A newspaper is published regularly on the overland trains of the Pacific Railway. There are telegraph stations everywhere on the route, and the latest news is handed “aboard” to the editor, leader‐writer, compositor, and pressman—represented by, or condensed into, one and the same individual—as soon as the train arrives, and is immediately “set up” and printed. Thus “specials,” “extra specials,” and “special extra specials” follow one another in rapid succession, and keep the train alive with excitement. A term which has come into vogue here originated on the Pacific Railway during the writer’s stay in California. A terrible accident occurred near Oakland, in which one train of the long cars usual in the United States met and literally “telescoped” another. The expression was used in a rather curious way in San Francisco for some time afterwards. If a business man in a hurry ran into another person—say, for example, coming round a corner—the latter would ejaculate, “Hi! are you trying to _telescope_ a fellow?” The writer will not soon forget his ride from Laramie to Sherman, a station on one of the ridges of the Rocky Mountains, which the Pacific Railway crosses at an altitude of over 8,000 feet. Armed with a pass from the company, the courteous station‐master at the former place made no objection to his accompanying a locomotive with a snow‐plough attached in front, then starting ahead of the regular train. The plough was a rough specimen of its kind, in form not greatly unlike the ram of an ironclad, and was constructed of sheet‐iron, covering a strong wooden frame. But it did its work efficiently, scattering the soft snow on either side in waves and spray, reminding one of the passage of some great ocean steamship through the billows. The snow had drifted in places till it was five or six feet deep on the road, but this proved child’s play to the plough, and the services of the navvies, who, seated on the coal, were swinging their legs over the side of the tender, were not required. The greatest danger on the line, now so amply protected by great snow sheds—literally wooden tunnels—and snow fences, arises from snow which has thawed, frozen, re‐ thawed, and re‐frozen until it is literally packed ice. The wheels of a locomotive, arrived at such a point, either revolve helplessly, without progressing, or run clean off the metals.