I kept a close lookout for the special train, which could not get under way as quickly as I had, and pretty soon I caught sight of it whirling along on the tracks next to the river bank. I veered over toward the train and flew along even with the locomotive for miles. I could see the people with their heads out the windows, some of them waving their hats or hands, while the ladies shook their handkerchiefs or veils frantically. It was no effort at all to keep up with the train, which was making fifty miles an hour. It was like a real race and I enjoyed the contest more than anything else during the flight. At times I would gain as the train swung around a short curve and thus lost ground, while I continued on in an air line. All along the river, wherever there was a village or town, and even along the roads and in boats on the river, I caught glimpses of crowds or groups of people with their faces turned skyward, their attitudes betokening the amazement which could not be read in their faces at that distance. Boatmen on the river swung their caps in mute greeting, while now and then a river tug with a long line of scows in tow, sent greetings in a blast of white steam, indicating there was the sound of a whistle behind. But I heard nothing but the steady, even roar of the motor in perfect rhythm, and the whirr of the propeller. Not even the noise of the speeding special train only a few hundred feet below reached me, although I could see every turn of the great drive-wheels on the engine. On we sped, the train and the aeroplane, representing a century of the history of transportation, keeping abreast until Hudson had been past. Here the aeroplane began to gain, and as the train took a wide sweeping curve away from the bank of the river, I increased the lead perceptibly, and soon lost sight of the special. It seemed but a few minutes until the great bridge spanning the Hudson at Poughkeepsie, came into view. It was a welcome landmark, for I knew that I had covered more than half the journey from Albany to New York, and that I must stop to replenish the gasoline. I might have gone on and taken a chance on having enough fuel, but this was not the time for taking chances. There was too much at stake.