THE SIGNALMAN ON THE MIDLAND

Temuka Leader, Issue 2095, 6 September 1890, Page 3

THE SIGNALMAN ON THE MIDLAND

There are probably about a million men employed in various capacities on the Railways of Great Britain —a number large enough if they were soldiers* to overrun Europe. X)PU n the intelligence, fidelity, and physical condition of this vast army depend the lives the multitudes who are constantly travelling by rail. Any sudden and serious disability happening to one of them may result in a disaster which would pat hundreds of families in mourning. Accustomed as it is to safe and swift oonveyanoe from point to point, the public scarcely realises this fact. The following brief narrative, which is strictly true, will therefore he read with interest s Qu the Midland Railway, twenty-three miles south of Carlisle there is a little station called Oulgaith. Hero there is a signal-box in which Signalman Andrew Agge is to be found on duty daily. As is the case with all other signal boxes, this one contains the levers and the usual complicated electric and mechanical contrivances for making and receiving signals. Mr Agge is on duty nearly every day, and takes his luncheons without leaving his post. He is a sturdy man of thirty-five, in good health, and no complaint has ever been made against him by the Company or by the public; yet an incident occurred a few years ago that came near depriving him of his position and his life. For some time ha had not felt well, the worst and most dangerous phase of his indisposition being a kind of giddiness that would seize him unexpectedly and, as he described it, set everv thing to moving and twisting round and round.” The doctor told him frankly that it was a symptom of a still more radical complaint brought on by tp much confine- , incut, and by his irregular habits of eating

and sleeping, and that he had better aband n his work, for a while, and try a change of soere. . _ But this was easier said than done. Ma had a family to support, and couldn’t afford the luxury of a Vacation. He knew no other business, and could not risk the loss of bis place. His work was always done, however no matter how he felt, But it is only fair to say he had many anxious hours over it. His ailment, which he had discovered to be indigestion and'dyspepsia, now set no more alarming simptoms. A physician at App.oby assured Agge that there was serious trouble with his kidneys and bladder. f lt is,’ said the doctor to the Signalman, * the result of the condition of your digestion. Your blood is poisoned by your stomach, and every organ of the body is crippled by it.’ This was a miserable outlook for Agge, who went back to Oulgaith with small courage for bis Work. He took hold, though, as well as he could, and kept it up until one morning several weeks afterwards. He was in his box as usual when of a sudden a sharp pain shot through him as ohough he had been stabbed with a knife. He tumbled down on the looker in the signal-box, and lay there all the forenoon in acute distress and agony. For the time his work was a secondary consideration. Unable to remain in that position any longer, he laid down and rolled on the floor. The pain in his hips and back was so intense that he compared it to being out with dull knives, and pierced with hot irons. Agge was alone when the attack came, and as nobody except railway officials are allowed in the signal boxes, it was some time before his plight was discovered Finally, however, the station-master came in, the neighbours were summoned jand the suffering man was put into a trap and taken to hie house, half a mile away. There he was ill for weeks, part of the time unconscious. When the physicians avowedly got to the end of their resources it was agreed that the Signalman's end was only a matter of a very little time. . This was the situation when a singular thing happened. . Two or three years before, while Agge was feeling the earlier symptoms of his disorder, he had taken a medicine that had helped him; getting better, he put the bottle aside, still half full, and forgot it altogether. . . , .... Now, as he was almost m a dying condition hii memory flwhed dp ono day, apd he distinctly recalled where he had put it; A search was made and then it was found. The prostrate Signalman began usingat and, to the astonishment of neighbours and doctors, in a few days was able to get out of doors. We may mention that the medicine was the well-known preparation, Mother Seigels Curative Syrup, although to advertise the article is not the chief motive for this little narmtiye. Ai ft matter of fact, Signalman Agge kept on doctoring himself with it, and it cured him, be its nature what it may. He went back to his box long ago, and this incident is printed in order that the reader may know more of the character and experience of a large and faithful body of public servants.