and it is hardly astonishing that this form of dual authority should have led to a good deal of squabbling between the rival "monarchs." It proved, indeed, a cumbrous contrivance, and, when the period for its operation terminated, with the close of 1878, the constitution of the board was allowed to revert to the limits laid down under the Act of 1864, without any provision for sectional directors at all. During these intervening years, indeed, questions of finance and of the upkeep of the lines were still for ever cropping up, and not always as readily disposed of. It is a long and dreary story of the inevitable struggles with ways and means which so often marks the life of pioneer undertakings. For years these Chancery suits hung like chains about the company's neck, and even into the eighties the directors were never free from sudden embarrassments and never knew from what quarter they might proceed. One such difficulty, indeed, ultimately proved a blessing in disguise. In 1884, at the instance of the Company's bankers, the line was placed in the hands of a Receiver, Mr. John Conacher, fortunately, being chosen for this office. The line was ripe for a great and final effort to place the undertaking on a firmer footing, and, together with the late Mr. A. C. Humphreys-Owen, Mr. Conacher drew up a scheme of arrangement between the Company and its creditors under which about seventy different stocks were consolidated into ten; and it was their patient and skilful work in thus formulating what became known as the scheme of 1885, that laid the foundation of the Company's improved financial position of which the proprietors and the public have reaped the benefit in subsequent years. Meantime, however, other matters not directly bearing on finance, engaged the attention of the directors. Amongst these was the question of the works, which it was found necessary to erect, since the Company was working its own line. In July 1864, the inhabitants of Welshpool, conscious of the prominent part which the town had played in the inauguration of the Oswestry and Newtown Railway, presented a memorial to the board in which they urged its central position on the system and the recent completion of the waterworks as strong arguments for favourable consideration of the borough's claims to such an advantage. Nor was it without an eye to future development that Welshpool station was built in a manner capable of allowing its upper stories to be used as the Company's offices. Here, for the brief space, the offices were, but in both these cases ambitious Poolonians were doomed to disappointment. [Picture: The late MR. A. C. HUMPHREYS-OWEN, M.P. Chairman, 1900-1905]