On June 17, 1908, a freight train, running fully thirty miles per hour, approached my signal tower with a clear right of way east-bound. At the same time an express passenger train, rushing at full speed west-bound, came in sight. From a distance of nearly half a mile I could see that a car on the freight train was enveloped in smoke and flame from a hot box. As an actual fact, the engineman, conductor, and brakemen were aware of it. A brakeman was on top of the car watching the trouble. But they were nearing the terminal, and on a parallel east-bound track there was a train that all hands were very anxious to pass by or “jump.” So, by common consent, they were taking the chance on the hot box, and the engineer “had her wide open.” As the freight approached the tower I could see the chips flying from the ties, which indicated that the melted journal had snapped in two. A few seconds later both east- and west-bound tracks were blocked with the twisted rails, broken ties, and derailed cars. The passenger train, consisting of sleepers and crowded coaches, escaped dashing into the wreck by a miracle,--that is, by a mere fraction of time. This is but an incident in the history of taking chances. Concealed in it, however, is a personal lesson that vitally concerns every man in the service. Do we actually insist upon disaster such as threatened this passenger train before we can be persuaded to come to our senses? In this business of taking chances, which covers every branch of railroad service, both the traveling public and the railroad corporations are at our mercy. Through a long course of years, influence and discipline of all kinds have utterly failed to check it. It is useless to talk about “spots,” for most of us take chances systematically. In fact I don’t think the managements have any idea of the nature and extent of this evil, for the reason perhaps that they have made no special study of the subject nor watched for and made note of illustrations, as I have. One would think it would have occurred to some railroad manager to issue a general order, with a caption somewhat as follows: “Here is a list of twenty dangerous chances which some of you are in the habit of taking. For goodness’ sake, have a care!”