His cars were then running to Dungarvan, Waterford, and Wexford in the south-west of Ireland; to Bandon, Rosscarbery, Skibbereen, and Cahirciveen, in the south; to Tralee, Galway, Clifden, Westport, and Belmullet in the west; to Sligo, Enniskillen, Strabane, and Letterkenny in the north; while, in the centre of Ireland, the towns of Thurles, Kilkenny, Birr, and Ballinasloe were also daily served by the cars of Bianconi. At the meeting of the British Association, held in Dublin in 1857, Mr. Bianconi mentioned a fact which, he thought, illustrated the increasing prosperity of the country and the progress of the people. It was, that although the population had so considerably decreased by emigration and other causes, the proportion of travellers by his conveyances continued to increase, demonstrating not only that the people had more money, but that they appreciated the money value of time, and also the advantages of the car system established for their accommodation. Although railways must necessarily have done much to promote the prosperity of Ireland, it is very doubtful whether the general passenger public were not better served by the cars of Bianconi than by the railways which superseded them. Bianconi's cars were on the whole cheaper, and were always run en correspondence, so as to meet each other; whereas many of the railway trains in the south of Ireland, under the competitive system existing between the several companies, are often run so as to miss each other. The present working of the Irish railway traffic provokes perpetual irritation amongst the Irish people, and sufficiently accounts for the frequent petitions presented to Parliament that they should be taken in hand and worked by the State. Bianconi continued to superintend his great car establishment until within the last few years. He had a constitution of iron, which he expended in active daily work. He liked to have a dozen irons in the fire, all red-hot at once. At the age of seventy he was still a man in his prime; and he might be seen at Clonmel helping, at busy times, to load the cars, unpacking and unstrapping the luggage where it seemed to be inconveniently placed; for he was a man who could never stand by and see others working without having a hand in it himself. Even when well on to eighty, he still continued to grapple with the immense business involved in working a traffic extending over two thousand five hundred miles of road. Nor was Bianconi without honour in his adopted country. He began his great enterprise in 1815, though it was not until 1831 that he obtained letters of naturalisation. His application for these privileges was supported by the magistrates of Tipperary and by the Grand Jury, and they were at once granted. In 1844 he was elected Mayor of Clonmel, and took his seat as Chairman at the Borough Petty Sessions to dispense justice.