Page:Hine (1904) Letters from an old railway official.djvu/113

 benefit of his wider experience, of his peculiar interest in its territory, of the infusion of fresh blood which his advent would mean.

Suppose an official has resigned for any good personal reason, or because he couldn’t reduce the size of the engine nozzles fast enough to suit a new management. When he starts out to hunt a job his brethren of the profession receive him with sympathy. They promise to help him out. Each begs him to understand how impossible it is for him to catch the pay car on that particular line. Perhaps his informant has been on that company’s payroll only six months himself, but he waxes eloquent on the benefits of civil service, on the desirability of making their own men, of overcoming previous demoralization. This would be amusing if it were not a serious business. Each seems to flatter himself that he got aboard because of peculiar personal fitness, and inferentially denies such attribute of genius in the man on the outside. As a matter of fact, the recognition of outside talent is usually a consequence, of acquaintance, of happening to know the right man at the right time, of having previously worked with the appointing official. All this