320 The National Geographic Magazine 



is now able to mail a letter to his agent 

 in Chicago on Monday and receive his 

 reply on Wednesday morning. A tre- 

 mendous advantage of the new train 

 service is that, since the mails at New 

 York close now six hours later, a whole 

 business day is gained at St. Louis and 

 points further west ;' almost a whole 

 business day is gained for Pittsburg, 

 Cincinnati, and Indianapolis. The 

 mails for the new fast trains close at one 

 o'clock in the afternoon at New York. 

 Within an hour on one line, and two 

 hours on the other, these pouches of 

 letters for the west are whirling toward 

 their destination. Columbus gains 

 nearly ten hours by the new service ; 

 Cincinnati, seven hours ; Indianapolis, 

 eleven hours; Kansas City, eleven hours. 

 In nearly all of the country southwest 

 of St. Louis there is a gain of from ten 

 to twenty-four hours. At St. Louis 

 the gain is twenty hours outside of the 

 business district, and twelve hours in- 

 side. Indeed, almost every section of the 

 country has been affected by the new 

 mail schedule made possible by these 

 fast trains. The east-bound mails, of 

 course, make practically the same gain 

 in time. There are minor differences 

 owing to connections at various points. 

 The apparent discrepancies between the 

 gain for business sctions of a cit}' and 

 the gain outside is explained by time of 

 arrival being after business hours. 



An amusing feature of the interest 

 taken in these fast trains is the impres- 

 sions made on those who imagine the 

 trains rocking madly back and forth, 

 taking the curves on two wheels and 

 righting themselves with difficulty, and 

 dashing by the scenery with such swift- 

 ness that nothing is to be seen save a 

 blur of green from the fields. 



' ' Guess you had to hold on to the 

 seat some," was one comment. 



It is a curious fact, but he who 

 travels on one of these twentieth-cen- 

 tury trains can scarcely appreciate more 

 than the results. It does not seem to 



him that the train is moving swifter 

 than an ordinary passenger train ; but 

 when he arrives at his destination, a 

 thousand miles away, eight hours 

 sooner than has been his custom, then 

 he realizes that something unusual has 

 happened en route. He has the feeling 

 that the trip has been exceedingly com- 

 fortable, and he may have noticed that 

 his train has made few stops — very short 

 ones ; that the engines were changed 

 quickly, and that no time was wasted 

 in getting under way again. 



It was the writer's privilege to make 

 the first trip of the Twentieth Century 

 Limited over the New York Central 

 and the Lake Shore Railroads. Aside 

 from one instance, when the train had 

 been delayed by a freight and there 

 were fourteen minutes to be made up 

 within an hour, which was done, it was 

 not possible to distinguish a high rate 

 of speed. An old railroad man was 

 asked where it was that these trains 

 gained eight hours on the average 

 trains running between New York and 

 Chicago. 



" Suppose two men started out to run 

 a mile race," he replied. "If one of 

 them had to stop every hundred 5^ards 

 and the other ran right on, which one 

 do you think would win ? ' ' 



Fewer stops, then, have contributed 

 to the saving of time, but other elements 

 have entered into the matter. During 

 the past five years millions of dollars 

 have been spent in improving track and 

 rolling stock, in shortening distances, 

 and in reducing grades. There is now 

 complete from Boston to Omaha a 

 double-track line of railways. Every 

 mile of this is guarded from wreck by 

 the block signals. Many trains a day 

 travel over the lines with absolute 

 safety. The engines are heavier than 

 formerly. Their capacity for coal and 

 water is greater, and hence longer runs 

 can be made without stops. Where 

 division points were formerty 150 miles 

 apart they are now separated by more 



