Part 2 (1/2)

But, except at night, they are seldom indoors. Riding many miles after stray cattle, milking, b.u.t.ter-making, rearing crops for cattle food in the winter. There is plenty of occupation and they work well.

The cattle on such ranches stay out the year round. On the largest the owner often knows not how many there are. Occasionally they are driven into corrals (wooden enclosures), and counted, while the young stock are then branded. The life is necessarily wild, rough, and solitary. The ranch-owner, like Robinson Crusoe, is lord of all he surveys for many miles round. His work is not hard, his gun, his rod, his horses are his amus.e.m.e.nts, but domestic happiness, the charm of ”home” is not his. Think you he is to be envied or pitied?

All ranches in the States are not as above described. Where there is more population the ranches are smaller and differ in other ways. I shall have to describe one later which I bought, so will not do it here.

I had with me a mattress and blankets for the emigrant car beyond New Orleans, but having a first-cla.s.s ticket I supposed this ent.i.tled me to a regular made-up bed in the Pullman carriage which was next to the first-cla.s.s car. I found though it was not so, and that two dollars a night had to be paid for the luxury. In the first-cla.s.s carriage, with small seats holding only two, it was impossible to lie down at all, and so I paid it, but this was the first experience I had of the way Europeans are deceived on the American railroads. When I paid at New York the difference of third to first as far as New Orleans, the official well knew, for I told him, I did it to secure sleeping accommodation, but he took good care not to undeceive me. I have known the same sort of thing occur again and again. The most flagrant case I met with I will mention here. I was in Colorado at the time, and about leaving for England. I wrote to a high official of the Central Pacific Railway, at Denver, for the rates of through tickets to New York. He replied that first-cla.s.s was 48 dollars, second, I think, 44, and added, the difference was small (which was quite true), and that an additional advantage obtained by going first-cla.s.s was that ”it ent.i.tled you to sleeping accommodation.” (I can swear to the six words quoted.) ”Yankee cuteness” had made me suspicious by this time, besides I had never known the Pullman beds included in first-cla.s.s fare, so I wrote again, and asked if he meant what his letter said. Driven into a corner he explained what I had previously known, viz. that only first-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers _could_ use the Pullman, but had to pay extra for it. I wrote back indignantly and said the statement in his first letter was a.n.a.logous, and equally truthful, to the following supposit.i.tious case. A meets his friend B in a town. A points to a jeweller's shop, and tells B he is ”ent.i.tled” to anything in it. So he is if he pays for it, and it was the same with the Pullman car!

We reached New Orleans in due course. It is in lat.i.tude 30 while New York is 41. It is thus much further south, about 1600 miles by rail.

It is not a healthy place, the yellow fever often makes great ravages, but I heard nothing of it. I was only there one day, so can say very little about the town. The sun was very powerful and I did not care to roam. There are many French, and they had imported Cafes on their national plan, with seats outside. Of course the coloured race was numerous, and as a consequence the semi-coloured also. Many ladies and women of this latter cla.s.s are very handsome; I saw some beautiful faces among them. The ”Yankees” are not in the ascendant so far south, and as a consequence the habits of the people are more courteous. The large French element there also conduces thereto.

Another thing struck me, the inhabitants seem to take life easier, there is not the rush and drive one meets with in New York. As regards the people I should not object to live there, but the climate is a sad drawback. The winters are much pleasanter than met with north, but the summers must be far worse, and the yellow fever is a sad ogre.

The princ.i.p.al street is a grand one, very wide, with trees on the Boulevard plan. In this respect it far surpa.s.ses Broadway in New York,[3] while in buildings it is equal to it. I also found New Orleans much cheaper, the dollar commands more. I was only there about sixteen hours, and then left by the Southern Pacific line _en route_ for California.

As I said before, for this part of the journey I had only emigrant cla.s.s tickets. The distance is very great, right across the continent, and to San Francisco, where I was bound, some 2900 miles.

It was with no little anxiety, therefore, I stepped into and inspected the said emigrant cla.s.s carriage, in which I was to spend some five days and nights. The interior will be better understood after I have described the general plan and principle of American trains.

