The engine, you see, loses weight as she bums
her coals and consumes her water, but the
coaches behind don't alter. We have a good
deal of trouble with young guards. In their
anxiety to perform their duties; they put on the
brakes too soon, so that sometimes we can
scarcely drag the train into the station; when
they grow older at it they are not so anxious,
and don't, put them on soon enough. It's no use
to say, when an accident happens, that they did
not put on the brakes in time; they swear they
did, and you can't prove that they didn't.

"Do I think that the tapping of the wheels
with a hammer is a mere ceremony? Well, I,
don't know exactly; I should not like to say.
It's not often that the chaps find anything
wrong. They may sometimes be half asleep
when a train comes into a station in the middle
of the night. You would be yourself. They
ought to tap the axle-box, but they don't.

"Many accidents take place that never get
into the papers; many trains, full of passengers,
escape being dashed to pieces by next door to a
miracle. Nobody knows anything about it but
the driver and the stoker. I remember once,
when I was driving on the Eastern Counties.
Going round a curve, I suddenly saw a train
coming along on the same line of rails. I
clapped on the brake, but it was too late, I
thought. Seeing the engine almost close
upon us, I cried to my stoker to jump. He
jumped off the engine, almost before the words
were out of my mouth. I was just taking my
hand off the lever to follow, when the coming
train turned off on the points, and the next
instant the hind coach passed my engine by a
shave. It was the nearest touch I ever saw. My
stoker was killed. In another half second I
should have jumped off and been killed too.
What would have become of the train without
us is more than I can tell you.

"There are heaps of people run over that no
one ever hears about. One dark night in the
Black Country, me and my mate felt something
wet and warm splash in our faces. ' That
didn't come from the engine, Bill,' I said.
' No,' he said; ' it's something thick, Jim.'
It was blood. That's what it was. We heard
afterwards that a collier had been run over.
When we kill any of our own chaps, we say
as little about it as possible. It's generally—-
mostly always—- their own fault. No, we never
think of danger ourselves. We're used to it,
you see. But we're not reckless. I don't believe
there's any body of men that takes more
pride in their work than engine-drivers do.
We are as proud and as fond of our engines as
if they were living things; as proud of them as
a huntsman or a jockey is of his horse. And a
engine has almost as many ways as a horse;
she's a kicker, a plunger, a roarer, or what
not, in her way. Put a stranger on to my
engine, and he wouldn't know what to do with
her. Yes; there's wonderful improvements in
engines since the last great Exhibition. Some
of them take up their water without stopping.
That's a wonderful invention, and yet as simple
as ABC. There are water-troughs at certain
places, lying between the rails. By moving a
lever you let down the mouth of a scoop into
the water, and as you rush along the water is
forced into the tank, at the rate of three thousand
gallons a minute.

"A engine-driver's chief anxiety is to keep
time; that's what he thinks most of. When
I was driving the Brighton express, I always
felt like as if I was riding a race against time.
I had no fear of the pace; what I feared was
losing way, and not getting in to the minute.
We have to give in an account of our time
when we arrive. The company provides us
with watches, and we go by them. Before
starting on a journey, we pass through a room
to be inspected. That's to see if we are sober.
But they don't say nothing to us, and a man who
was a little gone might pass easy. I've known
a stoker that had passed the inspection, come
on to the engine, as drunk as a fly, flop down
among the coals, and sleep there like a log for
the whole run. I had to be my own stoker
then. If you ask me if engine-drivers are
drinking men, I must answer you that they are
pretty well. It's trying work; one half of
you cold as ice; t'other half hot as fire; wet,
one minute, dry the next. If ever a man
had an excuse for drinking, that man's a
engine-driver. And yet I don't know if ever a
driver goes upon his engine drunk. If he
was to, the wind would soon sober him.

"I believe engine-drivers, as a body, are the
healthiest fellows alive; but they don't live
long. The cause of that, I believe to be the
cold food, and the shaking. By the cold
food, I mean that a engine-driver never gets
his meals comfortable. He's never at home
to his dinner. When he starts away the first
thing in the morning, he takes a bit of
cold meat and a piece of bread with him for
his dinner; and generally he has to eat it in
the shed, for he mustn't leave his engine. You
can understand how the jolting and shaking
knocks a man up, after a bit. The insurance
companies won't take us at ordinary rates.
We're obliged to be Foresters, or Old Friends,
or that sort of thing, where they ain't so particular.
The wages of a engine-driver average
about eight shillings a day, but if he's a good
schemer with his coals—- yes, I mean if he
economises his coals he's allowed so much
more. Some will make from five to ten shillings
a week that way. I don't complain of
the wages particular; but it's hard lines for
such as us, to have to pay income-tax. The
company gives an account of all our wages, and
we have to pay. It's a shame.

"Our domestic life—- our life at home, you
mean? Well, as to that, we don't see much of
our families. I leave home at half-past seven
in the morning, and don't get back again until
half-past nine, or maybe later. The children are
not up when I leave, and they've gone to bed
again before I come home. This is about my
day:—- Leave London at 8.15; drive for four
hours and a half; cold snack on the engine