Yardmaster

“ They fear that the old superintendent who gets aboard as yardmaster or dispatcher will be a nuisance, that he will be all the time scheming for promotion, that he may try to dictate to his superiors, that he will have too much dignity to climb a side ladder, that he will be only temporary, that they will soon be put to the trouble of breaking in another man. ”

“ If you are looking for talent to run a yard, consider some ambitious dispatcher. Too few dispatchers have become yardmasters. The same cool head, the same quick judgment, the same executive ability are needed in both positions. ”

“ As the yardmaster and the dispatcher must scatter their trains, so the superintendent must keep his staff doing different things. He must avoid having two men doing the same thing. If it is better to call the roundhouse foreman a master mechanic and invent a title for the man behind the back shop, let us do so ”

“ The yardmaster has one caller and the roundhouse foreman another. The two callers go up the same street, sometimes together, and call men in adjoining houses, an expensive duplication of work. The trainmaster rides in the caboose and the traveling engineer—road foreman is the modern term—in the engine, but neither dares presume to know the business of the other. Every trainmaster should be a traveling engineer and every traveling engineer should be a trainmaster. That will be the case when we train officials along more definite lines. Honey bees feed their future queen a special food. ”

“ The evidence also indicated that yardmasters have supervision over some who work within the yards but who are not spoken of as 'yardservice employees,' such as storekeepers, section men and clerks. On the crucial point, there was substantial agreement among the witnesses that yardmasters are not commonly designated in railroad parlance as 'yard-service employees,' that term being reserved for the yardmen described in the stipulation who work under the supervision of the yardmasters. ”

“ They are free to wander as they list over mead and leaze, and pluck the flowers out of the hedges, and idle by the brooks, all the year round, the latter part of the spring, when the grass is nearly fit for mowing, only excepted. Yet, excepting a few of the elder boys birdnesting, it is the rarest thing to meet a troop of children in the fields; but there they are in the road, the younger ones sprawling in the dust, their naked limbs kicking it up in clouds, and the bigger boys clambering about in the hedge-mound bounding the road, making gaps, splashing in the dirty water of the ditches. ”

“ The red glow within, as the furnace-door is opened, lights up the lad's studious face beneath like sunset. A few brown leaves yet cling to one bough of the oak, and the rooks come over cawing happily in the unwonted warmth. The low hum and the monotonous clanking, the rustling of the wire rope, give a sense of quiet. Let us wander along the hedge, and look for signs of spring. This is to-day. To-morrow, if we come, the engines are half hidden from afar by driving sleet and scattered snow-flakes fleeting aslant the field. Still sternly they labour in the cold and gloom. ”

“ She could dimly see the buildings in the yard now, the stable, the cowshed, her father's office, the men's hut, the post-and-rail fence of the stockyards beyond, with the bushrangers' horses hitched to it all in a row. It struck her forcibly how secure, how safe, they must have felt thus to have left their horses, their only means of escape, alone and unguarded. Should she let them go? Should she drive them away? ”

“ The coachman, when required to yoke the car, would come out of the stable yard to the front of the house and give a loud halloo, and having done so would go back, and you would hear presently from far away down in the valley of the demesne the rapid hoof-beats of a horse, a handsome grey horse I remember, and like rushing wind he would gallop past you into the yard behind the house, eager to leave the solitude of his pasturage for the open road. ”

“ About thirty unbroken horses were moving uneasily within a high, well-constructed stock-yard—the regulation 'four rails' and a 'cap'—amounting to a solid unyielding fence, over seven feet in height.
That the steeds were really unbroken, 'by spur and snaffle undefiled,' might be gathered from their long manes, tails sweeping the ground, and general air of terror or defiance. As each animal was wanted, it was driven or cajoled by means of a quiet horse into a close yard ending in a 'crush' or lane so narrow that turning round was impossible. ”

“ So the scouts jumped—some inside the automobile, some on the running board where they clung for dear life while Frances tore out of the yard, turning the corner of the fence on two wheels and just missing the gate-post by the width of a hair. On down the road sped the machine, completely enveloped in the dust it raised.
Frances was so used to the road by this time that she knew every rut, every rock, and every obstacle in the way from Green Hill Farm to Four Corners store. ”

“ When I got to the door, I found that the barn, to which the waggon, must soon come, lay just to the right, and overlooking the path I must take to the wood. In front of me lay a garden surrounded by a picket fence, to the left of me was a small gate, and that by passing through that gate would throw me into an open field, and give me clear running to the wood; but on looking through the gate, I saw that my captor, being with the team, would see me if I attempted to start before he moved from the position he then occupied. ”

“ When within sixty yards of the fence, he puts on a rush that even his rider's mighty muscles can not check: his impetus would send him through a castle wall; but he hardly rises at the leap, taking it, too, where there is a network of growers—a crash that might be heard in the grand stand—and horse and man are rolling in the field beyond. ”

“ He was gazing anxiously through a gap in the hedge which commanded the Rectory garden-gate. "This is my busy day. So long, old man!"
He vaulted the fence, and set off down the road at a vigorous and businesslike trot. But after a hundred yards or so he halted, and looked round him with an air which can only be described as furtive. Before him the road, white and dusty, continued officiously on its way to the village and duty. ”

“ Having business, we enter, and find ourselves in a spacious yard. Immediately before us and right across the yard runs a tall scaffolding called a gauntry, carrying on its top two travelling-cranes. On our right a little arm of the river runs up, and the gauntry is carried out into and over the water, allowing the travellers to load and unload with the greatest facility, while on our left are the contractors’ temporary offices. ”