Here in England each carriage is divided into compartments, distinct from each other, holding 6, 8, or 10 pa.s.sengers. In America there are no compartments whatever. Whether first, second, or emigrant cla.s.s, the carriage is open from end to end. In the middle, connecting the doors at either extremity (there are no doors at the sides), runs an open s.p.a.ce, about three feet wide, and the seats are on either side of this pa.s.sage, and placed at right angles to it. Each seat holds two people, the seats are placed in front of one another on both sides the whole length of the carriage or car, except a certain s.p.a.ce at either end, of which presently. When the pa.s.sengers are seated they thus all face the engine, but the back of each seat works on a pivot at its foot, so that the said back can be placed on either side of the seat. In other words, you can thus sit either with your face or back to the engine. This is a great convenience, for, if the carriage is not crowded and two people can occupy two seats, by placing the backs different ways, you can put your legs on the opposite cus.h.i.+on. But it is a greater convenience still in the emigrant cars, for in them a board can be drawn out to fill up the vacancy between the seats, and you thus have s.p.a.ce for a bed. In the emigrant carriages each pa.s.senger is ent.i.tled to s.p.a.ce for his bed at night, and it is thus arranged. The two seats hold four in the day.

At night two of the said four vacate, and occupy a s.p.a.ce above, made large enough for two beds. This is the arrangement when the car is full, which is not often the case, but otherwise one sleeps above and one below. I was fortunate. Sometimes I occupied the upper, sometimes the lower s.p.a.ce, but I never had to share either with another. The above arrangement, viz. s.p.a.ces for beds, is only in the emigrant cars. In the first cla.s.s, and in the second if there is one (for a second cla.s.s carriage is the exception), there is no board to pull out to fill up the vacancy between the seats, nor is there any s.p.a.ce for beds above, so that really, unless you go first and pay the nightly charge for the made bed in the Pullman car, you are far better off in the emigrant carriage than in either of the others.

The s.p.a.ces alluded to above at both ends of the carriages are occupied in one case by a stove and reservoir for iced water, in the other by a lavatory and retiring closet. The long journeys in America _could_ not be undertaken without these conveniences.

In front of the door at each end of the carriage is a small platform, which joins on to and very nearly touches the adjoining one of the next car. The conductor or guard can thus at any time go from one end of the train to the other. So in fact can anybody else, though not permitted into a higher cla.s.s than paid for. There is no difficulty whatever in going from one carriage to another. I have often seen children do it with the train running at full speed. The said platforms, except the pa.s.sing s.p.a.ce, are railed in, and it is often very pleasant to stand out there in the day time and see the scenery, often at night too, when it is hot, for the draught then is very welcome.

The seats in the emigrant cars have no cus.h.i.+ons, they are plain wood.

The pa.s.sengers sit on the pillows or mattresses brought with them, and there is thus no hards.h.i.+p in it. The other carriages have all cus.h.i.+oned seats. The Pullman cars are models of luxury. In some trains there are two Pullmans; one used as a drawing-room in the day and for beds at night, the other for meals. The lavatories in these are most commodious, one for men and one for ladies, and in every possible way the comfort of the pa.s.sengers is studied. You have your meals at any hour you like, the _cuisine_ is good, and all kinds of wine are on the list. You pa.s.s the day reading or writing, though the last is not easy, perfect as the springs are. You smoke, when you will, in a luxurious smoking-room. You can wander from one end of the train to the other, and at night you have a perfect bed. What more can one desire? Under such circ.u.mstances, a week's journey is no hards.h.i.+p; but, and it is an important ”but” to many, to ”do” America in this way is very expensive. The fare is high, the meals dear; thus, to cross the continent in this wise, costs perhaps 40_l._

I advise none but the rich to visit America with travel in view. But those to whom ”money is no object,” as the saying goes, can wander in the States with more comfort and luxury than anywhere in the world.

The American rail-cars, in their construction and arrangements, being so different to ours, it is well worth while to consider which is the better. I do not hesitate for a moment to award them the palm, in their phraseology, ”far and away.” In the first place, in such carriages the murders, thefts, and outrages, we occasionally hear of in England, are simply impossible. I will not dwell on this point, it must be so obvious. Secondly, you can quench your thirst, when you will, in whatever cla.s.s you are; here you cannot do it at all. More, you can wash, you can retire for any purpose, while here, the suffering both s.e.xes often go through, for want of such conveniences, is often very great, sometimes permanently injurious. Thirdly, you are not boxed up in a confined s.p.a.ce in their cars as you are in our carriages. You can have change, choose your society, stretch your legs, go outside, and all this necessarily makes the time pa.s.s pleasantly. That all this is so, every one must allow. Should we not then do well to copy their plan? The conservative feeling, prevalent with some, that _because_ ”our plan is ours it cannot be beaten, and we'll stick to it,” is so contemptible. Let each nation, I say, learn from the other in every way. Perfection is not human, there is always room for improvement, and narrow-minded is the individual who, puffed up with conceit for his own or national attributes, fails to recognize it outside. I know, of course, that to change our plan of rail carriages must in any case take many years, but some might be built on the new plan, and the change tried gradually. If any like privacy, a carriage on the old build would meet the want.

