Excerpt from Empire Builders The Irishman's praise was, not unmerited. Whatever his failings, and he groaned under his fair human share of them, Stuart Ford had the gift of leadership. Be fore he had been a month on the branch as its old man and autocrat, he had won the good-will and loyalty of the rank and file, from the othee men in the headquarters to the pick-and-shovel contingent on the sections. Even the blockade-breaking laborers - tempo rary helpers as they were - stood by him manfully in the sustained battle with the snow. Ford spared them when he could, and they knew it. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.