But in the majority of railroad stations throughout the United States the station-agent is the staff; he is lucky if he has a man to "spell" him in his "off" hours. He probably is the agent of the express company in addition, and probably the agent of the telegraph company, too, which, by arrangement with the railroad, transacts a general commercial business over its wires. There are frequent instances when the local post-office is situated within the depot and the agent proves the versatility of his profession by acting as postmaster, too. He serves many masters, as you can see, and not all of these are outside of the railroad. He is not only answerable to the superintendent, in almost every case he is freight-agent, too, making out the bills of lading and figuring the complicated rate sheet. For this part of his work he is under the control of the general freight-agent. The general passenger-agent is also his superior officer. To him he must account accurately for his ticket sales, and that is not always a very easy matter. The question of passenger rates is a fairly complicated one. Still, the agent must not only be able to figure the rate to South Paris, Me., or to Oshkosh, Wis., within two minutes, but he must make out a long and correct ticket within that time, while the railroad's patron demands information about some branch line connection on another system a thousand miles away. The country station-agent earns every cent of his humble salary. He works long hours; and then occasionally one of the railroad's travelling representatives will drop in upon him and casually suggest that in his leisure time he might get out and solicit a little business for the company! There is not much loafing at the little yellow depot in the country. Sometimes a group of trainmen from some freight awaiting orders will gather there to swap stories and the keen wit of the railroad. These are the exceptions. The most times are the times of long, hard grind, work, work, work like the men out upon the trains. This railroad army is truly the army of hard work. It was gathered for labor. Yet the station-agent leaning over his telegraph instrument in the bay of his office, and watching the Limited scurry by the little depot, and seeing the president's big and gay private car hitched on behind, knows that that very executive in charge of many miles of railroad and thousands of men, came from another little country depot like this. The time may yet come when he himself will have a private car and a deal of authority. There is a great goal for every man in the railroad service. CHAPTER XVI KEEPING THE LINE OPEN