Page:Hine (1904) Letters from an old railway official.djvu/80

 The switch is more effectual than a torpedo, and if a following train happens to get by him and his torpedoes his own train will not be hit. He should flag just the same, because a train entering the open switch too fast might turn over. It is better to take a chance on a derailment than on a collision. It is better still to have such training, vigilance and discipline that there will be little chance of either disaster.

Train your men to do things because they are right, because it is manly to do good railroading. Then, when you hold an investigation you will not find at the moment the accident happened that the engineman was priming his injector, the fireman putting in a fire, the head brakeman shoveling down coal, the conductor sorting his bills, and the hind man starting to boil coffee for supper.

There is hardly a conductor or an engineman of any length of service who has not at some time overlooked an order or a train. When he has forgotten, his partner has remembered. The trouble has come, bad luck, they call it, when they both forgot. Many a $50 operator has saved the job of a $150 engineman. Keep your men keyed up to the