A railway spring

September, besides being the first Spring month of the New Zealand year, can be taken to symbolise a period of Springtime in the Railways; for with all the improvements going on in every realm of railway activity, a railwayman's impression of the service at the present time may well be like Emerson's May Day song to the Spring, which

“In city or in solitude Step by step lifts bad to good, Without halting, without rest Lifting Better up to Best.”

Whatever the cause, there has been a release of imaginative energy, a great awakening of power, in regard to railway affairs that is now found reflected in the quality of service supplied to the public by the national transportation system. A ride by rail has become a thing of joy. The cars are roomy and fresh, well-sprung and smoothly handled. The automatic train signals wink you safely through the denser zones of traffic. The railway staff are looking for ways to help you. Thanks to the care and concoctional genius of the Lindsay Brigade, a railway pie, at a stopping place like Paekakariki, is now the pluperfect prestissimo of all the great pie family, just as, at Wellington Station, a railway hair-cut or a railway bath marks the highest achievement of art and luxury in exterior improvements.

On all sides there is evidence that the Railways are keeping pace with the technical developments for which this age of rapid adaptations of inventive genius to practical affairs is increasingly notable. Every development of this kind suggests new thoughts for the morrow, so that the practical, which feeds on facts, is perpetually being reconciled to that imaginative freedom of which dreams are made.

In this New Zealand we are so fortunately placed by nature that our most daring dreams have the chance to come true. We only fail if our imagination fails. And what great aids to imagination the whole land affords—what food for the imagination in our scenic effects alone! Run the length of the Eglinton—Hollyford road by railway bus on a sunny day and stop to see the glory of snow-clad Mt. Christine across the dark canyons and past the sheer lift of the nearer beech-clad mountains. Cast an eye over the sylvan beauty of the Tangarakau Gorge on the Stratford—Okahukura link of the North Island main trunk line. Take an early dip in the warmer seas up Waiwera way in the gracious Kauriland. Or see Pukaki's mirrored face at six o'clock in the morning, with the first beams of sunlight waking the questing Paradise ducks to flight, and every colour of the rainbow blending in tones of high relief the vision of silver sheen on placid waters, of rock and bush, of sombre sedge and crystal Southern Alps. These are among the treasures that wake imagination to the greatness of our land, to what it can become with interest and application, with daring in enterprise and confidence in ultimate success. They are part of the urge of the Railway Spring.

And they call to us all, in clarion tones, that the best that human hands and brains can do is none too good for the times in which we live, for the opportunities that are ours, and for love of the land that gives so richly all things of use and beauty, presented, too, in a setting of scenic wonders that are the grandest the world can offer.