Page:Harry Castlemon - The Steel Horse.djvu/10

 "Great Scott! How do you suppose that pile of things came on the track?"

"It isn't a pile of things. It is a big rock which has rolled down from the bank above, and we have discovered it in time to prevent a terrible railroad disaster."

"The rains loosened it, probably."

"Well, what are we standing here for? Let's take hold, all hands, and roll it off before the train comes along."

"We can't roll it off. It's half as big as Rube Royall's cabin. It seems strange to me that it stopped so squarely in the middle of the track. I should think it ought to have gathered headway enough during its descent to roll clear across the roadbed, and down into the gulf on the other side."

The speakers were your old friends Joe Wayring and his two chums, Roy Sheldon and Arthur Hastings; and I am one of the Expert Columbias who were introduced to your notice in the concluding chapters of the second volume of this series of books. I have been urged by my companions to describe the interesting and exciting incidents that happened during