The
heart of that engineer, and he was a brave man, as brave as any soldier
on the battlefield, had sunk very low. Railroads were little past their
infancy then and this was the first to cross the mountains. He was by
no means certain of his track, and, moreover, the rocks and forest might
shelter an ambush.
The Alleghanies and their outlying ridges and spurs are not lofty
mountains, but to this day they are wild and almost inaccessible in many
places. Nature has made them a formidable barrier, and in the great
Civil War those who trod there had to look with all their eyes and
listen with all their ears. The engineer was not alone in his anxiety
this night. Colonel Newcomb rose from an uneasy doze and he went with
Major Hertford into the engineer's cab. They were now going at the rate
of not more than five or six miles an hour, the long train winding like
a snake around the edges of precipices and feeling its way gingerly over
the trestles that spanned the deep valleys. All trains made a great
roar and rattle then, and the long ravines gave it back in a rumbling
and menacing echo. Gusts of rain were swept now and then into the faces
of the engineer, the firemen and the officers.
"Do you see anything ahead, Canby?" said Colonel Newcomb to the engineer.
"Nothing. That's the trouble, sir. If it were a clear night I
shouldn't be worried. Then we wouldn't be likely to steam into danger
with our eyes shut.
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