RAILWAY TRAVELLING IN AMERICA.
[FR011 OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.]
Washington, August 12, 1864.
THE New York papers which will reach London with this letter will contain all the meagre but sufficient information that we have at the North concerning recent naval and military events.
From the war I turn to a subject which, judging by the latest London papers that have reached us, has more interest for you— railway travelling in the lJnited States. Your discussion of the various:: modes in which it is possible to save yourselves from being knocked on the head and thrown out on the track, and at the same time to secure "modest girls" from being affronted with foul linguage from "half-drunken men," has at once provoked our mirth and awakened our sympathy. Having once used railway- carriages like yours, and having many years ago substituted for them cars in which comfort, convenience, economy, and privacy— mark the last—are almost perfectly attained, we cannot but be both amused and sorry at your rejection of these cars, and at your reasons for rejecting them. The principal of these reasons is very well put in the following extract from a letter signed "13. N. S.," which appeared in the London Daily News, and which has been repub- lished here as a curiosity :—
"The saloon system is not only thoroughly American, but American in that aspect of American character -which is most opposed to English tastes and habits. The Americans live in public, shunning seclusion and retirement if not with morbid dread, at all events with instinctive aversion. What is known in this country by the privacy of domesti life is practically unknown in the groat cities on the other side of the Atlantic. And as the permanent home of an American is usually an hotel, so his travelling home is very naturally a saloon car or saloon steamer. But all this is entirely nn-English."
I quote this passage not only because it is germane to the sub- ject, but because it gives me the best possible occasion for saying something about the view which it presents of our national cha- racter,—a view which is generally, if not universally entertained by those Europeans who are entirely ignorant or superficially informed with regard to the people of this country. This view is so mon- strously incorrect as not even to be within the bounds of caricature. It is simply and positively the absolute reverse of the truth. "The Americans " are not gregarious ; they do not live in public ; they do not shun seclusion and retirement ; the privacy of domestic life is not unknown on this "side of the Atlantic" (leaving out Mexico, South America, and the Canadas, for which I do not undertake to speak), but on the contrary is more earnestly sought, and in particular, and upon British evidence, is more entirely respected than it is in Great Britain. To say that "the perma- nent home of an American is usually an hotel" is to make either an assertion known not to be true or one not known to be true. I gladly admit that when made, as it so often is, by British writers, it belongs to the latter category, and is due to a union of ignorance and indifference upon its subject. Know, then, that an "American," if he is so unfortunate as to live at an hotel or a boarding-house, never thinks of calling it home, but ruefully speaks of himself as a homeless man. An " American " (marvellous and incomprehensible creature that he is !) desires first of all things a house of his own, and that only he calla a home. We have a proverb here that no house is big enough for two families, and in vain has the effort been made here by visionary architects to put up houses in which people may live upon the Parisian plan. If a man here can live by himself he insists upon having his home at least like Paul in his own hired house. lie will have his own roof ; he loves his own hearth. Hence those acres upon acres, those mile-long lines of houses in New York, whose monotonous comfort
and respectability so weary eyes enamoured of the social contrasts of Europe. But not only does the " American " seek isolation in regard to domestic affairs ; he does not regard himself as thoroughly and perfectly "homed," according to the Yankee ideal, unless he owns his dwelling-house. In this matter (I of course am speakiug of the great mass and not of the exceptions) his philosophy is "Touchstone's," "a poor thing, Sir, but mine own." The old home- stead is that to which his.heart clings most dearly under all vicis- situdes of life, and the Act known as the Homestead Law, which seeks to induce westward emigration by giving, and to a certain extent protecting, a plot of ground for a permanent family home, is a purely Yankee device appealing strongly to Yankee instincts. The Yankee not only loves his home and seeks domestic seclusion, but he is extremely reluctant to admit strangers within that charmed circle. Hence it is that we have such large hotels and so many of them. For, owing to the vast- ness of our country and the much travelling to which we are com- pelled, food and lodging for travellers must be had ; and owing to our love of domestic privacy, united to the comfortable condition of our people as a whole, we have very few lodging-houses, because we have few, almost none, of that class of people who with you take lodgers. People here who are in the condition of life which furnishes your lodging-house keepers are so well to do and so sen- sitive about their domestic privacy that they will not have a stranger in the house with them. Only the going into it in a large way as a regular business, or the pinch of unaccustomed poverty, ever induces people here to share their home with other people. And as to the very keepers of hotels, I speak from knowledge when I say that their families do not appear at the public table or even take their meals in the public dining-room, but live by themselves in entire seclusion from the guests of the house.
