t a policeman had me by the shoulders
and was shaking me as if I had been a bad child.

"If you ever do such a thing again," he thundered, "I'll lock you up!"

As soon as I could speak I assured him fervently that I never would; one
such experience was all I desired.

Occasionally a flash of humor, conscious or unconscious, lit up the
gloom of a trying situation. Thus, in Parkersburg, West Virginia, the
train I was on ran into a coal-car. I was sitting in a sleeper, leaning
back comfortably with my feet on the seat in front of me, and the force
of the collision lifted me up, turned me completely over, and deposited
me, head first, two seats beyond. On every side I heard cries and
the crash of human bodies against unyielding substances as my
fellow-passengers flew through the air, while high and clear above the
tumult rang the voice of the conductor:

"Keep your seats!" he yelled. "KEEP YOUR SEATS!"

Nobody in our car was seriously hurt; but, so great is the power of
vested authority, no one smiled over that order but me.

Many times my medical experience was useful. Once I was on a train which
ran into a buggy and killed the woman in it. Her little daughter, who
was with her, was badly hurt, and when the train had stopped the crew
lifted the dead woman and the injured child on board, to take them to
the next station. As I was the only doctor among the passengers, the
child was turned over to me. I made up a bed on the seats and put the
little patient there, but no woman in the car was able to assist me. The
tragedy had made them hysterical, and on every side they were weeping
and nerveless. The men were willing but inefficient, with the exception
of one uncouth woodsman whose trousers were tucked into his boots and
whose hands were phenomenally big and awkward. But they were also very
gentle, as I realized when he began to help me. I knew at once that
he was the man I needed, notwithstanding his unkempt hair, his general
ungainliness, the hat he wore on the back of his head, and the pink
carnation in his buttonhole, which, by its very incongruity, added the
final accent to his unprepossessing appearance. Together we worked over
the child, making it as comfortable as we could. It was hardly necessary
to tell my aide what I wanted done; he seemed to know and even to
anticipate my efforts.

When we reached the next station the dead woman was taken out and laid
on the platform, and a nurse and doctor who had been tel