Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-03-10

young women of the rich and chorus girls,
invalids bound for southern California, en-
igrants of all nations, couple of titled for
eigners, including the usual jagged young
Enslishman, professional card sharps.
famous bad man of Denyer-first name.
'Bat-who never talks about his badness
and such. Then, finally, the tall man with
the smooth face and the wig-anybody
could see that it was wig-and the short,
stout man with the Brownie grin;
These two had herded by themselves
from the beginning of the trip, sitting in
the smoking end of the sleeper and ex-
changing quiet condolences. When they
saw the train was stuck, however, they
branched out and constituted themselves
committee of two on entertainment 1t
was arranged that on the second night of
our stop in the snow each car load of peo-
pie on the train should be required TO con-
tribute whatever he or she could to the
entertainment of the others, and the tall
man with the palpable wig and the short
man with the Brownie grin Were to tour
the train and bring out the latent talent.
The faces of both of these men struck US
all as being sort o familiar in way, and
50 we concluded they Were 'troupers' bound
for Denver. They certainly were hot sue
cessss when IL came to bringing out latent
talent. The best entertainment of course
was produced by the couple o. dozen and
ODD young women, whom we had conclud-
ed from the first to be chorus girls They
sang the good things from most of the
recent connie operas, winding up their per-
romance with rather a fine rendering of
little Brownie-faced man acting as mock
solemn conductor.
Features of the Entertainme
"All of the men did bits of recitations or
sang songs 1t was great to hear the jag
ged young Englishman's rendition of
'Ro-hocked in the Cr-hadle awv tina De-
heep.' He did clog dance pretty accepta-
bly, after he did that, prefacing his dancing
with the statement that he had been caned
so often when kid for trying low clog
steps that 1t was real pleasure, y'know,
TO md himself in a company where he
could dawnce with IMMUNITY. Then there
was the performance of well-known
Philadelphia writer of western yarns-a
bearded young chap who had lived on the
plains and knew what he was writing
about when he published the best set of
frontier post and cowboy stories that I've
seen in dogs age. This young man was
a pretty good magician In an amateur way,
and he did some very neat sleight-of-hand
work, considering the primiuyeness of his
appliances. Mock-herOic speeches were
made by numbers of the men, the soldiers
IN the tourist sleeper got their buck and
wing dancers into action to the music of
banjos, and there surely was a hot time
generally along the length and breadth of
that train that night. Then these two
odd-looking members of the committee on
entertainment got up another funny di-
version. There We're a couple of big, good
natured cowboys in the smoker and the
two cowboys took their hats out of the
smoker racks and walked quietly forward
to the smoking compartment of one of the
sleepers. There, just as the two members
OF the entertainment committee were walk
ing by into the next car. the pair of cow
boys got into wordy alteration.
An Opera BOufe Battle.
You can't throw no such cheap CUFF
into me-. shouted one of the cow punchers
at the other. and then he pulled his gun
and blazed away. There were no women
in that car. they having gone ahead to the
forward cars for visiting purposes. The
cowboy who was shot at by his mate had
both of his guns out in a jiffy, and in no
time there was cannonading around that
end of the car that I'D make you think of
an infantry SkirmiSh at the base of kopje.
Most of the men in the front part of the
car scrambled for the door or ducked under
the seats when they heard the alteration,
followed by the shooting. The firing was
stu going on when the BrOwnie-facad man
walked up to one of the cowboys, gave him
what looked like swift punch on the jaw
and deliberately dared him to shoot. The
cowboy. looking ferocious, turned his big
gest pistol toward the breast of the little
man and deliberately shot at him four times
in succession.
Never touched me-. exclaimed the
Brownie-faced man, picking four cartridges
apparently out of his coat.
4 Lively Three Days.
Then there was n roar. and De Wolf
Hopper and Frank Daniels passed on to
the next car, followed by the grnning cow
boys. who removed the blank cartridge
shells from their pistols as they went. Hop
per and Daniels, the entertainment commit
tee of two. came out in their own colors
after that. and what they did to keep that
trainload of people cheerful when the nov
city of being showed in began to wear off
was plenty The snow plOws came along
before and behind us. on the third afternoon
of our enforced tie-up between Hugo and
Mirage, and We got under way for Denver
on the following morning
II was once a passenger on an Atlantic
liner that broke her propeller shaft in mid
ocean. and the time during which we wal
lowed in the trough of the sea, waiting for
help passed agreeably enough: but I'd
rather be snow-bound any time than in the
doldrums at sea-fOr, as the old darkey
says. when it comes to the worst at sea
'Wheah is yo'?-whereas, no matter what
kind OF trouble you may stack up against
on land Oar yo' isl"