Soon after this incident Joseph Taylor, the operator at Greensburg,
thirty miles from Pittsburgh, wishing to be absent for two weeks,
asked Mr. Brooks if he could not send some one to take his place. Mr.
Brooks called me and asked whether I thought I could do the work. I
replied at once in the affirmative.

"Well," he said, "we will send you out there for a trial."

I went out in the mail stage and had a most delightful trip. Mr. David
Bruce, a well-known solicitor of Scottish ancestry, and his sister
happened to be passengers. It was my first excursion, and my first
glimpse of the country. The hotel at Greensburg was the first public
house in which I had ever taken a meal. I thought the food wonderfully
fine.

[Illustration: HENRY PHIPPS]

This was in 1852. Deep cuts and embankments near Greensburg were then
being made for the Pennsylvania Railroad, and I often walked out in
the early morning to see the work going forward, little dreaming that
I was so soon to enter the service of that great corporation. This
was the first responsible position I had occupied in the telegraph
service, and I was so anxious to be at hand in case I should be
needed, that one night very late I sat in the office during a storm,
not wishing to cut off the connection. I ventured too near the key and
for my boldness was knocked off my stool. A flash of lightning very
nearly ended my career. After that I was noted in the office for
caution during lightning storms. I succeeded in doing the small
business at Greensburg to the satisfaction of my superiors, and
returned to Pittsburgh surrounded with something like a halo, so far