“ But in modern times the jackstays are made of wood or iron. However they are made, the sail is secured to the yard by them. You perceive that the yard is held to the fore-topmast by a band of iron over the mast, so that the cross-spar may slip easily up and down. The halyards are forward of the mast, and pass over a sheave in the head of a topmast. The yard is hoisted by men standing on the deck. The two ropes which run from the mast to the ends of the yard are the lifts by which one end may be raised and the other lowered, which is termed cock-billing the yard. ”

“ Think of it lifting and flapping its broken end, and then imagine it raising yard after yard of itself up and up, through the solemn water, more and more of it lifting itself from the bottom, curling itself backward and forward as it rises higher and higher, until at last, with a sudden jump that must have ripped a mile or more of it from the bottom, it claps its end against the thing it wants to touch, and which it can neither see, nor hear, nor smell, but which it knows is there. ”

“ Their last march together, their last foot chorus on the long trails. Square of shoulder, upright, I see even now those figures that have long since been still. Every yard a man crumpled up, any yard it might be YOU. And they laughed and smoked, went forth to call "Halt!" to those waves of grey, advancing some hundred yards away, as if they had a hundred lives to give. ”

“ Some time ago one of the largest freight yards in the western part of the state enjoyed a very unenviable reputation for breakages of draw-bars, derailments of cars, and all sorts of unnecessary delays to passenger trains. Finally a change was made in the yard-master. The new man began operations with heart-to-heart conversations with the yardmen. If they had grievances he was ready to straighten them out. The men had his sympathy and backing, and in return he requested their coöperation in order to convert the record of the yard from the worst to the best on the system. ”

“ Could one have been so situated on one of these hills with nothing to do but witness the two forces making for that fence, the Yankees coming down the hill on their side, moving in line as if on drill, determination on their faces and a quick, steady step without a falter or a quaver—on the other hill a lot of dirty, hungry, footsore, naked and barefoot men lying behind that plank fence awaiting orders. ”

“ The fence, which separated one yard from the other, was broken down, so that the barn yard dwellers, calves, pigs, and poultry, wandered at will in search of amusement or fodder to the very door of the kitchen, and so materially contributed to the general disorder, discomfort, and dirt.
Away from the house, however, where Nature had her own way, the farm stretched field after field on each side of the snake fenced lane to the line of woods in the distance, a picture of rich and varied beauty. ”

“ From the barn-yard, 344 a very variable number, per day. In my own case, two men with three horses have been hauling six and seven loads of sixty bushels, fine compost, a distance of from one-half to three-fourths of a mile, up a long and rather steep hill, and spreading from the wagon, as hauled, upon grass-sod.
Our larger farmers often have one driver and his team, two wagons, one loading, while the other is drawn to the field; the driver slips off one of the side-boards, and with his dung-hook draws off piles at nearly equal distances, to be spread as convenient. ”

“ Yard by yard, with patient under-sea sweeping, all that waste of sand brought down by the Buffalo is being cleared away; yard by yard, two massive arms of solidest masonry are stretching themselves out beyond those cruel breakers: the river is being forced into so narrow a channel that the rush of the water must needs carry the sand far out to sea in future, and scatter it in soundings where it cannot accumulate into such a barrier as that which now exists. ”

“ On one side of the spacious yard or lawn, in front of this building, stood, tied to a post, and impatiently pawing the ground, a noble-looking horse, equipped with a richly-caparisoned side-saddle; while near by, under the fence, sat, patiently smoking their pipes, three Indians, one of whom, as was evident by their contrasted bearing and accoutrements, was a chief, and the other two his attendants. Near the principal entrance was drawn up a two-horse team, having the appearance of awaiting the reception of persons about to depart on some journey. ”

“ Then the starboard watch board the main tack, and the larboard watch lay forward and board the fore tack and haul down the jib sheet, clapping a tackle upon it, if it blows very fresh. The after yards are then trimmed, the captain generally looking out for them himself. "Well the cross-jack yard!" "Small pull the main top-gallant yard!" "Well that!" "Well the mizen top-gallant yard!" "Cross-jack yards all well!" "Well all aft!" "Haul taut to windward!" Everything being now trimmed and in order, each man coils up the rigging at his own station, and the order is given—"Go below the watch!" ”

“ In the next field to the steam-plough the old ploughs drawn by horses may be seen at work, and barns still stand, and the old houses. In hill districts oxen are yet yoked to the plough, the scythe and reaping-hook are often seen at work, and, in short, the old and the new so shade and blend together that you can hardly say where one begins and the other ends. ”

“ Through the thin veil of moonlit mist that slid over the hillside we could see an army of rabbits bunched up, or hopping a few paces forward, feeding.
We set off at a swinging pace down the hill, scattering the hosts. As we approached the fence that bounded the Mill fields, he exclaimed, “Hullo!”—and hurried forward. I followed him, and observed the dark figure of a man rise from the hedge. It was a game-keeper. He pretended to be examining his gun. As we came up he greeted us with a calm “Good-evenin’!”
George replied by investigating the little gap in the hedge. ”

“ I don't dare rake our lawn, because the minute I start, out will come a lot of bolders, leaving terrific yawns in the sod. I'm sure the Duke will forgive me for getting peeved about that lawn, when he understands that there are callouses in my hands and knots in my lawn mower. Also, why on earth, after throwing on the grass seed, do the men drive wagons over it and make ruts and jam their heels into it and make holes, where my vagrant sprinklings with the hose create lakes and puddles and produce never a single grass? ”

“ Panther-limbed, hawk-eyed young persons leap about the lawn dressed in white from top to toe. They play on fast and level lawns, entirely circumscribed by a kind of deep-sea trawling apparatus. They want you to hit hard and well. I have only two strokes when I hit hard. One of them pierces the bottom of the seine or drag-net fixed across the fairway, the other brings the man round from the next-door garden but two to say that his cucumbers are catching cold. ”