Year: 1859




RIDINo ON THE RAIL.-Did any Of our readers
ever feel the desire for some new kind of excite.
ment--som, thing unusual which should stir the
blood and rouse the nervesl Runaways are good
''as far as they go, but are too common. Athun,
der storm, with all the wild Accomplishments OF
thunder bursts and blazes Of light, is exciting but
it is too little of a personal matter with us--wo
feel that we can only look and hear with wonder
and admiration. But above these and almost all
else in wild excitement, with just enough person
al DANCE to cause one to keep his eyes peeled
for earthly SCENES" il riding on the engine Of an
express train in the day time or night, especially
the latter. A few days since, in returning from au
eastern trip, We took dose Of such an excite.
ment, through the kindness OF Conductor Charlie
horehouse aud L NJ Raynor, engineer on the TO-
connective Lynx, on the Clevc land aud Erie Rail-
road, Fancy yourself reader, on the above Lynx,
tearing through the country at the rate OF twenty,
thirty, aud forty miles an hour, the Lynx putting
and throwing its arms Of smooth iron and brass
around and about It's machinery; while il de-
voured time and space IN its mpetuous leaps over
the miles OF lis route You are upon the seat be-
hind one Of the look out windows, and you gaze
forward for the first few miles with eager hook,
watching suGpieiously every black object which
can be imagined 20 look like log or body across
the track You wonder Il you iDiH get round that
curve in safety II that switch which you dash
over and bY is all right If you do not see the end
Of rail sticking up and Il the engineer Is looking
out,With careful watch You are inclined 10 take
the rens Of government into your own hands and
think the engineer is careless and yet there be
standl with his keen eye on the track. aud bis
hand ready to grasp with sure hold. The lever that
increases or decreases the speed of the black mon.
ster on whose back you are.


Then as a long level stretches out before you he
sits down and while you IOhiSh past houses aud
thunder over causeways, he tells you pleasant sto
ries Of narrow escapes he has bad from grand
smash up, until you neryousy ask if that isn't
stone on the track half mile ali, ad. Before you
can convince yourself what It is you are upon it,
and the next minute it is far in the rear Yon see
a black speck far in adYance-the driver Of the
metallic ateed tells you it is woman with a bas,
ket You think he is "gassing" to see so far, but
when half a mile nearer, you are amazed at his
keenness OF vision, as you see It Is what he has
said Faster and faster on-the fireman throws
thewoOdeu food into the glowing bowels Of the
irop steed-the Engineer gives slight touch to
certain lever aud on, on you rush through the
dust, over bridges past stations, across rayine or
through bill, until you near station 10 which
the dragon you have been riding draws up as slow
ly and gently as though he had not punished
thirty miles In forty minutes and was ready to do
L again.


Such in the day time, but Of the same ride in
the night when you see nothing but thick dark
ness in front-with little illuminated spot just u
Advance Of tue Locomotives when If a rail is mis-.
placed, tic gone, spike oOsenod, stone on the
rai, or sapling blown across the track. help must
come in the last hundred feet; this can be better
imagined than described, and must be tried 10 be
realized