How wonderfully adaptable a creature is man. I had not been a fortnight in my new position when I felt myself quite at home, as though Dublin and the West of Ireland had been my natural habitat. Belfast and the County Down receded into the past; and shall I confess it? much as I had liked the north, much as I admired the industry, manliness and energy of its people, much as I had enjoyed my life there, and highly as I esteemed the friends I had made, something I found in my new surroundings--easier manners, more of gaiety, and an admixture of pleasure with work--that added to life a charm I had hitherto missed, not only in the North of Ireland but in Glasgow and Derby as well. The Secretary of the Midland Great Western Railway, George William Greene, and Martin Atock, the locomotive engineer, were good fellows, and warm friends of each other. I became and remained the sincere friend of both until death took them hence. My principal assistant, called _Assistant Manager_, was John P. Hornsby, now in his 85th year and living in New Zealand. Robert Morrison, whom I stole for his good sense, manly worth, and excellent railway ability, from the Belfast and Northern Counties in October, 1891, succeeded Hornsby as my assistant. Afterwards he became goods manager at the time Thomas Elliot was appointed superintendent of the line, two appointments which relieved me of much detailed work. "The battle of Newcomen Junction" was raging at the time I joined the "Midland," as for shortness we dubbed the Midland Great Western and which, for the same reason, I shall continue to dub it, as convenience may require, during the continuance of my story. If I have occasion to again speak of my _alma mater_, the Midland of England, it shall, for the sake of clearness, be so designated. "The battle of Newcomen Junction." What of it? In railway circles, not only in Ireland but in England and Scotland too, it caused some talk at the time and no little amusement. Like many another conflict, 'twere better it had never been fought, for it left for long afterwards angry feelings where peace and amity should have existed, and it gained nothing that discussion and compromise could not have effected. The City of Dublin Junction Railway, a small line, a little over a mile in length (worked by the Dublin and South-Eastern Company) was formed to link up the Dublin railways and to provide through routes in connection with the Holyhead and Kingstown Royal Mail steamers and the steamers of the London and North-Western Company. A junction was authorised to be made at Newcomen with the Midland Great Western system. Parliament had sanctioned a junction, but not such a junction, the Midland said, as it was proposed to make. It would be unsafe and unworkable they contended, and they refused to allow it. The promoters insisted, the Midland were obdurate; the promoters invaded the Midland premises, knocked down a wall and entered on Midland land; the Midland