taiiily a fine piece of workmanship. Jake, however, spied me looking at it with inquiring eyes, and before I could ask him for a closer inspection lie mumbled something about orders and swinging down he walked up the tracks. "Say! Jim, where did Jake get that beauty?" I asked. "Last winter." He answered. "Did lie get that cut on his head the same time?" I ven tured. "Yep" "Give tne the story will you?" I begged. Jim was no exception to the, rule of liking to tell a story of his "superior" in the cab and as he pulled out an old pipe and some tobadco I knew there was a story with them. Jim soon had. the pressure up in both the boiler and his pipe, the one making about as much smoke as the other, and then, after making ourselves comfortable, he began. "It was one day last winter and we had been having bad weather all through the week. This particular night the wind and snow was hard to beat. The 'Limited,' four hours late, went out ahead of us in four sections, all within an hour. We were running with three sections ourselves as the holiday traffic was beginning to start. We got away at last, two hours late, and even with a helper we had all kinds of trouble getting to the summit, twenty miles 'out. There we were held awhile by a freight that had broken down in tha 'block' ahead of us. Finally we started down the grade for a seventy mile run, and Ja.ke was in a hurry, too. Five miles clown there is a big coaling and watering station for freights. As we rounded the curve above the shutes Jake shut off steam and I, seeing the lights all right, started to shovel coal. All of a sudden there was a deafening crash just as I picked up the Shovel, and Jake came flying into me with terrific force. We both sprawled back on the coal with the timber and remains of the cab over and on us. The wind had blown the shutes loose and we had struck them fair and square with this re-
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers