Mr. Cadwalader had bought in Philadelphia the best comestibles that it could provide, and had them stowed away in big hampers and put in the baggage-car. When the train stopped an hour for food, which it did three times a day, we preferred to spend that hour looking about us and (as Mr. Kasson said) stretching our legs rather than going into the overcrowded eating-rooms, which were reeking of food, loud talk, and ravenous passengers. The stations were always low wooden buildings with a piazza; sometimes no other houses were to be seen. On wooden boxes were enthroned the loafers, who must have ridden miles just to see passengers get in and out of the train. To show how kind these rough people must be when they are not engaged in killing people, chickens foraged about between their huge boots, and I saw a dog quietly asleep within an inch of a kick. As soon as the train started we went into the baggage-car and, seated about on the trunks, enjoyed our delicious feast.
We occupied almost one entire parlor-car. There were only two extra seats, and those were filled by two men surrounded by a mountain of newspapers and magazines of all kinds. I said, nodding toward one of these, "What a handsome man that is!"
"Do you know who it is?" asked Mr. Cadwalader.
"That is the famous scout, Buffalo Bill."
"Really!" I exclaimed. "I had fancied him quite different from that. He looks like the pictures of Charles the First. His eyes are so soft, and he has such lovely brown curls and a could-not-hurt-a-fly look about him."
"Well," said Mr. Cadwalader, "he has killed more men than he can count on his fingers when he tries to go to sleep."
"I can't imagine it," I said, gazing with admiration at Buffalo Bill's fine and kind face and splendid figure. "His friend does not look so amiable."
"I should think _not_. That is the celebrated Mr. Holmes of Texas. He is a terror in this part of the world."
"He looks it," I said. "See all the pistols he has about him. I can see one in his coat pocket, and one in his vest pocket, and..."
"And many under his coat which you can't see."
Just at that moment the "terror" got up, and, lo! a pistol fell out of his clothing on to the floor. Fortunately, it did not go off, but it frightened us almost out of our senses (the ladies, of course). Buffalo Bill picked up the weapon and handed it back to Mr. Holmes, who put it quietly in his pocket, seeming rather abashed.