le talk--an accomplishment uncommon at any
time, and particularly uncommon in these latter days. In these restless
days when--

"_What this troubled old world needs_,
_Is fewer words and better deeds_."

My year of office quickly passed and I got through it without discredit,
indeed my successor to the chair, Sir (then Mr.) Sam Fay, writing me just
after his election, said that I "had won golden opinions," and expressed
the hope that he would do as well. Of course he did better, for he was
far more experienced than I in British railway affairs, and this was only
his modesty. My friend Sir William (then Mr.) Forbes was my immediate
predecessor as Chairman, and to him I was indebted for the suggestion to
the Conference that I should succeed him in the occupancy of the chair.

Early in the year 1910 a delightful duty devolved upon me, the duty of
presiding at a farewell dinner to J. F. S. Gooday, General Manager of the
Great Eastern Railway, to celebrate his retirement from that position,
and his accession to the Board of Directors. For some years it had been
the custom, when a General Manager retired, for his colleagues to
entertain him to dinner, and for the Chairman of the Conference to
officiate as Chairman at the dinner. Gooday's brother Managers flocked
to London from all parts of the kingdom to do him honor, for whilst he
was esteemed for his ability as a manager, he was loved for his qualities
as a man. Of refined tastes, including a _penchant_ for blue china,
being a thriving bachelor, he was able to gratify them. We were so fond
of him that the best of dinners was not enough, in our estimation, to
worthily mark the occasion and to give him the pleasure he wished, and we
presented to him some rare blue vases which _Cousin Pons_ himself would
have been proud to possess.

By virtue of my office of Chairman of the Conference, I also, during
1910, sat as a member of the Council of the _Railway Companies'
Association_. This Association, of which I have not yet spoken, merits a
word or two. As described by its present Secretary, Mr. Arthur B. Cane,
it is "a voluntary Association of railway companies, established for the
purpose of mutual consultation upon matters affecting their common
interests, and is the result of a gradual development." It dates back as
far as the year 1854, when a meeting of Railway Directors was held in
London to consider certain legislative proposals which resulted in the
Rail