to realise what they were before this change took place; slow speed, delays and discomfort; bare boards; hard seats; shunting of third-class trains into sidings and waiting there for other trains, sometimes even goods trains, to pass. Mr. Allport might well be proud of the part he played.
Another matter which concerned, not so much the public as the welfare of the clerical staff of the railways, was the establishment of Superannuation Funds; yet the public was interested too, for the interests of the railway service and the general community are closely interwoven. Up till now station masters and clerks had struggled on without prospect of any provision for their old age. Their pay was barely sufficient to enable them to maintain a respectable position in life and afforded no margin for providing for the future.
At last, the principal railway companies, with the consent of their shareholders, and with Parliamentary sanction, established Superannuation Funds, which ever since have brought comfort and security to their officers and clerical staff, and have proved of benefit to the companies themselves. A pension encourages earlier retirement from work, quickens promotion, and vitalises the whole service. On nearly all railways retirement is optional at sixty and compulsory at sixty-five.
The London and North-Western was the first company to adopt the system of superannuation, the London and South-Western second, the Great Western came third, the Midland fourth, and other companies followed in their wake.
In 1873 the Railway Clearing House obtained Parliamentary power to form a fund for its staff, with permission to railway companies not large enough to successfully run funds of their own, and also to the Irish Railway Clearing House, to become partners in this fund. The Irish Clearing House took advantage of this, as also have many railway companies, and practically the whole of the clerical service throughout the United Kingdom can to-day look forward to the benefits of superannuation.
CHAPTER VIII.
SCOTLAND, GLASGOW LIFE, AND THE CALEDONIAN LINE.
On the last day of December, in the year 1872, between seven and eight o’clock in the evening, I arrived at Glasgow by the Caledonian train from Carlisle, and was met at Buchanan Street Station by my good friend Tom.
After supper we repaired to the streets to see the crowds that congregate on Hogmanhay, to make acquaintance with the mysteries of “first-footin’,” and to join in ushering in the “guid new year.” It was a stirring time, for Scotchmen encounter their Hogmanhay with ardent spirits. They are as keen in their pleasures as in their work. Compare for instance their country dances with ours. As Keats, in his letters from Scotland says, “it is about the same as leisurely stirring a cup o’ tea and beating up a batter pudding.” The public houses and bars were driving a lively trade, but “Forbes Mackenzie” was in force, and come eleven o’clock, though it were a hundred Hogmanhays, they all had to close. We met some new-made friends of Tom’s and joined in their conviviality. I was the dark complexioned man of the party, and as a “first-footer” in great request. We did not go home till morning, and reached there a little hilarious ourselves, but it was our first Hogmanhay and may be forgiven.
Dear reader, did you ever lie in a concealed bed? It is a Scottish device cunningly contrived to murder sleep. At least so Tom and I found it. It was my fate to sleep, to lie I should say, in one for several weeks. Its purpose is to economise space, and like Goldsmith’s chest of drawers, it is
“contrived a double debt to pay,” a sleeping room by night, a sitting room by day.