Las Vegas optic. (East Las Vegas, N.M.) 1908-1921, 1911-11-07
PASS RETURNED
With Comment
BY NYE
FREIGHT AUDITOR FINDS INTER.
ESTINc RELIC or FAMOUS
HUMoRIsT IN TOPEKA

the old building to the new skyscral
er. A. A. Hays. freight auditor fo
= the Atchison, Topeka and Santa F
Railway company, at Topeka, foun
an interesting letter from the lat
Bill Nye, the humorist, written 1
= 1887 to w. F. White, then genera
/ passenger agent of the Santa Fe. Ny
held an annual pass over the SAINT
' Fe, but early in 1887 the compan,
recalled it under provisions of tn
interstate commerce law enacted a
that time. Nye returned the pass
with the letter lately found by MI
: Hayes, as follows
! Hudson, Wis, March 80, 1887.
. w. r. White, Esq, General Passenge
Agent, Atchison Topeka and Santa
Fe Railroad, Topeka, Kansas.
Dear Sir: | enclose herewith an
nual pass No. O-O35 for self and fam
lily over your justly celebrated road
during the year 1887. l also return
your photograph and the letters you
have written me during the past five
years. VIII you kindly return mine ?
And so this brief and beautiful ex-
perience is to end and each must &c
his way own hereafter.
/ Alas!
To you this may be easy, but ii
brings pang to my heart which
your gentle letter of the LIST inst. can.
not wholly alleviate.
Whenever hereafter you look upon
this tear-speckled pass will you not
think of me? Remember that you
have cast me from you, and that
am wandering across the bleak and
wind swept plains. sadly enumerat-
ing the ties of my way to eternity.
| do not say this to reproach you,
for fear that you care for another,
and SO we would not be happy
again, together. But, oh! do you
pause to fully comprehend the pang
it costs me to return this pleasant
faced little pass with its conditions
on the back? Should you see me
now, as write these lines, turning
away ever and anon, laying aside
my trembling pen to go and sit by
the CRATE and shudder and weep, and
put out the fire with my bitter tears,
your heart would soften, and you
would say: Return. oh, wanderer,
return!" You do not say in your
letter that | have been false to you,
or that | have ever grown cold. You
do not charge me with infidelity, or
failure to provide. You simply say
that it would be better for each to
go his several ways, forgetting that
my several ways are passing away,
! passing away.
/ 1t is all very well for you to talk
about going your several ways. You
have every facility for doing so, but
with me it is different. Several
years ago a large northwestern cy-
clone and myself tried to pass each
other on the same track. When the
wrecking crew found me ! was in the
crotch of a butternut tree with a
broken leg. Since that time have
walked with great difficulty, and to
go my several ways has been very
serious matter with me.
But I do not want you to think that
| am murmuring | accept my doom
calmly. yet with a slight sigh of un-
availing regret.
Some time perhaps, in the middle
of the dark and angry night, when the
cold blasts wall through the tele-
graph wires and the crashing sleet
rushes with wild and impetuous fury
against the windows Of your special
car, as you lie warmly ensconced in
your voluptuous berth and hear the
pittiless winds with hoarse and crou-
py means chase each other around
the Kansas haystacks or shrek wild
ly as they light out for their cheer
less home in the bad lands, will you
not think of me as l grope blindly on
through the keen and pittiless blasts
stumbling over cattle guards, falling
into eulverts, and beating out my
rare young way, will you not think
of me? do not ask much of you,
but l do ask that we separate for
ever.
/ As you whiz by me do not treat