Our home was so situated that it overlooked a long
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6 THE GENERAL MANAGER'S STORY

heavy grade on the local railroad, and I used fre-
quently to watch with the greatest interest the freight
trains as they slowly and laboriously puffed and
tugged up the hill, the brakemen sitting — if it hap-
pened to be pleasant weather — on their brake-
wheels, with folded arms, and hat brims flapping in
the breeze, monarchs of all they surveyed. Some-
times they would, for some cause at that time im-
known to me, stop on a slight curve nearly in front
of our place, and then there would be a great shout-
ing and waving of arms and hats. Sometimes the
conductor would come up over the top of the train,
and jaw at the engineer, who apparently never failed
to give him fully as good as he sent ; then if they
failed to start again, they would cut the train in two
in the middle, and take half of it up at a time, to a
convenient side-track at the top, where it would be
coupled together again and proceed on its way.
But it was on the down trips that I got excited.
