The Strand Magazine/Volume 4/Issue 19/The Queer Side of Things
The Queer Side of Things.
THE LEGEND OF BILL ERIE.
Adapted from the French of J. Soudan.
ROM New York to Toronto, and from the Niagara Falls to Cleveland, wherever you travel you may hear from the railway official the story of "Bill Erie"—that noble soul who died rather than disgrace his craft.
Bill got his second name from the Lake Erie Railway, the property of the Vanderbilts, whereon he was employed as porter. He had held the trunk-smashing championship of America for many years. He had broken all the records as well as all the boxes. Ordinarily clever porters smashed their thousands—Bill smashed his tens of thousands. No patent iron-bound trunk had terrors for Bill—he smashed them all; while, as for ordinary portmanteaux and hat-boxes, he just annihilated them collectively in batches. You couldn't get ahead of Bill.
"I guess I could break up that lot with kid gloves on."
It is a sad thing, though, to think that even Bill was beaten at last. Everybody, even the boldest, meets his Waterloo some day. Still one may be pardoned a manly tear for poor Bill Erie. That he should have died, and by the treachery of a fellow porter!
The box that caused all the trouble was a plain-looking, old-fashioned box enough, although pretty stout. Bill Erie smiled to look at it. "I guess I could break up that lot with kid gloves on," he said.
He lifted it, that strong, noble man, as high as the crown of his head. Then he let it fall with a mighty bang.
There was something wrong. A little chip flew out of the concrete platform, but the box lay uninjured. "That's a'mighty queer," said Bill. "Reckon I'll have to boot it." Then he raised his foot—that mighty foot, clad in a boot which would go through a brick wall of its own weight.
"He executed his famous war-sance on the lid."
He kicked. Everybody within hearing jumped a foot high at the shock. There was a slight mark on one side of the box; that was all. Then he kicked again. This time he hurt his big toe. Then he tried all his regular dodges, and even executed his famous war-dance on the lid—that war-dance which had, again and again, burst in a new burglar-proof safe. But he knocked a piece of iron off one boot and hurt his feet on that solid mass. After that he went home, disappointed, rage gnawing at his heart.
All night he lay in anguish. That he, the champion smasher, should fail at an ordinary wooden box was bad enough, but the noble fellow felt most for the reputation of his employers. That any package should escape uninjured from that line would involve a loss of prestige terrible to think of.
"He took a mighty swing with the hammer."
Next morning, wearied and dispirited, he borrowed a sledge-hammer. Taking the box into a quiet corner, and divesting himself of his coat, he took a mighty swing with the hammer, and brought it down with all his force upon the lid. The hammer-head flew into a million fragments, and the shaft jerked away into space. The box actually seemed to smile at him. Poor Bill went sorrowfully away, and, leaving a request that the box be still kept at the station (for, at least, he could delay it), he paid for the sledge-hammer and took to his bed. It was as well he did. For he was so down in the mouth as quite to lose his regular form, and probably would have failed at an ordinary packing-case.
After a while, however, a notion struck Bill. He jumped up and bolted Poor downstairs shouting "Eureka!" Bill didn't know what the word meant, you see, but he had a sort of general notion that it was the correct thing to shout when you ran downstairs without waiting to dress. He went back, however, and put on his uniform, because it struck him that the thing should be done in style, and with all proper form and ceremony. Then he went off to the depôt, feeling like a new man.
He dragged the trunk a little along the line, and shoved it across the rails just as the late express came up. and waited. Then he lay by and waited.
Presently the express came along. Bill sat up and looked for his vindication. There was a rush, a roar of fifty thunders, and the engine passed by with the cow catcher smashed off. Bill didn't trouble about the train, but rushed for the fragments of the box.
Weep, O mountains of Adirondack! Howl, O mighty catawampus of the prairie! There lay the box without a mark! A little longer, and perhaps a little flatter, Bill fancied, but then Bill's mind was a bit disordered, you see.
Then Bill Erie's heroism came out strong.
"A mighty conqueror cannot survive a defeat," he said. "I have hitherto been conqueror among the destroyers of trunks. I will die, but my enemy shall perish with me."
"There lay the box without a mark."
With all his remaining strength the noble fellow dragged that box to the very top of the high tower on Bunker's Hill, and then, with his eyes closed and the box firmly clasped in his arms, he threw himself down, down, down to death.
"He threw himself down."
From New York to Toronto, and from the Niagara Falls to Cleveland, all good railway men revere the memory of Bill Erie.
The trunk did not break in the terrible fall that killed poor Bill. After his death, the secret came out. You see, Sam Slutters, the next best trunk-smasher on the line (who was a mean skunk, for all his good qualities) had a great jealousy of Bill. So he just put that box in his way after he had filled it tight full with sandwiches and buns from an English railway refreshment room, and riveted the sides firmly to the adamantine contents.
Nobody could do anything with that box, so they put a brass plate on it and stuck it over Bill's head by way of a gravestone. On the brass plate the following epitaph (adapted from the Greek of Thermopylæ) has been engraved:—
"Passer-by, tell Vanderbilt, the king of the railroads of the New World, that Bill Erie died to avenge the honour of the Railway Company."
A dynamite scare. 
"ASK A POLICEMAN"
1. "CONSTABLE, THAT CABMAN HAS BEEN GROSSLY INSOLENT TO ME! I INSIST ON YOUR TAKING HIS NUMBER"
2. "CONSTABLE, THAT DEAD DOG HAS LAIN HERE FOR THREE DAYS. I INSIST ON YOUR REMOVING IT INSTANTLY!"
3. "CUSH'BLE, THEESH PAVEMENTS POSH'V'LY DANG'ROUS! I INSIST ON YOUR SETTING 'EM SHTRAIGHT!"
4. "OH! CONSTABLE, THOSE PEOPLE OPPOSITE ARE SOLD OUT OF CASHMERE AT ONE AND SEVENPENCE THREE-FARTHINGS A YARD! CAN YOU TELL ME WHERE TO GO?"
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