about eight o'clock
Even the transcontinental railways , as any townsman will tell you , run through Mariposa . It is true that the trains mostly go through at night and do n't stop . But in the wakeful silence of the summer night you may hear the long whistle of the through train for the west as it tears through Mariposa , rattling over the switches and past the semaphores and ending in a long , sullen roar as it takes the trestle bridge over the Ossawippi . Or , better still , on a winter evening about eight o'clock you will see the long row of the Pullmans and diners of the night express going north to the mining country , the windows flashing with brilliant light , and within them a vista of cut glass and snow-white table linen , smiling negroes and millionaires with napkins at their chins whirling past in the driving snowstorm . I can tell you the people of Mariposa are proud of the trains , even if they do n't stop ! The joy of being on the main line lifts the Mariposa people above the level of their neighbours in such places as Tecumseh and Nichols Corners into the cosmopolitan atmosphere of through traffic and the larger life . Of course , they have their own train , too -- the Mariposa Local , made up right there in the station yard , and running south to the city a hundred miles away .