5 per cent., while giving the public an improved service and reduced
rates_." My satisfaction was the greater as I had given evidence before
the Commission, and helped to tell them the cheerful story of the
progress and development of the County Down Company. It was my first
appearance as a railway witness and before Sir James Allport, who had
commanded my unbounded admiration from my first entrance at Derby into
railway life. Need I say that to me it was an event of importance.
In the year 1875 the Board of the County Down, after an investigation of
its affairs by a Committee of Shareholders, was reorganised, and it was
then that Mr. Richard Woods Kelly became Chairman, and Lord (then Mr.)
Pirrie a Director. The latter has more than once since told me that the
County Down shares were one of his best investments.
Mr. Kelly merits more than a passing word. Before I joined the County
Down I was told he was a "terror," and that I ran foolish risk in leaving
a service like the Glasgow and South-Western for a position in which I
might find it impossible to please. But fears like that never disturbed
me.
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