The Jasper news., 1917-06-21

tender and caught the giant water pipe,
fitted 1t to the tank, and loosened the
flood of waters which poured over the
iron sides of the coal car and onto the
track below in pool Of mud and Gin
ders. The engineer took his torch and
oil can and went over the engine.
Here's Sam, Dock" Demmer shout
ed, as figure came up from the train
behind us. 1t was the conductor bear
ing the dispatcher's orders for the en-
glnemen.
We've got n passenger of our own,
SAM" Demmer boosted, and called me
down from the cab to introduce me to
the train conductor. The latter hand
ed over the dispatches to Demmcr and
spoke to me about my ride in the
cab.
When the time was up Demmer
climbed back, set his levers, and we
pulled away from the station. I
watched the conductor swing aboard
the middle part of the train. and st.
Charles became only an incident.
The cities and their outlying dis
tricts shaken off, Demmer became more
daring with his throttle, opening 1t
wider and wider and balancing the re-
verse lever the while. The rocking of
the car became lurch, as the road
bed flooded by underneath us in ever
increasing velocity. The headlight sent
Il simmer of light ahead over the
track, figuring the steel rails gingerly
as we flew past.
Faster and faster grew our pace. I'm
perturbable, Demmer sat on his perch
making the endless adjustments of lev
ers and valves until the steady rate of
GO miles an hour had been attained.
Like a giant wave sliding into us,
the track from the end of the search
lights reach, seemed to bulge up and
come veerlng down under us. We
could never mount to the crest of the
wave, and we could never gain on 1t.
A few lights marked n little by
station. In minute we were upon It,
and the few people there huddled
against the wall tc shield themselves
from the rush Of air as we smashed
past with a roar of connecting rods and
drivers. The fields were Aooded with
the light of the spring moon. which
silhouetted the rows of corn sheaves,
the hay stacks, and the horses roam
ing about the farmers fields. Over
head the stars raced evenly along with
us in the clear, crisp April sky, and
underneath the roadbed was going by
in an endless roar.
His hair, tinged with gray, prompted
me to ask Demmer how many years
work was necessary before man
obtained fast passenger run. He re-
piled that at least 20 years of a mans
life went into preparation for passen-
ger work, that such long seasoning was
necessary for the hard and rigorous
work of pulling the through passenger
trains over the line.
"How long do you work each day?" I
asked him.
"This run takes about eight hours"
he replied. "But let me tell you that
eight hours Is enough to work in this
business.
"Why, have worked sixteen hours
day and 1t is too much to expect that
a man can do his best work on about
five hours of sleep daily, What do you
think about it?"
Just then, far off in the distance,
red lamp appeared in our path. The
engineer pulled the cord over his head
and the steam whistle emitted long
blast. Presently, the red changed to
green, and Demmer relaxed again, set
Ting back into repose, If, 1t might be
called repose, In the jolting, swaylng
cab.
."That MEANS" he said, forgetting