So remarkable are these figures, considering the type of engine
used, that an English technical journal has, since the run was made,
scientifically demonstrated to its own satisfaction that it was an
impossibility. Well, it is the impossible which sometimes happens.
Through all the running at these wonderful speeds the train moved with
singular smoothness. Moments there were of some anxiety, when the cars
swung round a curve or dashed through the streets of a town. At such
times there were those among the passengers who would perhaps
gladly have sacrificed a few seconds of the record. Except for those
occasions, however, there was nothing to tell of the extraordinary
speed--nothing unless one stood on the rear platform of the last car
and saw the swirling cloud of dust and leaves and bits of paper, even
of sticks and stones, that were sucked up into the vacuum behind, and
almost shut out the view of the rapidly receding track. It may be
(it certainly will be) that the average of 65.07 miles an hour for a
distance of 510 miles will be beaten before long. It is almost certain
that the same engines on the same road could beat it in another
trial--taking a slightly lighter train, running by daylight and over a
dry rail. It will be long, however, before such another run is made as
that over the last 86 miles by the ten-wheeler, with William Tunkey in
charge. Railway men alone, perhaps, understand the qualities which
are necessary in an engineer to enable him to make such a run; and the
name of Tunkey is one (however unheroic it may sound) which railway
men will remember for many years to come. An analysis of the figures
given above will show that it was not until within 20 miles of the end
of the run that there was any confidence that the record was broken;
and not until the run was actually finished and the watches stopped
for the last time, at 34 seconds after half-past eleven, that
confidence was changed to certainty.
In addition to the mere speed, everything combined to make the run
supremely dramatic--the disappointment over the first divisions--the
growing hopes dashed by the unexpected flag--the increase of hope
again on the run to Erie--the misgivings as to the type of engine--all
culminating in the last tremendous burst of speed and the triumphant
rush into Buffalo station.
And having left Chicago at half-past three in the morning, at half
past-ten that night I sat and watched Mr. John Drew on the stage of a
New York theatre.