Having travelled in both carriages and cars, I can assure you that as to seclusion and privacy the advantages of the car over the carriage are very great. And if my readers will but reflect a moment the truth of this proposition, which at first may seem to some of them paradoxical, will become clear. Let any one of them answer to himself where is he most alone, most free from the intru- sion of looks and of personal criticism, in a railway-carriage with from one to five strangers, or in Cheapaide or Pall Mall at noonday with five hundred ? If we had our choice at the theatre or the opera we should make up our own party and take a nice private-box. This is the next best thing to having the perform- ance in your own house. But as the latter is impossible except to kings and princes, and as the private-box arrangement is within the reach of very few, we go to the open theatre. Again, suppose going alone or with a single companion, we had a choice between sitting in the open theatre and being shut up, locked up, during the performance in a private box with half-a-dozen strangers whom we never saw before, and of 'whom we knew nothing, in which situation should we deem ourselves most secluded, least liable to observation, most free to enjoy ourselves to our liking ? In the open theatre I take it. Under such cir- cumstances the contact in the private box would be too close, the forced endurance of strange company in the same little apartment would be annoying, while in the crowd of the open house we and our little party would be to all intents and purposes alone. So in railway travelling, if we could make a party and fill a carriage, well,—that is the next best thing to a special train. But if we cannot do that, which leaves us most to ourselves, —to be locked up in a little box with five utter strangers, three of them facing us, or to sit in a room in which there are sixty, no one of whom faces us, and the face of no one of whom we need see unless we choose ? For in the open cars of this country the seats all face one way, and the traveller, unless he chooses to do other- wise, sees only the backs of his fellow-travellers, who, unless he desires it, do not become in any sense his companions. He is no more exposed to intrusion from them, feels their presence no more, than if he and they were walking at the same time in the throng that fills Broadway.
There is much more to the purpose which might be said upon this subject ; but my assigned limits are almost reached, and I can but touch lightly on one or two points more. I read the pas- sage which is the occasion of this letter just after I took my seat for a journey of ten hours and a half at a stretch without change of cars, and I was led by it to observe the incidents of my travel a little more closely than usual, but I must omit or postpone the mention of nearly all of them. My fellow-passengers were the ordinary miscellaneous company that fills a car in this country. Among them were half-a-dozen officers, one of them a colonel, and a serjeant of cavalry whose rugged cheek had been laid open by a sabre gash but lately healed. Looking at them closely as they went in and out when the train stopped for water or inspection I noticed that but few, hardly half-a-dozen, belonged to the culti- vated classes. There were no ladies in this car. But during the whole journey I heard not one word, saw not one act which would have been found unpleasant in the most punctilious drawing-room in the world. Yes, I did see one. One man spat on the floor of the car, and only one. For I observed closely as I left the car, which being in the first morning train was as neat as a new pin when we entered it, and when I left it there was but this one defilement. Had the road been in the South or the extreme West the case would have been different. But the South is filled with chivalric high-bred gentlemen, as Mr. Beresford hope will tell you, and the extreme West is our—nay, Europe's—Australia. But had "a half-drunken man" or any man done or said what would have annoyed "a modest girl," be would have been very quickly put by himself in a baggage-car, if not left to himself by the roadside. But such incidents are to all intents and purposes unknown here. Modest girls can and do travel here hundreds of miles alone by rail as undisturbed by rudeness as if they were at home, finding also every man ready to be their respectful servant. I noticed also that in this car, except two pairs who came in as old acquaintances, no two men spoke together during the whole long journey. "1 he Americans" are very reserved in this respect, and are shy of opening conversation with people to whom they have not had the honour of an introduction, unless occasion calls for communication, and then they talk as freely as if they bad known each other for years, and, whatever their various conditions in life, upon terms of perfect equality. Mr. Trollope noticed this reserve and complained of it. He is right ; the Yankee carries, I think, to excess the English reserve common to him and to his British cousin. As we sped along we heard a little snap like that of a whip. The check-string had been pulled. We turned our heads, and looking through the rear