most effective distribution and prompt handling of equipment. Every now and then there is complaint of a coal famine, and that there are not cars enough to move the coal-supply. In reply to such complaints, the railways say, with some justice, that if users of coal defer their orders until cold weather, they cannot reasonably expect the railways to move in a few weeks the coal which should have been shipped during a period of months and stored in yards or bins at various points of consumption. Crowding the shipments into a short period of time creates car-shortage and a congestion on tracks and in yards.
No less than shippers in the prompt loading of cars, can those who receive freight conserve railway service, and therefore the national wealth, by promptly unloading shipments received in carloads, and by promptly removing their freight from the station sheds when it comes in less than carloads. Carelessness about this is one of the evils at which the railways in former times connived under stress of competition. There was a time when a con-
