portmanteau and blue hat-box will be handed to
me. I shall find them, I know, as sure as there
are slaves in America, with the brass labels,
twins to mine, upon them. I shall call out to the
porter or baggage-master, " 2359— 2617," and
out will roll, as in a pantomime trick, my black
and red portmanteau and my blue hat-box.

Presently, before the train starts, to return to
the routine of the system, I shall hear Cuffy roar
out: " Toledo, 2359— 2617," and to him answering,
will respond Sambo inside the luggage van
portal: " Toledo, 2359— 2617— right'!'' and at
the same moment down go the numbers in the
little note-book of the luggage man of Utica, who
stands by the van near a blazing red lamp, that
turns his face to currant-jelly, and whose business
it is to check all luggage passing from
Utica anywhither. You may go, in this restless
country, nine hundred miles at a stretch, may
change trains five times, may pass three nights
on the road, yet never be troubled to look after
your luggage once— nay, not even to bestow a
random nervous thought upon it; guard safely
2359— 2617, at Toledo or where not, and as sure
as three and three make what is called six, the
product will be 2617 and 2359. But I am
going— say from Albany— at the head of the
Hudson to Buffalo, near Lake Ontario. The
conductor seeing me walk about the platform,
and eye the several carriages, says to me with
sagacious forethought, "Sleeping car, mister?
Going through, stranger?"

I reply "Yes," and follow the quiet sallow
lean man into the last carriage, which is
lettered in large red letters, on a sunflower
yellow ground, "ALBANY AND BUFFALO SLEEPING
CAR." I go in, and find the ordinary railway
carriage; the usual filter, and the usual
stove are there; and the seats, two-and-two, are
arranged in the old quiet procession, turning
their backs on each other glumly, after their
kind. I ask how much extra I must pay for a
bed.

"Single-high, twenty-five cents.; yes, sir,"
says the officer on duty. "Double-low, half a
dollar; yes, sir."

I order a single-high (without at all know-
ing what I mean), and as I pay my twenty-
five cents, the bell on the engine begins
to get restless, and the steam horses snort and
champ and struggle. Ten other persons enter,
and order beds and pay for them, with more or
less of expectoration, regret, and wrangling.

More bell, more steam, smothering us all
with white— a wrench, a drag, a jolt back half
angry, as if the engine were sulky and restive,
and we are off. The signal-posts stride by us,
the timber-yards fly by, and we are in the open
country, with its zig-zag snake fences, and
Indian corn patches and piles of orange pumpkins.
Now ladies come in from other carriages,
for the restless or seeking traveller can walk all
through an American train. We are seated in
twos and twos, some at nuts, some at books,
some flirting, some musing, some chatting, some
discussing "the irrepressible squabble," many
chewing, or cutting plugs of tobacco from long
wedges, produced from their waistcoat-pockets.
The candy boys have been round three times,
the negro with the water-can twice, the lad with
the book basket once. One hour from Albany,
we are at Hoffman's; twenty minutes more, at
Amsterdam; fifty minutes more, and we have
readied Spraker's— pure Dutch names all, as
though old Hudson christened them. Now, as
we are between Little Falls and Herkeimer, the
officer of the sleeping cars enters, and calls out:

"Now then, misters, if you please, get up
from your seats, and allow me to make up the
beds."

Two by two we rise, and with neat trimness
and quick hand the nimble Yankee turns
over every other seat, so as to reverse the back,
and make two seats, one facing the other.
Nimbly he shuts the windows and pulls up the
shutters, leaving for ventilation the slip of
perforated zinc open at the top of each. Smartly
he strips up the cushions, and unfastens from
beneath each seat a light cane-bottomed frame,
there secreted. In a moment, opening certain
ratchet holes in the wall of the carriage, he
has slided these in at a suitable height above,
and covered each with cushions and sleeping rug.

I go outside on the balcony, to be out of the
way, and when I come back the whole place is
transformed. No longer an aisle of double
seats, like a section of a proprietary chapel put
on wheels, but the cabin of a small steamer,
snug for sleeping, with curtained berths and
closed portholes.

O dexterous genius of Zenas Wallace and
Ezra Jones, conductors of the New York
Central Railway! The lights of the candle lamps
are dimmed or withdrawn; a hushed stillness
pervades the chamber of sleep; no sound breaks
it but the clump of falling boots, and the button-
slapping sound of coats flung upon benches.
Further on, within a second enclosure, I hear
voices of women and children. A fat German
haberdasher, from Cincinnati, is unrobing
himself for sleep. He takes off his "undress"
as if he were performing a religious ceremony,
and, indeed, sleep is a rehearsal of death, and
seems rather a solemn thing, however we look
at it.

The bottom berths are singularly comfortable.
There is room to wander and explore, to roll and
turn, and the curtains hush all sound, and keep off
all inquisitive rays from Zenas's and Ezra's
portable lamps. There is, indeed, twice the room I
had in the Atlantic steamer that brought me over,
for, in that berth, I could not sit up at night without
bumping my head against No. 46's bed planks,
and could not turn without pulling all the scant
clothes off me. As for a heavy sea, why then
there was no keeping in bed at all without being
lashed in.

Now I mount my berth; for sleep is
sympathetic, and when every one else goes to
sleep, I must too. There are two berths to
choose from: both wicker trays, ledged in,
cushioned, and rugged: one about half a foot
higher than the other. I choose the top one, as
being nearer the zinc ventilator.