The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-01-17

| In London it carried the Prince of l Wales, and all the notables of Europe have examined it with interest. On the
 Fourth of July, 1895, this famous old
 coach was exhibited with the Wild
 West show at Concord, N. H., where it
 was made The owners and employees 1 Of the stage coach factory gave the
 historic old stage a great deal of atten- tion, and in the parade it bore this sign: l 'lS63-Home Again-1S95. Another one i of the old coaches is owned by J. Ster- 1 ling Morton, at Nebraska City, and an- other is owned at Topeka, where it is still in use for tally-ho purposes. Including Atchison and Placerville, there were 15S stations on the line the longest in existence Q,91S miles,. The fare was $225, or about 12 cents a mile.
 The fare was $225, or about 12 cents a mile. The stations were from ten to fourteen miles apart, Some days $2,000 was taken in at the stage office ill At
 chison for fares alone. Each passenger
 was allowed twenty-five pounds of bag
 gage, each pound of excess cost $1
 which was the price for carrying ex-
 press. The fare to Denver during the
 war was $175, or 27 cents mile per pas
 senger. The stages were nearly always
 crowded and passengers were often
 compelled to wait several days at At
 chison before they could be accommo-
 dated. A minister once refused to tray
 el on Sunday and abandoned his place.
 He'did not get a chance to go until the
 following Sunday, and this time he con-
 cluded that, under certain circum
 stances, travelling on Sunday was ex-
 cusable. Sometimes passengers booked
 for certain day sold out for bonus of rom $20 to $50 and waited for a later stage.
 The quickest route between New
 York and San Francisco at hat time was by way of Atchison. The western terminus of the line was changed from St, Joseph to Atchison on completion of the Hannibal and St. Joseph road to this point, as Atchison was eight miles nearer Placerville than St. Joseph. The stage line ran al title north of west from Atchlson, crossing the Big Blue at Marysville, one hundred miles west; thence continuing in northwesterly course up the north side of the Little Blue, and over the divide into the Platte Valley thence by way of Fort Kearney, Plum Creek and Julesberg to Denver. The road between Atchison and Denver was in the form of cres- cent; OFallon's Bluff was one hundred miles north of Atchison and Denver
 The easiest part of the line was be- tween Atchison and Fort Kearney The schedule time of the stages was four and half miles an hour, night and day, including stops. Occasionally the drivers would make fifteen miles an hour, and the passengers thought 1t very fast. The express messengers re- ceived $62.50 month, with free meals, and were compelled to ride beside the driver six days and nights without rest, except as they could sleep while the stage was in motion. They received a lay-over of nine days evry three weeks. On going to bed after trip they fre- quently slept twenty-four hours with out moving. Drivers received from s4o to $75 month and board. On the main line there were 2,750 horses and mules and one hundred coaches, The annual cost of operating the line was $2425. GOO.
 The passengers were nearly all men, and they had hard time amusing themselves. A gay party of eight once started from Atchison, and they sang for two days and nights, using ribald words to old church tunes. Finally one man proposed collection. With the money thus raised they bought a jug If whiskey at a station, Then there were spree and auarrelling and poker playing. One man said he had been robbed by one of the players, and he insisted so strongly on fight that the stage was stopped and a ring formed. The two drunken men rushed at each other, bumped each other down and could not get up. The other men helped he fighters to their feet and the harm ess battle was renewed Finally the iriver would wait no longer and the ,tge went on, with the passengers quar- relling on the inside. At last they en- gagged in az eneral fight and then went If into drunken sleep.-From the At 'hison Globe.