This train was a marvel of completeness and efficiency. It was manned by picked men, and the only complaint ever made against it was that it ran so fast that the clerks had not time to sort the mails for the post-offices between New York and Poughkeepsie. To obviate this, Colonel Bangs requested the postmaster at New York to have two hundred mail-bags dyed red, which should contain the mail for those offices nearest together, so that the crew in the train could distribute them first. There was no complaint after that. But when the dyer's bill was sent by the postmaster to the Department, it was disallowed by a clerk of the Second Assistant Postmaster-General, who, in a letter announcing the fact, said that there was no necessity for the outlay if the postal clerks did their duty. Bangs, who had just arrived at the post-office from a day and night's ride on his favorite train, was lying on a sofa half asleep in the postmaster's private office, as that official was opening his mail. When he came to that letter he handed it to Bangs. He was wide-awake in an instant. "Mr. Postmaster," said he, "do you know the man who signed this letter? He is a wheezy priest, a fool, and a Baptist, at that. Give me the letter." The bill was allowed as soon as Bangs reached the Department. He was wrong, however, in crediting the subordinate to the Baptist faith. He was an ornament of another persuasion. So carefully had the project been considered and adapted that the service on the Central, from the start, moved with the precision of clock-work, and was an immediate success. It is proper to say that word of what was going on between the Department and the Vanderbilt system reached the Hon. Thomas A. Scott, President of the Pennsylvania Railroad, and he at once made up his mind that the corporation under his management could not afford to be behind its great rival. One Saturday morning he telegraphed to J. D. Layng (now General Manager of the West Shore and President of the C. C. C. & I.), then General Manager of the Pennsylvania lines west of Pittsburg, to know if by the following Monday week, the date on which the train was to start, four postal cars could be built and the first one be in Chicago ready to start on its eastern trip. The answer came back, "Yes." The order was given to the Allegheny shops on Saturday afternoon, and on the following Saturday the first of the cars, complete and equipped for mail service, started for Chicago, and began its east-bound trip on Monday morning. The second and third cars were finished on Monday night, and the fourth--thus fully equipping the line--on Tuesday.