A Terrible Experience.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 5477, 7 February 1885, Page 3

A Terrible Experience.

We young engineers, had many good frionds in Bradford, 10 miles away, and would often run down thore to dinner other attraction, returning by a laggago train which started from Bradford to wend its weary way everywhere at the witching hour getting knocked about here and there, until its dismembered components would lind their way to the uttermost ends of the earth. I never looked King Death so fully in the face as from that night luggage Wo had on our staff an architect, who designed the stations, lodges, &c. _ This architect livod at Bradford, and being a hospitable man, wo dined with him iroquently, returning aa I have said. Isow this long, lumbering lugKajro-tnxin passed in its course within two or three hundred yards of tho residences of most of us, wmlrt tho station was much further away. The gradiont was unfavourable, the train heavy, and it was an understood thing that tho engine-driver wa3 not to slop to put us down, but slacken speed to. some five or six miles an hour, when we might got out as best we could. On this occasion wo had a carnage noxc tho engine, and a long lino of luggage trucks, gay 40, 50, or 60, behind us. Wo arrived at tho spot whero I meant to descend. Tho train slackened, and I opened tho carriage door. It was very dark, i could not eco the ground, but I swung_ my right foot lightly as I hung on tho carnage, ray left hand on tho door-handle, my- lett foot on the step, and looked earnestly down before jumping. I could not see, but 1 knew we were passing the proper place, and the rest urged mo on ; so I JumPca and pitched upon a raised heap ot iresn ballast. The ballast yielded under me j l slipped and foil rolling towards the train. Inside the carriage they shout and scream to the driver to stop the train, but the rattle overpowers their voices and he does not hear them. If they had succeoded, they would have killed me with their kindness. But thoy failed, and I, of course, knew nothing about it. They decided to say no word at tiQ station, wisely enough; of course, they know I shouldnot wish theaffairtobonoised about if I were safe, and if, as they all felt euro was the case, I was cut to pieces, they could do nothing for me- So, when the tram pulled up—for be sure no one else jumpoa down that night-they got lights from the lamp room and hurried back. They found the crushod remains of my hat. uney searched the line, the embankment foot, and the slope all over, and then they decided to go first to my room, to see It by any chance I had escaped. Thoy did so, and entering found me seated before the tire, a churchwarden in my mouth, a glass ot brandy and water on the table by myside, and my feet on the hob. contemplating a bright fire. The fact was that when I jell and rolled towards the train, expecting nothing but instant death, I tumbled into a hole eight inches deep, alongside of and indeed almost under the rail. My head fitted into this hole as the passing wheel brushed oft my hat. My body and feet lay away from the train over the six-foot. Was I safe ? Tha first waggon did not touch me, although the rattle from the loosened rail joint as the wheels crossed it jarred me terribly, striking terror into my very soul. Clank, clank, clank, the coupling chains passed over, and the leading wheels of the second waggon shook me again as thoy rolled over the loose joints. Then I began to feel safe j but anou I remembered that a hanging1 coupling or a dragging tarpaulin woulfl be fatal to me. I listened painfully fof, the jangle of a loose chain, but ere half-a-dozen waggons had passed I was unconscious of all but the great fact that the footboards were travelling three inches or less'above my head, and travelling, oh, so slowly} Would they never be past ? A horrible desire to raise my head^took possession of me. I felt that I must raise it, even though it were to be sliced in two the next instant in consequence of my doing so. I clenched my teeth atid fists and tried to pray that I might have strength to resist the infernal temptation. Just when that temptation had become positively agonising in its strength, and when I was on the point of succumbing to it, I saw a red glare above my head. It was the "tail lamp," and the train had passed ! But not for me; it was all going on just the same. More waggons, and still more, seemed to be rolling above me, and at last I lifted my head! As I live to write this, I solemnly declare it was with a sort of wonder as to what it would all feel like soon whore I was going to. Nothing touched me, however, I stared wildly around, and then fainted.

Presently the air and the stillness revived me, and I knew that I was safe. But at first I felt almost disappointed. 1 know that had there been half a score more of carriages to that train my head would have gone up and gone off, for my presence of mind had left me. I could barely stagger home, when I drank a tumbler of brandy quite full at a draught; it steadied me. Therest—thepipe, &c.—were rnerebravado. But I paid for it. That night, or morning rather, after I had gone to bed, and. ray rejoicing companions had left me, I started up shivering, rattling the very bed with my shaking, my teeth chattering, and my heart ooating in violent terror. It was long before I left that bed.—" Francis Grundy."