r poisoned with information--a Railway
Guide that shall be rich with doubts and lighted up with miserable
apprehensions. In other Railway Guides, pleasing fancy, poesy and
literary beauty, have been throttled at the very threshold of success,
by a wild incontinence of facts, figures, asterisks and references to
meal stations. For this reason a guide has been built at our own shops
and on a new plan. It is the literary _piece de resistance_ of the age
in which we live. It will not permit information to creep in and mar the
reader's enjoyment of the scenery. It contains no railroad map which is
grossly inaccurate. It has no time-table in it which has outlived its
uselessness. It does not prohibit passengers from riding on the
platform while the cars are in motion. It permits every one to do just
as he pleases and rather encourages him in taking that course.

The authors of this book have suffered intensely from the inordinate use
of other guides, having been compelled several times to rise at 3
o'clock a. m., in order to catch a car which did not go and which would
not have stopped at the station if it had gone.

They have decided, therefore, to issue a guide which will be good for
one to read after one has missed one's train by reason of one's faith in
other guides which we may have in one's luggage.

Let it be understood, then, that we are wholly irresponsible, and we
are glad of it. We do not care who knows it. We will not even hold
ourselves responsible for the pictures in this book, or the hard-boiled
eggs sold at points marked as meal stations in time tables. We have gone
into this thing wholly unpledged, and the man who gets up before he is
awake, in order to catch any East bound, or West bound, North bound,
South bound, or hide-bound train, named in this book, does himself a
great wrong without in any way advancing our own interests.

The authors of this book have made railroad travel a close study. They
have discovered that there has been no provision made for the man who
erroneously gets into a car which is side-tracked and swept out and
scrubbed by people who take in cars to scrub and laundry. He is one of
the men we are striving at this moment to reach with our little volume.
We have each of us been that man. We are yet.

He ought to have something to read that will distract his attention.
This book is designed for him. Also for people who would like to travel
but cannot get away from home. Of course, peop