into his life and interprets the end to which he is
tending."

Then came up from the keen intellect-quiver of our Rocky Mountain
engineman all the stock phrases, replies, and arguments of Voltaire,
Rousseau, Ingersoll, and others whose writings he knew perfectly.

With Christian and cultivated patience the minister listened and then
said with captivating and sympathetic tenderness: "But, my dear sir,
that is all speculation on the part of those scholarly and eloquent
men whom you quote so accurately. They know no better. The religion of
Jesus is not speculation; it is practical knowledge. Would not you,
sir, like to know personally as to its truth?"

"Yes, but how can I?"

His foot had been taken in the snare of the wise trapper.

Said the preacher: "You can; and this is the way. As you leave this
city for your return to the West, get a cheap New Testament; indeed,
here is a copy; please accept it. Tear it in two in the middle,
retaining only the four Gospels--Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Read
them; you will by yourself and by this means find the way to perfect
knowledge."

He of the throttle, hungry for the deepest knowledge, did as directed
and advised.

Back to his cab and engine he went, under the deepest conviction. Yet
he declared that he needed no extraneous assistance to be as good as
any Christian; Jesus he considered a superfluity, and said so. The
negative influences of the atheistic authors yet warped him. He said:
"I dare any of you to watch me. I can and will be as upright as any
Christian on earth." But after a short time of exemplary conduct, he
would wake up some morning only to discover to his hearty disgust that
he had been on an extended period of dissipation. Later he would
attempt another straightening-up and try to "be good" without the
necessary becoming so, only to fall again and harder than before.

Once, after such humiliating debauch, he entered a saloon which
contained the only barber shop in the village, the railway division
point where he had his "layovers" for regular rest. He sat down for
his daily shave. It was the morning after pay-day among the employees,
and, as he stated it to the writer, "everybody, even the barber, had
been drunk." Cigar stumps, empty bottles, cards, and other plentiful
signs of the previous night's carousals covered the floor with
bacchanalian litter. Lying there, eyes shut, an Armageddon was taking
place on the stage of his perturbed soul. His story