Newport daily independent., 1905-10-25
AS BAD AS A FIRE.
Traveller i'm Texas Was Compelled to Move Thrce Times In
 One Night.

O1d you ever Sleep ID three dlHer- ent towns and in three different hotels ln oneenight, paying three times for & rather incomplete nights rest2"
 The old travelling man threw out the question in an uncoucerned way after having listened in silence for an hour while the other members of the Corner club reeled off yard after yard of stories about the road, it's pleasures, its dan gers and its humors. The pause that followed was only broken by some vio- lent but futile efforts by the stutterer to launch a sentence.
 Well, I have done it," the old travel ing man continued. And l may add that although l have been kept on the road for 20 years ] have never met man who was able to boast of the same ex perience. It came about in this way: 1 was down In Texas in 1881 and 1882, and New Years day found me in small town called Longyiew, with my nose turned in the direction of the neighbor- ing town of Tyler. To get to one of these towns from the other you must travel on two different railroads and cover about 40 miles Of ground, ai- though the towns are hardly more than 15 miles apart as the crow flies. Long, view is on the International & Great Northern, while Tyler is on the Mineola branch of the Texas Pacific. The two railroads cross each other at junc- ton called Troop, about A miles from Longview and IS miles from Tyler.
 q was having my dinner In the hotel at Longview about six o'clock on the evening of New Years day, when first class norther came sweeping down upon us. If you have never met a genu inc Texas mortimer pray that you may be spared from having the experience. The wind will spring up without mo ment's warning, and I have seen it low CT the temperature 50 degrees in 50 min-. utes. Everyone had been going around in his shirt sleeves. After the mortimer began an ulster was needed. There was no fire in the house and no com fort. My train did not leave until 11s1o p. m. The only thing could think of was to take room and go to bed. and 50 l did. I awoke at 1o:30, jumped into my clothes and caught my train.
 My watch showed few minutes after midnight when I arrived at Troop and heard that the west-bound train on the Texas Pacific was any way from two to three hours late. A band of immigrants was waiting for the same train and they filled the waiting-room. hA roI- hot stove in the middle of the room. Others were sleeping on the benches and on the floor. There was not a va cant seat to be had and the atmosphere was indescribable. The air outside was pure enough, but the thermometer reg istered ten degrees above zero, which is not very comfortable temperature for man without an oyercoat or gloves. There was only one way to keep warm-to cross the tracks to the little hotel opposite the station and crawl into a warm bed for a couple of hours, and this l did.
 II slept till 4:15 and caught the be- lated train at :.43... There was only one passenger, who left the train when ws reached Tyler at 5:15, and that was L t was pitch dark then, cold as Alaska and so quiet. that.your steps sounded like hammer beats along the streets. No enc was stirring in ths hotel at that lime and it took me Sq ttafter of an houl to wake up an old negro who was sleep ing on the floor in the office. The first thing I did when got inside the house was to dig out the keys to the bar and to gulp down two big drinks of whisky And then l asked for fire.
 No coal, massa,' the old nigger an swercd, grinnihg like a split water melon; no wood. no nuffing. Massa had better go to bed
 And so l did, to be sure, for the third time that night. It was 5:45 o'clock in the morning then and I slept like dead man till 9:30. Have you ever heard the like of it? And yet my lodg- ing for that night cost me only $l.50, O, 50 cents at each hotel. The fun of if. when it was all over, was worth Sl.50, 1 think."-N. Y. Sun.