The times., 1899-07-08

| yards of the New Haven Road. The ex-
| press is one of the fastest trains in the
| country. 1t usually has about seven Pull
man coaches, but yesterday there were
nine. Numbers of people returning to the
South and Washington from spending the
| Fourth of July holiday were on the train,
and every berth and state-room was engag-
ed. 1t travels at great speed, and goes to
! the Harlem station, where it Is shunted
aboard the transfer boat Maryland, and
taken to Jersey City. 1t passes through
| West Chester at about O'Clock in the
afternoon, at the rate of almost a mile
minute.
! 1t is the custom of West Chester boys
! who go up in the country 10 pick cherries
at this time of the year to walk on the
tracks. There was large number of boys
out yesterday. Section Foreman John Fal-
by saw boys fooling on the track quarter
, of mile away; he had occasion to go
| some distance to get a drink of ice water,
and while he was drinking his attention
was attracted to the movements of the
boys. Falby dropped the tin dipper and
walked toward where the boys were gath
! cred. The boys ran away Falby was
about to turn back and go to where the
section hands were working when curiosity
led him to see what the boys had been
up to.
| He walked leisurely along until he heard
! in the distance family the warning whistle
| of a train. Knowing that it was the ex-
press, he hurried. When he reached the
| spot where the boys had been, he found
an iron bar seven feet long and two and
one-half inches in width wedged In the
/ track.
| 1t weighed forty-fve pounds One end Of
! the bar was wedged in under one rail, and
driven so hard that it entered the earth for
| about two feet. On either side of this end
were stones and heavy iron braces driven
into the earth up next TO the sleeper, to
hold it in place. The bar or "spreader, +"
| as 1t is called (from the fact that ii is
used for spreading rails was placed dag
onally, so that If the locomotive struck
1t, 1t would be further braced by the sleep
er and iron braces. A small crowbar was
driven down close TO the bar, and a piece
Of car rail, endwise, braced this. Falby
tried to move the car rail, but it was
| fast.
He pulled and tugged, and. with the aid
of another broken rail, finally got the OBJ
struction loose. The express was nearing:
1t could be seen. Falby tried to move the
"spreader." He could not bulge 1t. Sew
| eral of his section hands came in answer
to his beckonings. The men picked up a
rail and pried aside the bar The whistle
of the express urged them to act quickly.
Scarcely had the iron bar been pressed
doWH When the train went past.
Then the men examined the track and
bar. While the bar had been battered
aside, it was bent and hard to remove; 1t
required some little effort to remove the
spreader. AS soon as this was done.
Falby, accompanied by one of his men.
went to the West Chester police station
and reported the matter to Captain Dean,
who assigned Detectives Dillon and Nor
! ton to the case. They at once went to
the West Chester yards, searched all
through Pelham Park, and finally saw a
couple of boys coming out of Abbott
woods. The detectives, in civilian clothes,
began to question them, and they became
impudent. The detectives placed the boys
| under arrest.