But beyond the carriages there is nothing regarding American railroads equal to, or as good, as our system. Here in England the lowest tariff, the third cla.s.s, is fixed by Act of Parliament. Every line is compelled to provide traffic at a given rate, viz. one penny per mile (parliamentary fares), and thus the poor can always travel cheaply, or the rich either if they choose to go third cla.s.s. In America, as far as I could ascertain, there is no Government interference at all in this respect, and each railroad company can charge what fares it pleases. The consequence is that on some lines the rates are simply prohibitory.

In England we have first, second, and third cla.s.s, to suit the means of pa.s.sengers. In America some lines have first and second cla.s.s, some first and emigrant cla.s.s, but some again only first! The second cla.s.s avails nothing for long distances, inasmuch as you have no room to lie down, and if you go second, as I said above, you cannot, even if ready to pay the charge, get a bed in the Pullman car. You are therefore, unless prepared to go emigrant, practically driven into the first cla.s.s. On those lines where there is only first cla.s.s, you are, of course, still more helpless, and can simply elect between rail and any other conveyance. I later bought a ranch in Colorado, close to a railroad. On that line there was only first cla.s.s. I there wrote the following letter to a local newspaper, and I give it here, as it elucidates much of what I have said.

A RANCHMAN'S PLAINT.

_To the Editor of the_ DAILY GAZETTE.

Sir,--I am an Englishman. I have lately bought a ranch near a station on the Denver and Rio Grande Railway. I naturally thought when I did so, that being near one of the iron roads would be a great advantage in many ways, but experience has shown me I was mistaken, inasmuch as the rates for pa.s.sengers, goods, and live stock are so high, no benefit whatever is conferred by the said railroad.

First, as to the said rates. On all the railroads I have seen in all the many countries I have visited, and I have travelled much, there are different cla.s.ses for pa.s.sengers. Here, on this railroad, there is only one, and that first-cla.s.s.

Where the justice, nay the policy, of this, even in the interests of the railroad? Is it fair to make a poor man travel in a velvet bedecked and gilded carriage and pay for the same, when economy being the one important point to him, he would rather pay less for ruder accommodation? Of course the only object the railroad directors can have by this unique and singular arrangement is to increase the receipts. But does it do so? I say no; many times no. How empty the carriages are! In my own case, had there been a cheap cla.s.s, I should, since I have been here, have once or twice a week visited Denver or the Springs. Instead of perhaps twenty trips, I have made three (my family none), and the last time there were only two other pa.s.sengers with me in the carriage. None of the ranchmen around use the rail. If they have to go anywhere on the line they drive, and all say it is far cheaper to do so and pay livery for the team than incur such high rates. Is not this an absurdity? The rate is, I believe, six cents a mile, which is just about three times that for the third cla.s.s in England. A railway should increase and foster travel. It always does so. No; one exception: the D. and R. G. Railway does not.

In the same way as individuals use their legs, horses, anything in preference to the rail, so it is on this line found cheaper to cart crops to market, and it is so done. Another result: crops don't pay here because the cost of taking them to market is so high. So not only does the railroad not get the existing crops, it also forfeits all which would be grown were the rates reasonable.

Truly the policy figured is a strange one and exemplifies exactly the best way ”not to do it.”

But I dare not trespa.s.s more on your s.p.a.ce, or I could enlarge greatly on other singular facts.

How, because there is compet.i.tion in one case and not in the other, short distances cost more for both pa.s.sengers and goods than longer ones. How it was (I am not sure as to the present) cheaper to take a through ticket when the destination was an intermediate station and get out at that station--if you could! These and much more are not peculiar to the railroad under discussion, though peculiar to America. The whole system of railroads in America puzzles me. With much that other countries might with advantage copy, there are crying evils which, were public opinion more expressed, could never be tolerated. But enough for to-day. If you care to insert this I may write again. E. M.

The American carriages have not the cla.s.s painted on them as ours.[4]