[Note 122.1] A reference to the system whereby a man waited at home util he was called out to work. If he wasn't there when the knocker-up called, he lost a day's pay.

[Note 122.2] Wetness on the rails caused driving wheels to lose traction

[Note 122.3] A Perfect Day was published in 1910 and was very popular. The lines "you sit alone with your thought" and "Well, this is the end of a perfect day, Near the end of a journey, too" must have had particular ironic force.

When you come to the end of a perfect day,
And you sit alone with your thought,
While the chimes ring out with a carol gay
For the joy that the day has brought,
Do you think what the end of a perfect day
Can mean to a tired heart,
When the sun goes down with a flaming ray,
And the dear friends have to part?

Well, this is the end of a perfect day,
Near the end of a journey, too;
But it leaves a thought that is big and strong,
With a wish that is kind and true.
For mem'ry has painted this perfect day
With colors that never fade,
And we find at the end of a perfect day
The soul of a friend we've made.

[Note 122.4] If footplate men finished their turn a long way from home they slept in the barracks: company hostels where drivers and firemen ate at separate tables. Below is the Banbury Lodge owned by the Great Western. Note the partitions do not reach the ceiling

[Note 294.1] Karl Dallas wrote(i) that this was "One of the first songs Jim Ward wrote was about his experiences working for the London and North Eastern Railway."
(i) 100 Songs of Toil p

[Note 294.2] During the depression 750 London van guards like him were offered jobs 'down the line', Ward recalled that 'For me and them it was a process of transfers from job to job to get back to one's home station,' he recalls. 'I had five transfers back to Bishopsgate.' " The practice of moving workers from place to place was well established. See for example bar005 ~ All Change for Llafairfechan.

insert 294Bishopsgate.png Bishopsgate goods yard; June 1925. The yard was destroyed by fire in 1964. See Bishopsgate Depot Fire (bar658) by the same author

[Note 294.3] Ward's experience driving a horse-drawn van informs his song A-Working on the Railway (bar353)

[Note 294.4] This suggests that the author moved from horse-drawn vehicles to motor vehicles.

[Note 369.1] The picture shows a North Eastern Railway locomotive built about a year before the poem was written

[Note 369.2] Lancaster is near Morecombe Bay. The references to places along the line suggest that the poet was writing from experience of the journey. The route described in the poem was opened by the South Durham and Lancashire Union Railway in 1861. It became part of the North Eastern Railway in 1863 thus linking Lancaster and Stockton on Tees.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Durham_and_Lancashire_Union_Railway]

[Note 369.3] Stockton on Tees was a river port for vessels using the North Sea

[Note 369.4] Perhaps the poet means the member of the falcon family capable of rapid acceleration in flight.]

[Note 369.5] According to Francesca Wilde "Fairies take great delight in horsemanshio and are spendid riders. Many fine young men are enticed to ride with them, when they dash along with the fairies like the wind"
[Ancient legend, Mystic Charms and Superstitions of Ireland http://www.libraryireland.com/AncientLegendsSuperstitions/Ride-Fairies.php]

[Note 240.1] once on a time … growth of Manchester image . The population grew 8-fold from 22,000 in 1771 to 180,00 in 1821
Manchester 1834
Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1835
Artist: G. Pickering - Engraved by: T. Higham

[Note 240.2] The Irwell rapidly became one of the most polluted rivers in the world. Edward Corbett, the Borough Engineer of Salford, wrote in his 1907 book The River Irwell of his father's experiences around 1819, of seeing "large shoals of fish, chiefly gudgeon but also other fish, rising to the flies" from a vantage point on New Bailey bridge, (now Albert Bridge) in Manchester. Local industry dumped toxic chemicals into the river, such as gas-tar, gas-lime and ammonia water, and by 1850 fish stocks had all but disappeared. In 1860 the Irwell was described as "almost proverbial for the foulness of its waters; receiving the refuse of cotton factories, coal mines, print works, bleach works, dye works, chemical works, paper works, almost every kind of industry." 
https://ontheirwell.wordpress.com/irwell-history/

[Note 240.3] Manchester Zoological Gardens opened in 1838

[Note 240.4] The Salford old bridge is taken away, and clapt a new one in, sir

[Note 240.5]  The station in Newton Lane opened in 1839. It was initially called Manchester Oldham Road but later renamed Victoria Station.

[Note 240.6]  The Bolton and Manchester Railway opened in 1838. Large numbers of stations were being built at the time of this song. Manchester was soon encircled by termini.

[Note 240.7] A mayor and corporation to govern the old town, Manchester was incorporated in 1838 under the Municipal Corporations Act 1835 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester_City_Council

[Note 240.8] Manchester Borough Gaol (also known as Belle Vue Prison was opened on Hyde Road West Gorton in 1849. This does not agree with the proposed site of Brown Street which is in the city centre.
http://www.manchester.gov.uk/directory_record/212407/prison_records/category/1363/land_and_buildings

[Note 240.9] The Theatre Royal as built in 1840. The celebrated clown Joesph Grimaldi had appeared in Manchester in 1811 and 1813
http://www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/ManchesterTheatres/ManchesterTheatresHistoryLesson.htm

[Note 240.10] In former times our cotton swells were not so mighty found, sir,

[Note 240.11] This may be an implication that the "ladies" are prostitutes.