Dodge city,
where Cheyne took comfort once again
1,5e- fah = n d
At night the punched electr1cS lit up
that distressful palace OF all the lux
1ries and they Jared SumptuouSly,
swinging on through the emptiness OF
abject desoIation.
Nov they heard the swish OF the
water tank and the gutteral voice OF a
Chinaman, the clink, clink OF hammers
that tested the Krupp steel Wheels, ana
the oath of a tramp chased off the rear
platform; now the solid crash or coal
shot into the tender, and now peallHS
hack of noises as they flew past a
waiting train. Now they looked out IN
to the great abysses, a trestIe purIiHS
beneath their tread, or up TO rocks Ihal
barred out half the stars NOW scauf
and ravine changed and rolled pack TO
ia eged mountains on the horizons edge
and now broke into hills, lower ana
lower. till at last came the true plains;
"At Dodge City an unknown mana
threw a COPY of a Kansas paper con-
tanning some sort of an interview WIN
Harvey, and this soothed Mrs. Cneyhe
for while. Her one Wofd hurry was
convened by the crews to the engineers
at NicIlerson, Topeka and Marceline,
where the grades are easy, ana they
brushed the continent behind them
Towns and villages were close together
now and a man could feel that ne
moved among people. At TT. manson
they changed engines for the last
time
sPshaw.' said the Atchison, Topeka
& Santa Fe men, discussing life later,
we weren't running for record. ,HaT-
ana We didn't want to jounce HEROINE
to think of it, our running time from
San Diego to Chicago was 81 hours ana
"a minutes You can tell that to them
eastern way trains. When were Try
ing for a record, Wen let you know
Billiards. -Horehound Syrup is the
best known remedy for Consumption,
Coughs, Colds and all Throat and Chest
Troubles. Every bottle is guaranteed.
1t is the best remedy for children. 25
and soc. Geo. W. Stansheld, 632 Kan
sas avenue. and Miller's Pharmacy,
corner Sixth and Topeka avenues.