Different from this was the experience of a car of eastbound California oranges traveling via the gorges and canyons of a Rocky Mountain railway. A broken axle precipitated trouble in the middle of the train which threw the “cripple” out of alignment and in shorter time than is consumed in relating it, the down-grade impetus and pressure wrenched it free throwing the disabled car clear. It fell to the bottom of the gorge, the automatic couplers linked the drawheads of the separated halves of the train and no one was wiser until the following springtime freshets uncovered the debris at the base of a cliff, clearing up a mystery for the checkers and claim department. Sparks from passing locomotives do widespread damage to crops and fencing and a battalion of agents are continually engrossed with personal injury matters and destruction of stock. A car of expensive western steers was recently heading eastward to the seaboard when early in the morning prairie grass in the racks of troughs igniting from sparks started a blaze. Being under way, the crew did not detect the trouble at once but, on learning the danger, they raced to the water tank at Ingersoll. Before the water was reached a draw bar pulled out and broke setting the emergency brakes hard, jolting the train to a sudden stop. Fifteen head of the cattle were found roasted to death and three jumped from the car and ran amuck crazed with blisters and the intense heat. Railroading is not all profit. Some days you cannot lay up a cent. The following true story is apropos:-- “How many cows have you now?” inquired the visitor. “Eight,” replied Farmer Corntossel, discontentedly; “all comin’ home reg’lar every night to make work for somebody.” “I understand two of your neighbor’s cows got hit by railway trains last week.” “Yep. An’ he got cash fur ’em, too. I don’t see how that feller trains his cattle not to shy at a locomotive.”--_Washington Star._ When the public magnifies the cash returns from ticket sales and freight traffic it has not an accurate conception of the immense sums paid out annually by the railway companies for the adjustment of even small claims. Traffic Manager Adam Scott of the F. W. Woolworth Company, with eighty-five stores in Canada, was instrumental in having authorized during the past fiscal year $16,000 in vouchers issued to write off small claims on less than carload shipments of glassware and crockery. This firm controls nine hundred and ninety-eight stores in America and the sums involved in this phase of profit and loss must be immense.