THE RAILROADMAN

The schoolhouse and the railroad go hand in hand.

Travel is the great educator; it is the supreme civilizer.

HAVE seen corn selling in Kansas for ten cents a bushel, and hogs at two cents a pound, simply because there was no available transportation for these things from where they were plentiful to where they were needed

The railroad cancels distance and annihilates space.

Railroads have only one thing to offer, and that is transportation.

The unit of transportation is the mile haul.

Railroads carry an adult human being a mile for two cents; and they carry a ton of freight a mile for a cent or less.

To carry a ton of freight on a wagon a mile, with average roads, costs thirty cents. To carry a man on horseback, or in a wagon, as was done in stagecoach times, costs ten cents

The stagecoach fare from New York to Philadelphia, say a hundred miles, used to be ten dollars. If you walked the distance,

Book of as my grandfather did, it took three days, Business and the cost of board and lodging along the road was no inconsiderable figure.

George Washington tells in his diary of riding horseback from Philadelphia to Boston in a week, and he thought he was going some ⇓

Now the railroad carries you in two hours from New York to Philadelphia, and the fare is, say, two dollars, and on the route you need neither board nor lodging.

The railroad is the greatest factor in civilization. America holds her proud place among the nations on account of her railroads, because by the railroads the world's markets are brought to the doors of both producer and consumer v

The Uganda Railroad has done more to civilize the Dark Continent than all of the missionaries ever sent there.

"The Trans-Siberian Railroad," says the Honorable James Bryce, "is the one big factor that worked the evolution of Japan, and is civilizing Russia as well."

For lack of travel a man is forever a villager. People who live in one place and see only a few people do not evolve, grow and become. They get pot-bound. The big people of the world are those who travel. They little know of England who only

England know. You have got to get out of Book of
England in order to get the perspective. Business
As you travel, you will always remember

the kindly, gracious people you meet, the
people who speed you on your way, the
people who do not talk you to death, who
do not bore you with the sad story of their
lives, the people who smile. The smile dis-
solves the sediment in our souls and
prevents arterio-sclerosis of the ego
There are railroad-conductors who, as they
pass through a coach taking up tickets,
spread an atmosphere of good-will and
courtesy, and put the whole car in good
humor, not by what they say, but by their
kindly habit of mind.

When the passenger hands him a ticket,
the words, "Thank you!" from the con-
ductor sort of liberate pent-up love, and
lubricate existence V

A railroadman, above all other individuals, should be proud of his occupation. Great responsibilities are resting on him. When he forgets, dire distress may follow. The lives and the treasure and the happiness of a vast number of people are in his keeping.

No matter how menial his occupation, he has an opportunity for serving the public which few people have, and within a few years the consciousness has come to