But the whistle sounded.  The page was done.  We sprang to our feet and strung out alongside the track.  There she came, coughing and spluttering up the grade, the headlight turning night into day and silhouetting us in sharp relief.  The engine passed us, and we were all running with the train, some boarding on the side-ladders, others “springing” the side-doors of empty box-cars and climbing in.  I caught a flat-car loaded with mixed lumber and crawled away into a comfortable nook.  I lay on my back with a newspaper under my head for a pillow.  Above me the stars were winking and wheeling in squadrons back and forth as the train rounded the curves, and watching them I fell asleep.  The day was done—­one day of all my days.  To-morrow would be another day, and I was young.

“PINCHED”

I rode into Niagara Falls in a “side-door Pullman,” or, in common parlance, a box-car.  A flat-car, by the way, is known amongst the fraternity as a “gondola,” with the second syllable emphasized and pronounced long.  But to return.  I arrived in the afternoon and headed straight from the freight train to the falls.  Once my eyes were filled with that wonder-vision of down-rushing water, I was lost.  I could not tear myself away long enough to “batter” the “privates” (domiciles) for my supper.  Even a “set-down” could not have lured me away.  Night came on, a beautiful night of moonlight, and I lingered by the falls until after eleven.  Then it was up to me to hunt for a place to “kip.”

“Kip,” “doss,” “flop,” “pound your ear,” all mean the same thing; namely, to sleep.  Somehow, I had a “hunch” that Niagara Falls was a “bad” town for hoboes, and I headed out into the country.  I climbed a fence and “flopped” in a field.  John Law would never find me there, I flattered myself.  I lay on my back in the grass and slept like a babe.  It was so balmy warm that I woke up not once all night.  But with the first gray daylight my eyes opened, and I remembered the wonderful falls.  I climbed the fence and started down the road to have another look at them.  It was early—­not more than five o’clock—­and not until eight o’clock could I begin to batter for my breakfast.  I could spend at least three hours by the river.  Alas!  I was fated never to see the river nor the falls again.

The town was asleep when I entered it.  As I came along the quiet street, I saw three men coming toward me along the sidewalk.  They were walking abreast.  Hoboes, I decided, like myself, who had got up early.  In this surmise I was not quite correct.  I was only sixty-six and two-thirds per cent correct.  The men on each side were hoboes all right, but the man in the middle wasn’t.  I directed my steps to the edge of the sidewalk in order to let the trio go by.  But it didn’t go by.  At some word from the man in the centre, all three halted, and he of the centre addressed me.