duty to God or man, and are ever ready of our good will. The farm-hands threshed to resort to chicanery, deceit and arrogance for the purpose of overreaching those to whom they are actually indebted for the position and emoluments they enjoy. It is to afford protection from the injustice of this latter class of men that I strongly urge the establishment, by railway employes, of an association open to those connected with all departments of the service. If you would secure the respect of unprincipled men you must be in a position to command it In other words, to be respected, you must be feared.

the rye and oats on rainy days with the flail, (we had no machine,) or they shelled the beans, or husked the yellow corn, and sang snatches of old songs long since forgotten and numbered with the things that were; and the air was sweet with smells of clover hay and meadow brakes, and the rafters were festooned with cobwebs whose fineness and delicacy no human skill could rival; and the blue-green swallows twittered in their nests beneath the crossbeams; and above all, the soft patter of the rain made music on the moss-grown shinI feel grieved to hear that your Associa-gles; and all the trees on the hill-side tion has been so sorely tried, but sincerely were dyed a fresher green, and the parched trust that a brilliant future awaits it. Let its members practice the principles that adorn your JOURNAL and both it and they will eventually flourish, however great may be the opposition now exhibited towards them. I shall be glad indeed to receive copies of your rules, etc., and will send you ours (now under revision) when completed.

I trust the day is not far distant when this earth will be girded by an association comprised of honest, manly, dignified, industrious railway employes. Trusting to have the pleasure of hearing from you again, I remain,

Yours fraternally,
T. F. ATKINS, Gen. Sec.

A RAINY DAY.

PORT JERVIS, Nov., 1877. MESSRS. EDITORS: It the universal fashion to rail at rainy days, and to get blue and cross at such times. "Any temper may be excused on a rainy day," says somebody we were reading about the other day. Now, we do not believe in this condemnation of rainy days. A rainy day is to many persons a holiday. Those whose employments are out-of-door should hail rainy days as the children at school hail Saturdays. When I was a child, I lived on a farm away back in the country, and on rainy days the big old barn was our playground. What good friends we were with the speckled hens and the meek-faced cows, and the red oxen, and the old white horse, aud how many forbidden handfuls of corn did these friends of ours receive as tokens

grass on the garden slope revived in the grateful moisture, and the dahlias and asters were heavy with diamond raindrops; and in the swollen brook the snowwhite geese paddled, and were happy as kings on thrones. The monarch of the barn-yard, the red-backed rooster, went about with his tail at half-mast, and sought refuge for his disconsolate condition on the lee side of the cow-shed. How plainly it all comes up before us to-day! How distinctly the pleasant, homely picture is photographed upon our memory!

And even at this late time a rainy day has lost none of its wierd charms. Though wide vistas of joy and sorrow lie between then and now, we still love a rainy day. We have our life all to ourselves. Outside cares are laid aside for the time. No visitors love us well enough to brave the storm.

We can rummage old chests, and bring forth treasures of other days without fear of being disturbed. We read our old letters, full of affection and sweetness still; perhaps the hands which formed those faded lines have long since moldered into their native clay. We try on old garments, out of fashion, and imagine ourself our own grandmother, in embroidered petticoat and short gown. We finish odd jobs of work, which have lain for months, waiting just such an opportunity, and we think of old friends who have passed beyond, and wonder what they are doing to-day in that far and mystic land over the River.

A rainy day! To be alone with memory-alone with duties to perform-to live

over the past-to realize the present-to fect character) must be accordant and indulge hope of the future.

Even

adorned with graces, and dazzle with the But to sit at ease by one's own fireside, brilliancy of consistency, equal to the richsurrounded by those who love us and whom est mosaic picture ever wrought. we love to know and feel that, on this the most humble duty accomplished, counts rainy day, no alien presence will intrude-one precious stone, to be set with the infiwhat is better? what is sweeter than home? nite variety.

FROM AN ENGINEER'S WIFE,

MOSAICS.

Of Division 54.

The great and noble have left works never to be obliterated, wrought many fine and noble edifices of intellectual structure, which dispense rays of light to many a

It is by the refraction of clouds that we see the beautiful colors of the rainbow. It is the concentration of a hundred influences that forms the beautiful phenomenon of life. Each noble act performed does its little to help complete the toilsome work. Each good deed only adds one mosaic, which shall reflect light and beauty through the years.

