Robert has travelled extensively all the mountain ranges. He was a very adventurous person. He was looking for new areas which could be developed into plantations always riding on a pony taking great risks. Let us read his own writing.

     "On returning to Bleak House, after four months of malarial fever I resumed my work in the Addreley Estate. My little dog Ben was my constant companion and the favourite of everybody. But on one occasion coming from Coonoor on the back of a pony, I stopped for a minute,to pick up a stick as I was passing through a very thickly wooded area. Suddenly I heard a yelp from my dog and saw to my utter shock that a cheetah had seized him on the road picking him just as a cat does a rat and bounded off with him, into the jungle. I could do nothing except to whack my pony with the stick I had picked up and thus gave vent to my feelings."

     Establishing and maintaining an estate was no easy job those days. The coffee from their estates used to be sent down to Mettupalayam by pack ponies and their loaded on to carts and sent all the way to Cochin for curing by Pierce Leslie & Co. It was an expensive affair. The brothers then decided to establish Coffee curing works in Coimbatore. This is what brought him to Coimbatore.

     Robert soon found the climate of Coimbatore like that of Manchester. He started studying the weather reports of this city. He was convinced that it was extremely suitable for the textile industry. His Coffee curing and exporting business also flourished. It is the considered opinion of many that it was Robert Stanes who gave to Coimbatore its present Industrial importance. In 1888 the C.S.& W. Mills, popularly known as Stanes Mills, financed by Robert Stanes, thrust its first great chimney skywards. This still remains the tallest chimney in Coimbatore symbolising its cotton Industry. Later columns of smoke continued to ascend upwards until today, the horizon is marked by many smokeless chimneys, too numerous to count. It is probably true that Coimbatore owes its textile importance to Robert Stanes to a great extent.

     Shortly before this period Robert Stanes met with an accident and was about to lose his left eye. He also suffered from an accompanying Malarial fever. He had to go back to England for recovery. It was during this period that He experienced certain deep religious convictions, which made all the difference in his life's work. Though the service motive was in him from the very beginning, he became a very religious and a charitable person after 1888.

     Way back in 1861 itself,Robert Stanes,then a young man of just twenty commenced a Day School for the children of his employees. The beginning was very humble a very little house rented near the Kumaran market and the school opened with just two teachers and four pupils. The school was, after a short time, removed to a place near the present clock tower, where it continued to grow. The next move, about two years later, was to a building at present occupied by the Head Post Office. The school was then a residential school. The Boys Boarding Home occupied the present U.M.S near the flyover while the girls stayed in the bungalow, adjoining the school.

     Robert Stanes was very particular that the school campus should be very spacious and that the school, the hostel and the playground should be together. He was on the lookout for a spacious area within the city. Soon he succeeded in getting the present spacious campus on the Avinashi Road. He was dreaming for a beautiful building. So in 1927 amid all the pomp and splendour befitting the ocassion the foundations of the present buildings were laid.

     It is far from true that Robert Stanes was always very comfortable in his business and that out of his abundance He built up the schools in Coonoor and Coimbatore Let me quote from his autobiography

     " Around the year 1880 the firm suffered great losses and Messrs Stanes Watson & Co in London failed in business which led to the total collapse of my firm. I had to begin again ~ all that I had was Rs.500/- of my own ~ but with the assistance of Arbuthnot Lantham & Co the firm was reconstituted under the name of T.Stanes & Co. At this juncture it became necessary for me to send my wife and children back to England and they had to set sail in the cargo boat with untold discomfort. My dear wife and children endured all that without a murmur and great patience."

     Robert Stanes was capable of very hard work. He was a determined businessman, and within a matter of five years he stabilized himself again and launched into the textile industry. He never allowed his charitable institutions to suffer, on account of business fluctuations. Though he was the founder and financier of these institutions, he kept a separate Governing Board, for managing the affairs of the school, from the beginning. Later when the family decided to leave India, winding up all its business interests, the schools were left under a board of trustees to carry on the services.

     Charity and greatness were in his blood. A very interesting anecdote will illustrate the point. It happened in Stanes Motors. A night watchman of the company, was in the habit of stealing petrol from the parked vehicles. Once unwittingly, he drained petrol, whilesmoking, which led to a serious fire accident, in which two trucks were burnt. The truth was found out and he was duly dismissed by the executives of the Company. This incident had happened when Robert Stanes was in England on a short trip. On his return he was informed of the incident.

     The dismissed watchman, wanted atleast his own savings to be returned and he pleaded to meet his master. He had a large family to support. Robert gave him the interview and listened to him patiently. Finally he reinstated him with this remark " Chinnu, don't smoke while stealing petrol in future! " Much against the advice of his executives he was reinstated. It was not business, but the human factor that was important to Stanes. He was truly called "A MISSIONARY BUSINESS MAN.