window saw that the string bad not only been pulled but parted. The coupling between our car and that behind (the last on the train) had become unhitched, and the car was of course left behind. We might have gone on no one knows how long, at least until the conductor came through the train again, and the car have been left until a collision had ensued, had it not been for that check-string, which nobody pulled,—nobody had time to pull, but which was of course pulled by the car itself as it fell away from the train. This check-thing, this simple, common-sense contrivance, of which you are so shy, for fear your trains should be subject to continual, cause- less, and of course dangerous stoppage, is never abused among WI, or vainly used. Are the Briton's nerves so much lees steaiy than the Yankee's that he can't be trusted to cry "Port the helm?" I don't believe it. A YANKEE, New York, August 20, 1864. Jr my letter of August 13 reached London in time for publi- cation my readers may remember my telling how the last car of the train in which I went from New York to Washington fell behind into what would have been a perilous position, had it not been for the check-string which the car itself pulled. We stopped, backed, and in less than five minutes heard the welcome cry of "All right !" and on we went. When we turned our heads at the snap of the string one or two cried "Hallo, we've left the ladies behind ;" for the car which uncoupled was the ladies' car—an "in- stitution" which judging from the Spectator of July16, is unknown to you. No such antipathy to a special provision for their comfort as you mention is felt by women here, but the contrary. A ladies' car is attached to every train that leaves a principal station. This car is of course always the freshest and most comfortable in the train, and is generally the last or the next to the last. But it is not filled entirely with ladies, gentlemen accompanying ladies having of course a right to enter it. And if the train be crowded after the principal station is left, even single gentlemen get admit- tance, the conductor usually contriving without giving offence that only such men enter it as will be agreeable to its fair inmates. I will add here that one objection does occur to me against your using the check-string which does not obtain with us,— that is the unprotected British female, with whose traits and habits inimita- ble John Leech has made us so well acquainted. The unprotected female is a purely British "institution," which has not taken root in our soil. There are a very few here, but like other luxuries they are imported. Any woman born and bred in this country may be safely trusted in a car with a check-string. In the only instance in which I ever heard of the improper use of this guard a man was the culprit. A Frenchman going north- ward by the Hudson River Railway stopped the train because he thought that they had forgotten his portmanteau! For that portmanteau he had a check in his ppcket which secured hhn payment, not only for the thing itself if it were lost, but for damages caused by any unreasonable delay in its delivery. And now this matter of bag and baggage has been so simplified and systematized that you can send to an express office, buy your railway tickets there and have at the same time all your luggage checked from your house to your place of destination, and whether you go ten miles or a hundred not see or know anything about it until you find it in your room on your arrival. Damage in this case, too, is paid by the express company, even for unreasonable delay. The cost of this entire relief from care is about a shilling sterling on each article for thirty miles, the cost diminishing in proportion as the distance increases.
The silence among fellow-travellers here which I noticed in my last letter is merely the result of the Yankee's disposition to keep himself to himself and not to talk with strangers unless there is occa- sion. On the journey to which I referred I noticed sitting just before me on the opposite side a negro. He was evidently one of the poorest and humblest of his humble race, not a lovely creature to look upon either in person or in dress. He would not have ventured to take a seat in any car but that, unless he had gone into one which contained some negro soldiers which were on our train. A gentleman came in and took the seat behind him. Soon after one of the authorized vendors of fruit and confectionery who are permitted on all our railways passed through the car, and the gentleman bought three fine peaches of him. Before be ate one himself he leaned over and offered them to the negro, and I noticed that he contrived that Sambo should take the finest one. Now the gentleman was known to me by sight and name, though I am not acquainted with him, and there probably is not in the whole country a stronger opponent than he is known to be of any social intermingling between the negro and the white, or of giving the former any political status. This I thought of after the little incident which I have related, and which seemed to me to have a bearing upon the assertion often made in Europe that "Ameri- cans," and especially we of the North, "hate the negro."
