"Well," said he, "I don't see how any man possessed with any common sense and reason could ever be such a fool as to go to sea."
I said that possibly that was the reason for my going to sea—just simply a want of good sense on my part. But it suited me very well, and I should like to know what objections he had against a sea life.
"Why, sir, supposing you are in a gale and a fire breaks out on board, what are you going to do? You have no back door to escape through?"
"Well, we may be able to leave in the boats."
"But you can't do it in a terrible storm."
"Well, then, we will do the best we can, and do as sailors often are compelled to do, trust in Providence. But for my part, I don't see that we run more risks in a gale at sea than you do in the cities or than we do now on the rail. What is to prevent us from having a smash-up before morning?"
"Well, now, my good sir, I beg of you don't go to sea any more, but just come out to Iowa and buy a nice farm and settle down ashore. You can buy a nice farm with all improvements at from three thousand to five thousand dollars."
I asked him what was the matter with the other man, that he wanted to sell his farm and all improvements. I did not get any satisfactory answer to this, as we had something more serious to attend to. Just at this time I felt a peculiar motion in the car, like a horse cantering. I clapped my hand on my friend and said, "Sit still," and in a few moments I felt my heels grinding on some one—and the next thing was, that we were landed bottom up down twenty-five feet of embankment, and terrible shrieks on all sides.
Three cars were capsized. One in front of us went down on its side, endways. Ours went a side-somersault, and the next one endways, on its wheels. En route we had gathered a number of soldiers who had been drafted and were on their way South. The cars were jammed full.
The furnace in our car did great damage to some, and altogether about seventy were more or less hurt. The accident was caused by a rail breaking, owing to severe frost.