MUGBY JUNCTION.

THE EXTRA CHRISTMAS NUMBER OF ALL THE YEAR ROUND.

CONDUCTED BY CHARLES DICKENS.

CONTAINING THE AMOUNT OF TWO ORDINARY NUMBERS.

CHRISTMAS, 1866. Price 4d.

INDEX.

"GUARD!  What place is this?"

"Mugby Junction, sir."

"A windy place!"

"Yes, it mostly is, sir."

"And looks comfortless indeed!"

"Yes, it generally does, sir."

"Is it a rainy night still?"

"Pours, sir."

"Open the door. I'll get out."

"You'll have, sir," said the guard, glistening
with drops of wet, and looking at the tearful
face of his watch by the light of his lantern as
the traveller descended, " three minutes here."

"More, I think.—— For I am not going on."

"Thought you had a through ticket, sir?"

"So I have, but I shall sacrifice the rest of
  it. I want my luggage."

"Please to come to the van and point it out
sir. Be good enough to look very sharp, sir.
Not a moment to spare."

The guard hurried to the luggage van, and
the traveller hurried after him. The guard got
into it, and the traveller looked into it.

"Those two large black portmanteaus in the
corner where your light shines.  Those are
mine."

"Name upon 'em, sir?"

"Barbox Brothers."

"Stand clear, sir, if you please. One. Two
Right!"

Lamp waved. Signal lights ahead
already changing. Shriek from engine. Train gone.

"Mugby Junction!" said the traveller, pulling
up the woollen muffler round his throat with
both hands. " At past three o'clock of a tempestuous
morning! So!"

He spoke to himself. There was no one else
to speak to. Perhaps, though there had been
any one else to speak to, he would have preferred
to speak to himself. Speaking to himself, he
spoke to a man within five years of fifty either
way, who had turned grey too soon, like a neglected
fire; a man of pondering habit, brooding
carriage of the head, and suppressed internal
voice; a man with many indications on him of
having been much alone.

He stood unnoticed on the dreary platform,
except by the rain and by the wind. Those two
vigilant assailants made a rush at him. " Very
well," said he, yielding. " It signifies nothing
to me, to what quarter I turn my face."

Thus, at Mugby Junction, at past three o'clock
of a tempestuous morning, the traveller went
where the weather drove him.

Not but what he could make a stand when
he was so minded, for, coming to the end
of the roofed shelter (it is of considerable
extent at Mugby Junction) and looking out
upon the dark night, with a yet darker spirit-
wing of storm beating its wild way through
it, he faced about, and held his own as ruggedly
in the difficult direction, as he had held it in
the easier one. Thus, with a steady step, the
traveller went up and down, up and down, up
and down, seeking nothing, and finding it.

A place replete with shadowy shapes, this
Mugby Junction in the black hours of the four-
and-twenty. Mysterious goods trains, covered
with palls and gliding on like vast weird funerals,
conveying themselves guiltily away from the
presence of the few lighted lamps, as if their
freight had come to a secret and unlawful end.
Half miles of coal pursuing in a Detective manner,
following when they lead, stopping when they
stop, backing when they back. Red hot embers
showering out upon the ground, down this
dark avenue, and down* the other, as if
torturing fires were being raked clear; concurrently,
shrieks and groans and grinds invading
the ear, as if the tortured were at the height
of their suffering. Iron-barred cages full of
cattle jangling by midway, the drooping beasts
with horns entangled, eyes frozen with terror,