A WEEK OF DISASTERS 369 



and had lost all power of my left side and arm (shoulder 

 out). Biss tried "Cognac" afterwards as to paces and likes 

 him all — but his mouth, &c. 



With my usual luck the hounds found a fox at Leaden 

 Roothino-, and ran him to the Blackmore Hiofh Woods. 



This is a week of disasters. On Friday evening, as I was 

 about to retire to my bedroom, a messenger on horseback 

 brouo-ht me a letter from Mould of the "White Hart," announc- 

 ing that poor Frank* had been the subject of a railway 

 accident. The particulars which I afterwards learned were, 

 that returning by the mail train, and being in the rearmost 

 division of a carriage by himself, he had fallen asleep, and 

 awaking suddenly as the train was about stopping at the 

 Brentwood Station, he imagined it to be just starting from the 

 station towards Chelmsford, and that he would be carried 

 beyond his destination. Opening the door and stepping out 

 hastily while the train was still in motion, something w^ould 

 appear to have caught either his foot or his clothes, for 

 though he alighted on his feet on the platform he was instantly 

 drawn backwards, and fell on to the railway between the 

 carriage he had quitted and the next one. 



Providentially, something (perhaps the connecting chain 

 between the carriages) broke or changed the direction of his 

 fall, for instead of falling across the rails, in which case death 

 or at least the loss of a limb would have been inevitable, he 

 fell lencrthwise between them, with his head towards Inoate- 

 stone, and his right shoulder so close to the near rail that the 

 flange of the first wheel pressed it into the soft ground, and 

 cut two small but very deep wounds in the muscle of his arm 

 between the elbow and shoulders, in addition to bruisino 

 severely the whole arm from the shoulder to the fingers. Two 

 pennyworth of half-pence in his coat pocket singularly lodged 

 on the rail and canted the wheel in some degree off the 

 shoulders and arms, leaving their impressions on his railway 

 ticket, which was literally cut in two in his pocket. He did 

 not wait for the second wheel, but drawino- his arm to him and 

 turning on his side fortunately escaped all further injury, and 

 the train immediately after stopping, the porters who witnessed 

 the accident came with lanthorns and extricated him from his 

 perilous position. He lost a good deal of blood and fainted 

 on his way to the "White Hart," where every attention was 

 paid to him by Mould, and he remains under the care of 



* Frank Vickerman. 

 24 



