He now saw that the snakelike heads belonged to creatures with large oval bodies, and that, besides the fifty or more which had come up to look at the fire, there were whole droves of them upon the sandy beach beyond.  As far as he could see on all sides, the bank was covered with them.  A strange sight it was, and most fearful.  For his life he could not make out what it meant, or by what sort of wild animals he was surrounded.

He could see that their bodies were not larger than those of small sheep; and, from the way in which they glistened in the moonlight, he was sure they had come out of the river.  He called to the Indian guide, who awoke and started to his feet in alarm.  The movement frightened the creatures round the fire; they rushed to the shore, and were heard plunging by hundreds into the water.

The Indian’s ear caught the sounds, and his eye took in the whole thing at a glance.

“Turtles,” he said.

“Oh,” said the lad; “turtles, are they?”

“Yes, master,” answered the guide.  “I suppose this is one of their great hatching places.  They are going to lay their eggs in the sand.”

—­Captain Mayne Reid.

Would the preceding incident be interesting if we were told at the beginning that the boy and the Indian had encamped near a hatching place of turtles?

2.  Not every story that reads like fiction is fact, but the Brooklyn Eagle assures its readers that the one here quoted is quite true.  The man who told it was for many years an officer of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Company in Illinois, and had annual passes over all the important railroads in the country.  His duties took him to Springfield, the state capital, and as he generally went by the Chicago, Alton & St. Louis road, the conductors on that line knew him so well that they never asked to see his pass.

“One day I received a telegram summoning me to meet one of the officers of my company at Aurora the next morning.  I had only a short time to catch my train to Chicago, and in my haste left my passbook behind.  I did not find this out until I reached Chicago, and was about to take the last train for Aurora that night.  Then I saw that the conductor, a man brought over from the Iowa division, was a stranger, and the fact that I would need my pass reminded me that I did not have it.

“I told the conductor the situation, but he said he could not carry me on my mere representation that I had a pass.

“Why, man,” said I, “I am an officer of the company, going to Aurora on company business, and this is the last train that will get me there in time.  You must take me.”

“He was polite, but firm.  He said he was a new man on this division, and could not afford to make any mistakes.

“When I saw that he was determined, I rushed off to the telegraph office; but it was too late to catch anybody authorized to issue passes, so I settled it in my mind that I must go by carriage, and the prospect of an all-night ride over bad roads through the dark was anything but inviting.  Indeed, it was so forbidding that I resolved to make one more appeal to the conductor.