The Iron Horse, R. M. Ballantyne [howl and other poems .txt] 📗
- Author: R. M. Ballantyne
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“Really, sir,” said Mrs Tipps, laughing, “you talk so enthusiastically of this Insurance Company that I almost suspect you to be a director of it.”
“Madam,” replied the elderly gentleman with some severity, “if I were a director of it, which I grieve to say I am not, I should only be doing my simple duty to it and to you in thus urging it on your attention. But I am altogether uninterested in it, except as a philanthropist. I see and feel that it does good to myself and to my fellow-men, therefore I wish my fellow-men to appreciate it more highly than they do, for it not only insures against accident by railway, but against all kinds of accidents; while its arrangements are made to suit the convenience of the public in every possible way.”
“Why, madam,” he continued, kindling up again and polishing his head violently, “only think, for the small sum of 4 pounds paid annually, it insures that you shall have paid to your family, if you chance to be killed, the sum of 1000 pounds, or, if not killed, 6 pounds a week while you are totally laid up, and 1 pound, 10 shillings a week while you are only partially disabled. And yet, would you believe it, many persons who see the value of this, and begin the wise course of insurance, go on for only a few years and then foolishly give it up—disappointed, I presume, that no accident has happened to them! See, here is one of their pamphlets!”
He pulled a paper out of his pocket energetically, and put on a pair of gold spectacles, through which he looked when consulting the pamphlet, and over which he glanced when observing the effect of what he read on Mrs Tipps.
“What do I find—eh? ha—yes—here it is—a Cornish auctioneer pushed back a window shutter—these are the very words, madam—what more he did to that shutter, or what it did to him, is not told, but he must have come by some damage, because he received 55 pounds. A London clerk got his eye injured by a hair-pin in his daughter’s hair—how suggestive that is, madam! what a picture it calls up of a wearied toil-worn man fondling his child of an evening—pressing his cheek to her fair head—and what a commentary it is (he became very stern here) on the use of such barbarous implements as hair-pins! I am not punning, madam; I am much too serious to pun; I should have used the word savage instead of barbarous.
“Now, what was the result? This company gave that clerk compensation to the extent of 26 pounds. Again, a medical practitioner fell through the floor of a room. It must have been a bad, as it certainly was a strange, fall—probably he was heavy and the floor decayed—at all events that fall procured him 120 pounds. A Cardiff agent was bathing his feet—why, we are not told, but imagination is not slow to comprehend the reason, when the severity of our climate is taken into account; he broke the foot-pan—a much less comprehensible thing—and the breaking of that foot-pan did him damage, for which he was compensated with 52 pounds, 16 shillings. Again, a merchant of Birkenhead was paid 20 pounds for playing with his children!”
“Dear me, sir!” exclaimed Mrs Marrot in surprise, “surely—”
“Of course, my good woman,” said the elderly gentleman, “you are to understand that he came by some damage while doing so, but I give you the exact words of the pamphlet. It were desirable that a little more information had been given just to gratify our curiosity. Now, these that I have read are under the head of ‘Accidents at Home.’ Under other ‘Heads,’ we find a farmer suffocated by the falling in of a sand-pit, for which his representatives received 1000 pounds. Another thousand is paid to the heirs of a poor dyer who fell into a vat of boiling liquor; while, in regard to smaller matters, a warehouseman, whose finger caught in the cog-wheel of a crane, received 30 pounds. And, again, here is 1000 pounds to a gentleman killed in a railway accident, and 100 pounds to a poor woman. The latter had insured for a single trip in an excursion train at a charge of two-pence, while the former had a policy of insurance extending over a considerable period, for which he probably paid twenty or thirty shillings. These are but samples, madam, of the good service rendered to sorrowing humanity by this assurance company, which, you must observe, makes no pretensions to philanthropic aims, but is based simply on business principles. And I find that the total amount of compensation paid in this manner daring one year by this Company amounts to about 72,000 pounds.”
As Mrs Marrot yawned at this point and Mrs Tipps appeared somewhat mystified, the enthusiastic gentleman smiled, put away his pamphlet, and wisely changed the subject. He commented on the extreme beauty of the weather, and how fortunate this state of things was for the people who went to the country for a day’s enjoyment. Thus pleasantly he whiled away the time, and ingratiated himself with Gertie, until they arrived at the station where Mrs Tipps and Mrs Marrot had to get out, and where many of the excursionists got out along with them. While the former went their several ways, arranging to meet in the evening and return together by the same train, the latter scattered themselves over the neighbouring common and green fields, and, sitting down under the hedgerows among the wild-flowers, pic-nicked in the sunshine, or wandered about the lanes, enjoying the song of birds and scent of flowers, and wishing, perchance, that their lot had been cast among the green pastures of the country, rather than amid the din and smoke and turmoil of the town.
