me of father's papers, we
came across a request that under certain conditions you were to be sent
an old keepsake of his, a clock with mother's picture on it. I have
brought it to you."

"And your father and mother, what of them, my friend?" I asked, for the
promise of that clock "under certain conditions" was coming back to me.

"Haven't you heard, sir, poor papa and mama were lost in that awful
wreck at Castleton, two years ago."

And as I write, from the dial of "Scar Faced" Hopkins's clock "My Lady
of the Eyes" looks down at me from across the mystery of eternity. The
eyes do not change as once they did, or has age dimmed my sight and
imagination? Long I look into their peaceful depths thinking of their
story, and ask, "Dear Eyes, is it well with thee?"--and they seem to
answer, "It is well."

SOME FREAKS OF FATE

I am just back from a visit to old scenes, old chums and old memories of
my interesting experience on the western fringe of Uncle Sam's great,
gray blanket--the plains.

If some of these fellows who know more about writing than about running
engines would only go out there for a year and keep their eyes and ears
and brains open, and mouths shut, they could come home and write us some
true stories that would make fiction-grinders exceedingly weary.

The frontier attracts strong characters, men with pioneer spirit, men
who are willing to sacrifice something, in order to gain an end; men
with loves and men with hates. Bad men are there, some of them hunted
from Eastern communities, perhaps, but you will find no fools and mighty
few weak faces--there's character in every feature you look at.

Every one is there for a purpose; to accomplish something; to get ahead
in the world; to make a new start; perhaps to live down something, or to
get out of the rut cut by ancestors; some may only want to drink, and
shout, and shoot, but even these do it with a vim--they mean it.

Of the many men who ran engines at the front, with me in the old days, I
recall few whose lives were purposeless; almost every one had a
life-story.

If there's anything that I enjoy, it's to sit down to a pipe and a
life-story--told by the subject himself. How many have I listened to,
out there, and every one of them worthy the pen of a Kipling!

The population of the frontier is never all made up of men, and the
women all have strong features, too--self-sacrifice, devotion,
degradation, or _something_, is written on every f