A BABY ON THE CARS.

Evening Post, Volume XXX, Issue 58, 5 September 1885, Page 1 (Supplement)

A BABY ON THE CARS.

There was a baby on a car of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad the other afternoon. It — a T>aby in long clothes is always an it — was loaded to the muzzle with cry. It was a little thing, not more than two feet long, but it had more cry in it than you would hare supposed could be stowed away in a baby as big as a town constable. What would not an auctioneer' give for that baby's capacity ? '•Veil, the train and baby got a good even start, and for several miles the passengers looked on with intense interest in tho race. Almost anybody would bet off-hand that a baby's steam-wbistle would run down before an engine's, but if you knew this particular baby you would disclaim all illegal propositions and declare yourself " not a betting character," which, by the way, is a most righteous declaration, especially when you have no suro thing. The poor young mother of this portable noise factory was crimson with embarrassment, for of course every passenger looked at her and seemed to say — " Why can't you shut up that squalling brat 1" Presently a man with a flowing beard came up the aisle, chucked the baby under the chin, made a horrid grimace, and simpered, " Da, da, da, tootle de tooty." The baby was crying as loud as it could, but this made it cry louder. Then a woman reached over from the opposite seat and tried to whisper something in the mother's ear. Of course no one heard anything that she said, and the mother only sat the little one on her hand and shook her head. A man across the way said perhaps there was a pin sticking in it; and the baby was turned and twisted and wapseyed about until investigation exploded this theory. [ • Probably got the colic," said a dignified woman with a, double chin. A man in a long duster gave it a peppermint lozeuge, and the baby declined it with kicks and yells. The poor mother looked down on the floor as if she wished to find a nail-hole to slip through. A kindlooking woman came from the other end of the car, took the baby, and pranced up and down the aisle bobbing and jumping the bundle of scream until it was demonstrated that this was not the cure. She passed the baby to a man, who offered it his watch, but that was spitefully flung to the floor, as the baby opened the steam whistle again. A young man with a struggling moustache and a high collar was looking out of the window and whistling " Baby Mine." He turned his head languidly and suggested to the man who was trotting the screaming infant on his knee trying to shake its lungs down into the muffling folds of its long shirt : "If you people keep on until you frighten the baby to death, it'll stop it's noise, I guess." Fvery eye in the car shot a bloodred stare at that young man. What did be know about babies, the stripling 1 ? But the baby was passed back to its mother and all the passengers sat and brooded over the insult. Then the baby in the dense quietude laid its little head upon the mother's shoulder, Bniffed a few sobs and fell into a peaceful, noiseless slumber, and the young man turned his head down into his high collar, and concluded his tribute to " Baby Mine," while the other passengers thought, >t " ISow he thinks he is smart, doesn't he 1" — American paper.