Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 October 1885 — There Was Life in IL [ARTICLE]

There Was Life in IL

About eighteen miles' above Centralia, Illinois, the engineer began to blow toot! toot! toot! and to slacken his pace, and by and by the train came to a standstill. The male passengers rushed out, as in duty bound, and in time to see a man lying on the rails in front of the engine, and another man bending over him. When the crowd, headed by the conductor, reached the spot tho man on his feet explained: “I discovered him about ten minutes ago, and as I didn’t want to see the train run over him I gave you the signal.” “But why didn't you pull him off the track ?” asked the conductor. “I couldn’t be hired to touch a dead body,” was the reply. “What! is he dead?” “Reckon he is that”

We examined the body and found life in it. He was a poorly-dressed man, seemingly in hard luck, and for the matter of that so was the other. “1 think,” said the stranger who had stopped the train, “that he’s taken pizen and laid down here to make sure work of it. If you are a mind to take him on to Centralia I’ll kind o’ rub him into life and get a doctor to pump him out” The conductor assented, and we lugged the body into the baggage car. The case created considerable talk among the passengers, and a purse of $7 was made up for the unfortunate. However, as we sl&wed up for Centralia, and before the purse was presented, there was a great yelling from the baggage car, and we looked* oxit to see the two tramps dusting it across a held. It was a game they had played to get w twenty-mile lift.— Detroit Free Press. The man who speaks truth speaks it within the walls of no creed; confides it to no religion; the world is his auditorium, and the race his audience.