Excerpt: 'The railway station stood in the midst of an apparent solitude, and from its one long platform there was no sign of any human habitation. A stranger, looking around him in passing that way, might well have wondered why a station should be found there at all; nevertheless, the board which figured prominently above the white palings suggested the near presence of three places; Wellsby, Meadhope, and Simonstower and a glance at a map of the county would have sufficed to show him that three villages of the names there indicated lay hidden amongst the surrounding woods, one to the east and two to the west of the railway.'