In due time that holiday came to a close, and the excursionists returned to the station where their train awaited them. Among the rest came Mrs Tipps and Mrs Marrot, but they did not arrive together, and therefore, much to their annoyance, failed to get into the same carriage.
The weather, which up to that time had kept fine, began to lower, and, just as the train started, a smart thunder-shower fell, but, being under cover, the holiday-makers heeded it not. Upon the whole they were an orderly band of excursionists. Some of the separate groups were teetotallers, and only one or two showed symptoms of having sought to increase their hilarity by the use of stimulants.
When the shower began, John Marrot and his mate put on their pilot-cloth coats, for the screen that formed their only protection from the weather was a thin flat one, without roof or sides, forming only a partial protection from wind and rain.
Night had begun to descend before the train left the station, and as the lowering clouds overspread the sky, the gloom rapidly increased until it became quite dark.
“We are going to have a bad night of it,” observed John Marrot as his mate examined the water-gauge.
“Looks like it,” was Garvie’s curt reply.
The clatter of the engine and howling of the wind, which had by that time risen to a gale, rendered conversation difficult; the two men therefore confined themselves to the few occasional words that were requisite for the proper discharge of their duties. It was not a night on which the thoughts of an engine-driver were likely to wander much. To drive an excursion train in a dark night through a populous country over a line which was crowded with traffic, while the rain beat violently on the little round windows in the screen, obscuring them and rendering it difficult to keep a good look-out was extremely anxious work, which claimed the closest and most undivided attention. Nevertheless, the thoughts of John Marrot did wander a little that night to the carriage behind him in which were his wife and child, but this wandering of thought caused him to redouble rather than to relax his vigilance and caution.
Will Garvie consulted the water-gauge for a moment and then opened the iron door of the furnace in order to throw in more coal. The effect would have stirred the heart of Rembrandt. The instantaneous blinding glare of the intense fire shot through the surrounding darkness, lighting up the two men and the tender as if all were made of red-hot metal; flooding the smoke and steam-clouds overhead with round masses and curling lines of more subdued light, and sending sharp gleams through the murky atmosphere into dark space beyond, where the ghostly landscape appeared to rush wildly by.
Now it chanced that at the part of the line they had reached, a mineral train which preceded them had been thrown off the rails by a bale of goods which had fallen from a previous goods train. Carelessness on the part of those who had loaded the truck, from which the bale had fallen, led to this accident. The driver and fireman of the mineral train were rather severely hurt, and the guard was much shaken as well as excited, so that they neglected to take the proper precaution of sending back one of their number to stop the train that followed them. This would have been a matter of little consequence had the line been worked on the block system, because, in that case, the danger-signal would have been kept up, and would have prevented the excursion train from entering on that portion of the line until it was signalled “clear;” but the block system had been only partially introduced on the line. A sufficient interval of time had been allowed after the mineral train had passed the last station, and then, as we have seen, the excursion train was permitted to proceed. Thus it came to pass that at a part of the line where there was a slight curve and a deep cutting, John Marrot looking anxiously through his circular window, saw the red tail-light of the mineral train.
Instantly he cried, “Clap on the brakes, Bill!”
Almost at the same moment he reversed the engine and opened the whistle to alarm the guard, who applied his brakes in violent haste. But it was too late. The speed could not be checked in time. The rails were slippery, owing to rain. Almost at full speed they dashed into the mineral train with a noise like thunder. The result was appalling. The engine was smashed and twisted in a manner that is quite indescribable, and the tender was turned completely over, while the driver and fireman were shot as if from a cannon’s mouth, high into the air. The first two carriages of the passenger-train, and the last van of the mineral, were completely wrecked; and over these the remaining carriages of the passenger-train were piled until they reached an incredible height. The guard’s van was raised high in the air, with its ends resting on a third-class carriage, which at one end was completely smashed in by the van.
At the time of the concussion—just after the terrible crash—there was a brief, strange, unearthly silence. All was still for a few seconds, and passengers who were uninjured gazed at each other in mute and horrified amazement. But death in that moment had passed upon many, while others were fearfully mangled. The silence was almost immediately broken by the cries and groans of the wounded. Some had been forcibly thrown out of the carriages, others had their legs and arms broken, and some were jammed into fixed positions from which death alone relieved them. The scenes that followed were heart-rending. Those who were uninjured, or only slightly hurt, lent willing aid to extricate their less fortunate fellow-travellers, but the howling of the wind, the deluging rain, and the darkness of the night, retarded their efforts, and in many cases rendered them unavailing.
John Marrot, who, as
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