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BRITISH RAILWAYS AND THE WAR

the impossibilities of other days are tackled and overcome. The British railways may at least hope that, having solved the problems of war traffic and employment in unequalled fashion, they will master the lesser problems of the coming days of peace.

Of the many high tributes paid to the British railways by the responsible heads of the nation, only two need be quoted here. The first is from Sir William Robertson, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, on May 12, 1917:—

 

During the last five or six weeks, I suppose, we have expended some 260,000 tons of ammunition, which have had to be moved by road, rail, and sea from the factories in England to the guns in France, and man-handled probably not less than half a dozen times. As you can imagine, this has entailed a great deal of railway work at the front as well as in England, and the skilful and determined way in which the work has been executed by the railway managers and employees who have assisted us is beyond all praise.

 

The Earl of Selborne nearly two years earlier, on August 26, 1915, said:—

 

Have you thought of what the railwaymen are doing? An immense number of men have been taken from the railways. The railways are carrying now a volume of trade such as never has been carried on our railways before, and the strain on those men is very great. That is nothing but silent heroism; as neces-

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