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 Shrewsbury and Ludlow Railway--probably the
youngest railway manager recorded. Ten years later the Shrewsbury
railway was acquired by the London and North-Western company, and
Findlay, to use his own words, "was taken over with the rest of the
rolling stock." This was how his London and North-Western railway career
began. He was a tall, portly man of fine presence, distinguished by a
large measure of strong, plain, homely commonsense, an absence of
prejudice, a great calmness of judgment, and a fearless frankness of
speech. His sense of honour was very high, and he impressed upon the
service of which he was the executive head that the word of the London
and North-Western Railway must always be its bond. "Be slow to promise
and quick to perform," was his guiding precept. A born organiser and
administrator, he knew how to select his men. Before Parliamentary
Committees he was the best of witnesses, always cool and resourceful,
with great command of temper, full of knowledge, and blest with a ready
wit. His services as witness and expert adviser were in great request by
railway companies. At the long Board of Trade Inquiry in connection with
the _Railway and Canal Traffic Act_ and Railway Rates and