MESSRS. EDITORS: In ancient times won-heart. derful pavement was wrought by fitting together small pieces of colored stone or glass, that they might blend transparently. They were cut in pieces of the requisite sizes, from slender rods of different degrees of thickness. Mosaic is from a Greek word, meaning pure. The mastic was composed of calcined marble and finely powdered Travestine stone, and in time it became sufficiently indurated. The work was susceptible of a polish like crystals, and the rare colors blended together and reflected their light in marvelous beauty. "The Florentine Mosaic, used chiefly for the decoration of altars and tombs, or for cabinets and the like, is composed of precious materials in small slices of veneers;" and, by harmonizing the tints of the marble or jasper, beautiful imitations of flowers or fruit are produced. None but the hardest stones are used.

After the careful toil of years, and even centuries, a perfect work was formed from particles so minute as scarcely to be considered separately. Some have been executed occupying periods of from twelve to twenty years, and requiring from ten to fifteen thousand different shades of the primary colors for the purposes of the work.

The most important remains of pictorial art are the mosaics in the churches, and the most ancient representations of the Virgin Mary now remaining are the old mosaics in the churches of Rome and Venice, and are perhaps the purest specimens of the style in Italy. They cover a surface of many square feet of the upper walls, and are laid upon gold ground.

Our lives are mosaics, that should be blent with beauty and with care. The polished mosaics (if we would form a per

In this advancing age of the world there still remain mosaics of the lives of those who have long been but dust; yet their beauty cometh forth, and their life shall not be counted among the wasted. The choicest graces will harmonize with the tears and trials, teaching us how to suffer and rejoice-how to search for duties to perform which shall bless our race.

ONLY A WOMAN.

TRENTON, MO., Nov. 28, 1877. MESSRS. EDITORS: While thinking on the uncertainty of life and the "vanity of all human pursuits," the lapse of time and the certainty of death, we wonder that our brother engineers neglect to avail themselves of our Mutual Life Assurance. Two of our members have died within the year, one with a policy and the other without. Less than one-half of our total membership enjoy the benefits of insurance. Some, no doubt, think the proceeds will not be honestly applied, or through ignorance of the plan neglect to insure. When the business was in other hands with no responsible head, we had a right to hesitate to join and consent to run it as a "side track " or side issue to our institution. But under the present management, when we have taken it into our organization as a part and parcel of the B. of L. E., we should all join and share the mutual benefit and protection. It

NEW YEARS.

We hail the approach of another new year,
With feelings of joy and delight;

And hope, now all brilliant with the hues of the bow,
Gilds our pathway with visions so bright.

Yet clouds dim our joy on this happy day,
And we dwell on the past with a pain,

On the year that is gone, on its time mis-spent,
Never more to be ours again.

We think of bright hopes that are yet unfulfilled,
Of air-castles gone to decay,

Like the dew-drops of morn by the sunbeams dis-
tilled,

Like the cloud shadow flitting away.

We think of the friends that have bid us adieu,
Whose absence has taught us their worth,
We mourn our neglect when the past we review,
But grief can't recall them to earth.

Then let us spend the year that's to come,
That when it has passed away,

The review may afford a prospect as great
As the prospect of to-day.

Dec. 18, 1877.

ALICE.
Springfield, Ill.

The Bournal.

CLEVELAND, JANUARY, 1878.

THE WRONG REMEDY.

It is currently reported that the officers of the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western and the Lehigh Valley Roads are requiring those of their employes that belong to the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen's Union to sign a paper renouncing their allegiance to said organizations, under penalty of dismissal from the service of the companies. The reasons assigned for pursuing this course, to our mind, are very foolish indeed, and the remedy applied will never cure the evil complained of. Although the men may be compelled by force of circumstances to submit for the present to a flagrant outrage, the time will come when they will retaliate. If any members of the Brotherhood, during the recent strikes on those roads, were guilty of committing any overt act they should be punished, but we do not think it right or just to condemn the organization for the acts of a few of the members, no more than it would be to hold the church responsible for the perfidy and faithlessness of some of its prominent members. Our experience has taught us that more flies can be caught with molasses than vinegar, and our advice to the officials of those roads is if they want to prevent a recurrence of the bane of society, 'strikes," to cultivate a spirit of kindness among their employes, make them feel that you have an interest in their welfare; do by them as you would like to be done by, and you will apply the only effectual remedy for all the evils that arise between the employed and the employer. Much stress has been laid upon the action taken by the Conductors' Brotherhood and Insurance Association in passing resolutions condemnatory of strikes, which was very commendable in them if there was a probability of their ever engaging in a strike. When reading the resolutions we were reminded of the remark made by W. H. Vanderbilt a few years ago: "Give me a reliable man man on the engine and I will take any of my clerks and make conductors of them."

