Very pleasant and very interesting I found my new avocation on the County Down, which for short the Belfast and County Down Railway was usually called.  My salary certainly was not magnificent, 500 pounds a year, but it was about 100 pounds more than the whole of the income I earned in Scotland, and now for the 500 pounds I had only my railway work to perform.  Now I could give up those newspaper lucubrations, which had become almost a burden and daily enjoy some hours of leisure.  The change soon benefited my health.  Instead of close confinement to the office during the day, and drudgery indoors with pen and ink at night, my days were varied with out-door as well as in-door work, and I had time for reading, recreation and social enjoyment.  My lean and lanky form filled out, and I became familiar with the greeting of my friends:  “Why, how well you look!”

The County Down railway was 68 miles long.  Situated entirely in County Down, it occupied a snug little corner to itself, bounded on the north by Belfast Lough, on the south by the Mourne Mountains, and on the east by Strangford Lough and the Irish Sea.  To the west ran the Great Northern railway but some distance away.  The County Down line enjoyed three fine sources of seaside traffic, Bangor, Donaghadee and Newcastle, and was rich in pleasure resorts and in residential districts.  It even possessed the attractions of a golf course, the first in Ireland, the Kinnegar at Holywood, but more of that anon.  As I have said, it was a busy line, and it was not unprosperous.  The dividend in 1885 reached five and a-half per cent., and in spite of considerable expenditure necessary for bringing the line up to first-class condition, it never went back, but steadily improved, and for many years has been a comfortable six and a-half per cent.  In 1885 the condition of the permanent way, the rolling stock, and the stations was anything but good, and as the traffic showed capacity for development, to stint expenditure would have been but folly.  I do not think, however, the outlay would have been so liberal as it was but for Lord (then Mr.) Pirrie, who was an active and influential director, though there were also on the Board several other business men of energy and position.  Indeed, it was a good Board, but the Chairman, though a shrewd far-seeing man, had, like John Gilpin’s spouse, “a frugal mind,” and Lord Pirrie’s bold commercial spirit quite eclipsed his cautious ways.  One instance will suffice to exemplify this, and also to illustrate the novelty of my new duties, which were delightful in their diversity and activity to one whose life hitherto had been confined to sedentary work.