try an honest
life.

"At the depot we worked our way through the Babel of at least one
thousand Germans, Irish, Italians, and Norwegians, with whom nothing
goes right; every one insists that he is in the wrong car--that his
baggage has received the wrong mark--that Chicago is in this direction,
and the cars are on the wrong track; in short, they are agreed upon
nothing except in the opinion that this is a 'bad counthry, and it's
good luck to the soul who sees the end on't.' The conductor, a
red-faced, middle-aged man, promises to give us a separate car; but,
while he whispers and negotiates with two Dutch girls, who are traveling
without a protector, the motley mass rush into the cars, and we are
finally pushed into one already full--some standing, a part sitting in
laps, and some On the floor under the benches--crowded to suffocation,
in a freight-car without windows--rough benches for seats, and no
back--no ventilation except through the sliding-doors, where the little
chaps are in constant danger of falling through. There were scenes that
afternoon and night which it would not do to reveal. Irishmen passed
around bad whisky and sang bawdy songs; Dutch men and women smoked and
sang, and grunted and cursed; babies squalled and nursed, and left no
baby duties undone.

"Night came on, and we were told that 'passengers furnish; their own
lights!' For this we were unprepared, and so we tried to endure
darkness, which never before seemed half so thick as in that stifled
car, though it was relieved here and there for a few minutes by a
lighted pipe. One Dutchman in the corner kept up a constant fire; and
when we told him we were choking with smoke, he only answered with a
complacent grunt and a fresh supply of the weed. The fellow seemed to
puff when he was fairly asleep, and the curls were lifting beautifully
above the bowl, when smash against the car went the pipe in a dozen
pieces! No one knew the cause, except, perhaps, the boy behind me, who
had begged an apple a few minutes before.

"At Utica we dropped our fellow-passengers from Germany, and, thus
partially relieved, spent the rest of the night in tolerable comfort.

"In the morning, we were in the vicinity of Rochester, and you can
hardly imagine the delight of the children as they looked, many of them
for the first time, upon country scenery. Each one must see everything
we passed, find its name, and make his own comments. 'What's that,
mister?' 'A cornfield.'