"Jones and I issued into West Street, sitting on some straw in the bottom of an open baggage wagon. It rained miraculously, and from that moment till on the following night I left New York, there was scarce a lull, and no cessation of the downpour....
"It took but a few moments, though it cost a good deal of money, to be rattled along West Street to our destination: Reunion House, No. 10 West Street, 'kept by one Mitchell.'
"Here I was at last in America and was soon out upon the New York streets, spying for things foreign....
"The following day I had a thousand and one things to do; only the day to do them in and a journey across the continent before me in the evening.... It rained with potent fury; every now and then I had to get under cover for a while in order, so to speak, to give my mackintosh a rest; for under this continued drenching it began to grow damp on the inside. I went to banks, post-offices, railway offices, restaurants, publishers, book sellers and money changers.
"I was so wet when I got back to Mitchell's toward evening, that I had simply to divest myself of my shoes, socks and trousers, and leave them behind for the benefit of New York City. No fire could have dried them ere I had to start; and to pack them in their present condition was to spread ruin among my other possessions. With a heavy heart I said farewell to them as they lay a pulp in the middle of a pool upon the floor of Mitchell's kitchen. I wonder if they are dry by now."
That night he joined a party of emigrants bound for the West, the weight of his baggage much increased by the result of his day's purchases—Bancroft's "History of the United States" in six fat volumes. So in less than twenty-four hours after landing on one coast he was on his way to the other.
If at times he had been uncomfortable on the steamer he was ten times more so on the train. It is hard to realize in these days of easy travelling what the discomforts of riding in the emigrant trains were; crowded together in badly lighted, badly ventilated cars, with stiff wooden benches on either side, which were most uncomfortable to sit on and next to impossible to lie down upon. Meals were taken as best they might when they stopped at way stations while some bought milk and eggs and made a shift to cook themselves a meal or brew a cup of tea on the stove at the end of the car.
Over a week of this sort of slow travelling through the heat of the plains was enough to tax the strength and courage of the most robust man, let alone one in as delicate health as Stevenson at that time, and it is a wonder he ever lived through it. Indeed, he was ill but kept cheerful in spite of all, and was interested in the country and the sights along the way. His own discomforts seemed to dwindle when he contrasted them with those the pioneers endured travelling that same direction twenty years before; crawling along in ox-carts with their cattle and family possessions; suffering hunger, thirst, and infinite weariness, and living in daily terror of attack from the Indians.
He made note of all he saw and the doings of his fellow emigrants, to be used later on. Letters to Henley and Colvin en route are interesting.
"In the Emigrant Train from New York to San Francisco, Aug., 1879.