On again, and we come to the broad mouth of the Susquehanna ; too broad, too deep to be bridged. But we don't leave the cars. The whole train goes over in three parallel lines on an immense platform or flat boat, propelled by steam, with three tracks laid upon it upon which the cars are run. On again, and we reach Baltimore, but still keep our cars. They are drawn round to another st ition through the outskirts of the city, five large horses being harnessed tandem to each car. The horses are guided entirely by the voice, and a horn is loudly blown at short intervals to give warning that the cars are coming.
A fresh engine, and on we dash again. We are now on the Baltimore and Ohio road, against which General Lee's forces have frequently "operated," and which is under military supervision. I am two hundred miles south of my home and am weary of my ten hours' journey,—hungry, too, for this train affords no time for luncheon. The heat is intense, and the strong breeze made by our quick passage is like the breath of a furnace. I look at my watch, see that in little more than half an hour we shall be due in Washington, and am cheering myself with the prospect of a bath, a dinner, and a bed, when a sudden check, a swaying motion, a crushing sound, three or four quick heavy thuds, and we stop short. All in our car spring to their feet and go out. We meet the ladies streaming out of their car in alarm ; but when we tell them to keep their se ts, that whatever has happened is over, they all go quietly back like good, brave girls as they are. In a deep cut, where with a shamef iii parsimony not peculiar to this company only a single track has been laid, two passenger trains have run slap into each other. Luckily neither was running at full speed, but as it is there are death and ruin. We see the horrid sight of a man with his head and half his body protruding from between two cars, where he seems to be crushed as flat as paper ; yet he lives and looks at us imploringly. There is instantly apparent a lack of systematic provision for such an emergency. Men do not fall into their places ; there is no recognized subordination,—in fact no one to take command, for no one in authority appears. The conductors have both fled. But in an instant, as it seems, three men with axes are hewing away at the end of the car where the crushed man looked mutely out upon us. A few blows show, however, how long it will take to relieve him thus. Then it occurs to one or two that in spite of the ruin the cars may be uncoupled and moved back a little one by one. They call upon all to help, and all come instantly as if obeying superior orders. They work with a will and with intel- ligence, and the cars in a few minutes—two or three—are disea-
tangled and moved back. Two men are killed, one seriously injured, and many have braises and contusions. There is but one house in sight. The dead and seriously wounded are borne thither, and we find hospitable preparation already made for them, beds spread down stairs, stimulants and water ready. The army surgeons take possession, and place a sentry at the door to keep out intruders. The telegraph soon brings up official persons and swarms of workmen on a hand-car from the next station. But what is to be done? It will take two days to remove that wreck (it did take more), there is only one track, and already, before they could be stopped by telegraph, three immense trains have come up on each side of the scene of our disaster, one of them filled with rebel prisoners of war. It is decided that a new track must be laid around the ruin, beginning of course far distant on each side, that the curve may not be too great ; and the constructor thinks that he can do this in three or four hours. Night has come on, and the woodwork of the broken cars is torn off and built into bonfires to light the workmen. Four hours stretch into five, six, and the track is not half laid. It is decided that the waiting trains cannot be backed twenty miles each way, and so the work must go on. It is a strange sight, those brawny half-clad men working in light of the blazing ruins, with two hundred people -watching and anxiously waiting upon their labour. The night wears on, it is two, three, four o'clock, and without shelter, with- out food, having only gram or sand to sit upon, the dew so heavy that we have to go to the bonfires once an hour or so to dry our clothes, we remain there eleven weary hours. Thirty of us are women, some of whom have little children with them ; but they make themselves as comfortable as possible, and utter no complaint. Indeed in all that crowd I beard not one murmur through that night, although censure was sharp enough upon the conductor who was the cause of the accident. He will be punished, and the company will have heavy damages to pay to the wounded and the families of the killed. At last the welcome whistle and rumble are heard, we throng into the train, and at five o'clock in the morn- ing enter Washington, at which your correspondent rejoices with the joy of a man who has bad but two hours sleep in sixty, and
nothing to eat or drink in twenty-two. A YANKEE.
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