ROCHESTER, N. Y., Dec. 12, 1877. MESSRS. EDITORS: Several years ago there was a man traveling through the country representing that he belonged to our Order; this he done to get favors. He was advertised in the JOURNAL, and I heard no more for a short time. He next appeared as Jim Wood, and run several hotel bills. Jim had two or three letters from some part of Pennsylvania to come and pay his bills. He was found out to be a fraud, and some one gave him a whipping. He has now appeared as Henry Watkey's brother on some western railroad, acting as Master Mechanic; and tells a smooth story about going to Boston to bury one of his friends, that he has got out of money and will send it to them as soon as he gets home. In this way he victimized one man in Binghamton, this week, out of ten dollars. He was in Toledo, Ohio, in October, and told about the same story. Mr. Watkey says he has no brother in the railroad business, and this man traveling through the country representing himself to be his brother is a fraud, and he should be stopped some way. I think it would be well to insert a notice in the JOURNAL that would check this villain Fraternally,

in some way.

CHAS. THOMAS.

MR. F. B. GOWEN is out with another scheme

for rendering the public the helpless slaves of the coal monopoly. Mr. Gowen is a man of brains, and has done some things for which he deserves credit; but he would become a public enemy if he could carry out his colossal schemes for absopublic must trust to the natural obstinacy and rivalry of the different parties concerned to protect it against Mr. Gowen and his magnificent projects.-Boston Herald.

We do not wish to speak disparagingly of their organization, and to fleece them out conductors, but we believe in being honest of what they paid to its substitute. It and truthful, and we want to remind them does not seem to us that it requires much that a few years ago some of their most study or reflection to determine which of prominent members were very persistent the two terms applies to him. in their efforts to form an alliance with our organization for the very purpose of doing what they now condemn, and the engineers at least are entitled to credit for preferring to paddle their own canoe. And we repeat what we have frequently assert-lutely controlling the coal trade. As it is, the ed, that the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers are opposed to strikes and will not resort to them unless compelled by the tyrannous conduct of such men as Gowen, and others of his ilk. We admit that strikes are fruitful of much harm and ought to be avoided if possible, and no one is more willing to prevent them than we But when all overtures for a peaceful adjustment of differences are rejected, what are we to do? Our only alternative is submission or stop work. All the differences that have arisen between the engineers and their employers we were willing to submit to a board of arbitration and abide by their decision, which is the only just way to settle disputes.

are.

POOR SECURITY.

It will be remembered that, last spring, when the President of the P. & R. Railroad Company had the great contest with his engineers, and instituted a sort of a "beneficial society," to supplant their "Brotherhood Insurance" feature, he (Gowen) offered for security three parties, viz.: the Company, whose stock soon depreciated to nearly nothing; the firm of Seyfert & McManus, of Reading, which has heavy mortgages on it; and then "Boas Bank," which has recently gone up the spout" in the most regular style imaginable. Now, taken all together or in detail, wasn't it glorious security? And were not the engineers wise in not accepting it? This is only equaled by his advice to his employes, some years ago, to invest their surplus earnings in the Company's stock; but they didn't, and that's where they acted wisely, too. Judging Mr. Gowen by the foregoing, we must conclude that he is either very short-sighted or else a-trickster!-Norris

town Monitor.

From the foregoing extract it is easy to see that our estimate of Mr. Gowen at the time of the difficulty was a just one. We did not believe then, and we do not believe now, that the welfare of his employes entered his mind, but that it was just what we claimed for it-a cunningly devised scheme to delude the men into giving up

We have no desire to be unjust or vindictive, but we cannot refrain from expressing the conviction that the Herald has just expressed the true inwardness of the man. It is what he has been striving for all along; he made slaves of his miners, and worse, for even a master who has any regard for his own interests will see to it that his slaves are properly fed and clad, but the wages that Mr. Gowen paid would not admit of either being done. He tried it with his engineers, and although he succeeded in running his road, yet it was done at such a cost that the balance-sheet of the Company does not afford very pleasant reading for the stockholders, but now it touches the pockets of even editors, and the dear public is interested. Men may starve and children be compelled to go barefooted and hungry, and no fault be found; but when self-interest prompts they are ready to condemn.

BOUND VOLUMES.

Bound volumes of the JOURNAL for 1877 will be ready in a very few days, and we are prepared to fill orders for any reasonable number that may be required at the extremely low price of $1.50 per volume. We have also a limited supply of the years 1871 to date, which will be furnished to those who send in their orders first.

It hardly seems necessary to remind our members of the satisfaction that there is, and the desirability as well, of having a complete file of the JOURNAL to refer to as a record of events that have transpired in times past.