al-dust and the lack of
oxygen, and turn to the chief room of the house--the kitchen, parlour,
dining-room, drawing-room, nursery, and family bedroom all in one.
Engine-drivers are not always so badly off for space in their domiciles,
but circumstances which are not worth mentioning have led John Marrot to
put up with little. In this apartment, which is wonderfully clean and
neat, there are two box-beds and a sort of crib. Baby sleeps--as only
babies can--in perfect bliss in the crib; Gertie slumbers with her
upturned sweet little face shaded by the white dimity curtains in one
bed; Mrs Molly Marrot snores like a grampus in the other. It is a wide
bed, let deep into the wall, as it were, and Mrs M's red countenance
looms over the counterpane like the setting sun over a winter fog-bank.

Hark? A rumble in the far distance--ominous and low at first, but
rapidly increasing to the tones of distant thunder. It is the night
express for the North--going at fifty miles an hour. At such a rate of
speed it might go right round the world in twenty-one days! While yet
distant the whistle is heard, shrill, threatening, and prolonged.
Louder and louder; it is nearing the curve now and the earth trembles--
the house trembles too, but Gertie's parted lips breathe as softly as
before; baby's eyes are as tight and his entire frame as still as when
he first fell asleep. Mrs Marrot, too, maintains the monotony of her
snore. Round the curve it comes at last, hammer and tongs, thundering
like Olympus, and yelling like an iron fiend. The earthquake is "on!"
The embankment shudders; the house quivers; the doors, windows, cups,
saucers, and pans rattle. Outside, all the sledge-hammers and anvils in
Vulcan's smithy are banging an _obbligato_ accompaniment to the hissing
of all the serpents that Saint Patrick drove out of Ireland as the
express comes up; still Gertie's rest is unbroken. She does indeed give
a slight smile and turn her head on the other side, as if she had heard
a pleasant whisper, but nothing more. Baby, too, vents a prolonged sigh
before plunging into a profounder depth of repose. Mrs Marrot gives a
deprecatory grunt between snores, but it is merely a complimentary
"Hallo! 's that you?" sort of question which requires no answer.

As the rushing storm goes by a timid and wakeful passenger happens to
lower the window and look out. He sees the house. "It's all over?" are
his last words as he falls back in his seat a