There is a man now entering through the big doors of the Dowlais Works whom you, a stranger, intuitively know is somebody. The Irish labourer shambles out of his way; old Welsh workers touch their hats and bow their heads at the same time. He is the master, evidently. Tall, with strongly marked features, his hair long and alack, a huge scarf around his neck, but with clothing in cut or character of dress to indicate consideration for the fashions and usages of society still there is something about him which constrains attention, commands respect, deference. Who is he? What is he?

The answer is soon given William Menelaus manager of the Dowlais Ironworks, and its dependent collieries and industries, employer of ten thousand people, who has grasped the details iron of one of the largest works in the world, and holds them like multitudinous reins in his land as the huge industry rolls around; and who; whether it be the steel made close at hand or the Spanish ore branch at Bilbao, the working profit and loss of the deepest collieries, or the specifications of rails, the texture of steel, has got all, so to state, at his fingers' ends. Follow him through the works.

Every man, boy, and girl are on their best behaviour as he nears them; hands ply vigorously; even the horses and locomotives seem to catch the contagion, and there is no loitering hand or foot or wheel to be seen. They all know that he is no superficial looker on, that he knows how to do it all and which is the best way, and that he has in eye which can seize in a moment the weak point of men or manufacture.

Follow him to his home. You are told that he is of the people, and that in early life he laboured with hand as well as with brain. You are surprised, for he is surrounded by the indications of intellectual refinement. His pictures, his books indicate the art critic as well as the thinker. Mostly treasures from gifted easels cover the walls, and your host, unlike the wealthy parvenu, who is a collector for the love of collecting or possessing, can discourse with ability of the special points hidden from all but, a few. In the works you will jet from him a thorough practical insight into iron and steel making. You feel that he could take you into the laboratory and explain minutely chemical properties, and the processes by which phosphor, the arch-enemy, is fought, and how good make it ensured at the lowest possible minimum of cost; and take up the role of any of his men, and teach them practically in every branch; as if he had delved, or puddled, or rolled. . . cont'd. . . .