The Argosy — page 41: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

28 : Third Class. because I am not adventurous. Also my appearance, which is re- spectable, and, I trust, benign, is rather calculated to attract the timid female than gay gallants, lunatics, or giddy girls. In fact, l seldom seat myself in a railway carriage and show my face at the window, without its being promptly besieged by timid and unprotected women. The very guards themselves discover me at once, and open my door for nervous passengers, with the remark— ‘Here, ma’am, here’s a lady in this carriage.” Of course, with such fellow-passengers, one is not likely to meet with adventures, but there can be plenty of amusement without them. Colonials, come to visit the mother country, are some of the most interesting of the third-class passengers, and they are generally de- lighted to give you their experiences. You may get as much infor- mation out of an Australian squatter or Canadian farmer between London and Red-Hill, as you will find in a bulky volume of travels from Mudie’s Library. Another pleasant feature of third class travelling is the kindness shown to children. If you have the misfortune to be travelling with little children in a first or second class carriage, your fellow taveliers are apt to glare at you, as though a baby were an indecent exhibition ; and nothing but the impossibility of finding a seat elsewhere, will induce the first class Englishman to remain in a carriage which is desecrated by the presence of a fellow-creature under ten years of age. 9 In a third class carriage I have more than once seen a poor tired mother, with two or three infants, who could hardly have got through her journey but for the kindness of her fellow-passengers. A woman with a baby appeals, more strongly than anything else, to the heart of a ‘‘third class” Englishman. At one time, when I was frequently travelling, at night, in the overcrowded trains on the under- ground railway, I sometimes saw young girls left to stand, while the © men in the carriage remained seated ; but I never saw a woman left standing with a baby. ‘The roughest-looking men would rise, and with a friendly ‘‘ Here, Missis!” give up their seats to the mother. It is this general interest in one another’s concerns which ea stitutes the greatest charm of third class travellers. Some few months ago, I was travelling from London to Wester- mouth. It was the middle of the day, and I had just chosen a comfortable carriage (as near as I could get to the middle of the train) when, as usual, the timid females began to flock. First "a" sea: fais bal middle-aged woman, silently; took the seat Opposite to mine ; then a brisk little woman, who’ might have been fifty years of age, bristled ; in. She had bright, dark eyes, and delicate, waxen-looking features; but her breath was short, and she was struggling with her bundle ; so I tossed it up on to the rack for her. “Oh, dear, you are strong I couldn’t do that, not if it were for e€om (>) 21 0)(0)(0) KS 4(E(0) m