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Show m English Railway Management H A LITTLE more than a year ago Mrs. Henry H North Thornton, an American railroad man, M was called to England to take the place of gen- H eral manager of the Great Eastern Railway of m England. H He made good from the first. He recently B gave a correspondent some most interesting facts H touching English railways from which the fol- M lowing are condensed: m Soon after his arrival the great war burst upon 1 England like a peal of thunder from a clear sky. m The railway managers of England were called H upon to report to the war secretary, Lord Kitch- H ener. vFrom him they received an order that H within sixty hours they must devise means to H move with the utmost dispatch the soldiers and H war material of the government to Southamp- H ton. In forty-eight hours they reported to the H war secretary that they were ready. During the H first few days of the war eighty trains per day H reached Southampton, bringing soidlers and war H material from all parts of the United Kingdom H those from Ireland being sent by sea to Liverpool H or Fishguard, and picked up there by the trains. H The trains pulled into Southampton twelve mln- Hj utes apart. Within three days the roads delivered H into Southampton more than 150,000 men and not H one of the three hundred and fifty-trains was a H minute late or suffered accident. In the mean- H time the regular business trains did their accus- H tomed work. Mr. Thornton declares that the H management of railways in England has been re- H duced to almost an exact science. He added: H "We have some trains on our line that have not H been reported late for years; the total number of H passengers carried on our system annually is es- H timatcd at 145,000,000." H From G a. m. to 9:30 a. m. there are 278 trains H arriving at the Liverpool street station, and the M number of passengers who arrive in that time B average 76,000. During the twenty-four hours H about 700 trains arrive at and depart from that 1 station. M He says also that American passengers have . more comforts on the roads in this country than m Englishmen have on theirs. An American has his H' seat in the Pullman, also in the dining car, also i in the smoker and observation car. These last 1 two are denied him in England. H He concludes by saying; "It is not difficult to H do business with English people if one under- H stands them." H The region traversed by his line is about the H size of the state of Connecticut. What will our H country be when it becomes as thickly settled as H is England? |