a similar course, it would be better for themselves, for the men they lead, and for the world at large.  The deputy-chairman of the society was Michael O’Neill, the audit accountant of the company, and if ever a plain-spoken man, blunt and direct of speech existed, it was he.  Every word he spoke had the ring of honest sincerity.  To the men he spoke more plainly even than I, and him they never resented.  I think their trust in him exceeded their trust in me.  True he was Irish and I was not, and then they had known him much longer than me; and so, small blame to them, said I. One good thing for the society I managed to do.  I induced the directors to treble the company’s annual contribution to its funds, a substantial benefit, of course, to the men.  I remained chairman of the society, and Michael O’Neill its deputy chairman till 1912, when the National Insurance Act came into operation.  Then, by a resolution of a majority of its members, it was wound up, to the regret, however, of many of them, who preferred their own old institution which they knew so well, and in the management of which they had a voice, to what some of them styled “a new-fangled thing.”

The occasions on which I have met, for the first time, men eminent in the railway world, and for whom I have had great admiration, have always left upon me very clear impressions, and this was particularly so in the case of Sir George Findlay, the General Manager of the London and North-Western Railway.  He was not, however, Sir George when I met him first, but plain Mr. Findlay.  It was in the year 1891, the occasion being one of the periodical visits to Ireland of the London and North-Western chairman, directors, and principal officers.  They gave a dinner at their hotel in Dublin to which, with other Irish railway representatives, I was invited.  My seat at dinner was next to Mr. Findlay, and I had much conversation with him.  Then in his sixty-third year, he was, perhaps, interested in a young Englishman, 21 years his junior, who had not long begun his career as a railway manager, and who showed some eagerness in, and, perhaps, a little knowledge of, railway affairs.

I remember well the impression he made upon me.  I felt I was in the presence of a strong, natural man, gifted with great discernment and ability but full also of human kindness.  His face was one which expressed that goodness which the consciousness of power imparts to strong natures.  He was a notable as well as what is called “a self-made” man, a fact of which he never boasted but I think was a little proud.  He commenced work at the early age of fourteen as a mason—­a boy help he could only have been—­and continued a mason for several years.  He was employed in the building of the new Houses of Parliament and much of the stone work and delicate tracery of the great window at the east end of Westminster Hall is the work of his hands.  In his twenty-third year he became manager of the