Of course, taking a wider view of preventable accidents, it is always an easy matter to divide the responsibility for them between the men and the management. This is the usual and popular method of treating the subject. But the idea, reasonable at times, has been overworked, and has now degenerated into a principle that responsibility should always be divided. Consequently, while we are busy adjusting the division, we frequently lose sight of the real issues, and the offenders are allowed to escape. Fundamentally, then, it must be confessed, we railroad men are to blame for these preventable accidents. Most of the trouble can be directly traced to our own personal behavior, that is to say, to our conduct and habits of thought as railroad men. This is by no means a reflection on our character as sympathetic and reasonable human beings. Our intentions are all right, but our training in the railroad business has been all wrong. But it is of little use to talk or write about personality in the abstract. As practical men dealing with a practical topic, we must follow the railroad man out on the road, we must watch him at his work, and we must take notice of the common sense, the caution, and the good judgment or otherwise, which he habitually displays in the execution of his duties. Then, and not until then, can we expect to become qualified to place our opinions or conclusions on record. Now the regulations relating to the running and protection of trains are very similar on all railroads, and therefore the following rule taken from one of our current working time-tables may be looked upon as thoroughly representative. “A freight train must not leave a station to follow a passenger train until five minutes after the departure of said passenger train.” To any ordinary thinker this rule will appear to be plain, positive, and for the most part necessary. Yet as a matter of fact no attention whatever is paid to it either by enginemen, by conductors, or for that matter by superintendents. Its violation has been the cause of collisions and loss of life, but that does not seem to bother us, for we continue to disregard it. Let us take another illustration. At the point where the writer has been employed for many years, there is a junction of four-track and two-track systems. The rule for the handling of trains at this point is as follows:-- “All trains will approach and enter upon four-track sections under complete control.”