Pick up a paper any day that the President
or some big functionary is out on a trip, and you will probably read
how, at the end of the run, he stopped beside the panting engine, and
reaching up to shake the hand of the faithful, grimy engineer, would
say:
"Thank you so much for giving us such a good run. I don't know when I
have ridden so fast before," or words to that effect. He never thinks
that the engineer and crew are but the mechanical agents, they are but
small cogs in a huge machine. They do their part and do it well, but the
brains of the machine are up in the little office and are all
incorporated in the despatcher on duty. Flying over the country
regardless of time or space, one is apt to forget where the real credit
belongs. The swift run could not be made, and the train kept running
without a stop, if it were not for the fact that the despatcher puts
trains on the sidetrack so that the special need not be delayed, and he
does it in such a manner that the regular business of the road shall not
be interfered with.
The interior of the despatcher's office is not, as a rule, very
sumptuous.
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