In November, 1909, as was my habit unless prevented by other important duties, I attended the General Managers’ Conference at the Railway Clearing House in London, and to my surprise and delight was unanimously elected Chairman of the Conference for the ensuing year, the first and only occasion on which the Manager of an Irish railway has been selected to fill that office.

The Conference consists of the General Managers of all railways who are parties to the London Clearing House, which means all the principal railways of the United Kingdom.  Other Conferences there were such as the Goods Managers’, the Superintendents’, the Claims Conference, etc., but it was the General Managers’ Conference that dealt with the most important matters.

I remember that, in returning thanks for my election, I ventured on a few remarks which I thought appropriate to the occasion.  Amongst other things I said it was breaking new ground for the Conference to look to Ireland for a Pope, but that in doing so they exhibited a catholicity of outlook which did them honor; and I added that, in filling the high office to which they had elected me, though I should certainly never pretend to the infallibility of His Holiness, I should no doubt find it necessary at times to exercise his authority.  At ten o’clock in the morning this little attempt at pleasantry seemed to be rather unexpected, but it raised a laugh, which, of course, was something to the good.  The Conference was a businesslike assembly that prided itself on getting through much work with little talk—­an accomplishment uncommon at any time, and particularly uncommon in these latter days.  In these restless days when—­

   “What this troubled old world needs,
   Is fewer words and better deeds.”

My year of office quickly passed and I got through it without discredit, indeed my successor to the chair, Sir (then Mr.) Sam Fay, writing me just after his election, said that I “had won golden opinions,” and expressed the hope that he would do as well.  Of course he did better, for he was far more experienced than I in British railway affairs, and this was only his modesty.  My friend Sir William (then Mr.) Forbes was my immediate predecessor as Chairman, and to him I was indebted for the suggestion to the Conference that I should succeed him in the occupancy of the chair.

Early in the year 1910 a delightful duty devolved upon me, the duty of presiding at a farewell dinner to J. F. S. Gooday, General Manager of the Great Eastern Railway, to celebrate his retirement from that position, and his accession to the Board of Directors.  For some years it had been the custom, when a General Manager retired, for his colleagues to entertain him to dinner, and for the Chairman of the Conference to officiate as Chairman at the dinner.  Gooday’s brother Managers flocked to London from all parts of the kingdom to do him honor, for whilst he was