Perhaps the old gentleman thought something of the sort, for he looked melancholy enough as he pulled his bare, grey head back into the carriage, and the train smoked under the bridge, and forth, with ever quickening speed, across the mingled heaths and woods of the New Forest.
Not many hundred yards beyond Browndean, however, a sudden jarring of brakes set everybody's teeth on edge, and there was a brutal stoppage.
Morris Finsbury was aware of a confused uproar of voices, and sprang to the window.

Women were screaming, men were tumbling from the windows on the track, the guard was crying to them to stay where they were; at the same time the train began to gather way and move very slowly backward toward Browndean; and the next moment--, all these various sounds were blotted out in the apocalyptic whistle and the thundering onslaught of the down express.
The actual collision Morris did not hear.

Perhaps he fainted.

He had a wild dream of having seen the carriage double up and fall to pieces like a pantomime trick; and sure enough, when he came to himself, he was lying on the bare earth and under the open sky.

His head ached savagely; he carried his hand to his brow, and was not surprised to see it red with blood.