I knew the truth in a glance. There had been clamors for the positions of honor, and she, from weakness of sex, had been overborne. She, whose heart cried out for the distinction of train-boy, conductor, engineer, brakeman, or fireman, in the order named, had been forced into the only degrading post in the game--a mere passenger without voice or office in those delicate feats of administration. And she suffered--suffered with a pathetic loyalty, for she knew as well as they that some one _had_ to be the passenger. I held an accusing eye upon my namesake and the train came to a sudden halt, much embarrassed, though the brakeman, with artistic relish, made a vast ado with his brake and pretended that "she" might start off again any minute. My namesake poised himself on the foot that had no stone-bruise and began:-- "Now, Uncle Maje, I _told_ her she could be engineer after we got to the next station--" His tones were those of benevolence that has been ill-requited. "_That_ was las' station," broke in the aggrieved passenger, "an' they wouldn't stop the train there 'cause they said it was a 'spress train and mustn't stop at such little stations--" "I tried awful hard to stop her," said the crafty Sullivan at the throttle, "but she got away from me. She did _so_, now!" "And I said, 'First to be engineer,'" resumed the passenger, bitterly, "an' they wouldn't let me, an' I said, 'Secon' to be engineer,' an' they never let me, an' I said, 'Las' to be engineer,' an' they never let me." "She wants to be _everything_" said my namesake, rendered a little sullen by this concise putting of her case. "You come with me," I said to the passenger, "and we'll do something better than this--something fine!" Her face brightened, for she knew that I never made idle promises as do so many grown-ups. She jumped from her seat, even though the first Sullivan tooted a throaty whistle and the second rattled his brake machinery in warning. I helped her over the side of the box, and as we walked away she shouted back to the bereaved express train a consolatory couplet:-- "First the worst, second the same, Last the best of all the game!" That superb machinery of travel was silent, and the mechanics and officials, robbed of their passenger, eyed us with disfavor. "They are terrapin-buzzards!" exclaimed my woman child, with deep conviction. I shuddered fittingly at the violence of her speech. Before we had gone far the train-boy deserted his post and came running after us. "John B. Gough!" he exclaimed bitterly--profanely. "He's swearing," warned his sister. "Look out, Uncle Maje, or he'll say 'Gamboge' next." "I don't care," retorted the indignant follower; "you can't have a train without any passenger--it's silly. I don't care if I do say Gamboge. There! Gamboge it!"