Various

“ No great author was ever made by studying grammar, rhetoric, language, history, or by imitating some other author, however great.
Neither has there ever been any great poet or artist produced by training. But there are many writers who are not great authors, many rhymsters who are not poets, and many painters who are not artists; and while training will not make great men of them, it will help them to avoid doing that which is absolutely bad, and so may it not be with machine designing? ”

“ Then, if this be admitted, cannot the following law be established, that every machine should be so designed and constructed that when once made true it will so remain, regardless of wear and all external influences to which it is liable to be subjected? One tool maker says that it is right, and another that it cannot be done. No matter whether it can or cannot, is it not the thing wanted, and if so, is it not an object worth striving for? One tool maker says that all machine tools, engines, and machinery should set on solid stone foundations. ”

“ One of the most important and one of the first things in the construction of a building is the foundation, and the laws which govern its construction can be stated in a breath, and ought to be understood by every one. Assuming the ground upon which a building is to be built to be of uniform density, the width of the foundation should be in proportion to the load, the foundation should taper equally on each side, and the center of the foundation should be under the center of pressure. ”

“ Where can better concrete be found than that which has set under water? A certain definite amount of water is necessary and sufficient to hydrate the cement; less than that amount will be detrimental, while an excess can do no harm, provided, as before mentioned, that it does not wash the mortar from the stone. Again, dry concrete is apt to be very porous, which in certain positions is a very grave objection to it—this, not only from the fact of its porosity, but from the liability to disintegration from water freezing in the crevices. ”

“ Once establish, by clear and unmistakable demonstration, the life history of an organism, and truly some change must have come over nature as a whole, if that life history be not the same to-morrow as to-day; and the same to one observer, in the same conditions, as to another.
No amount of paradox would induce us to believe that the combining proportions of hydrogen and oxygen had altered, in a specified experimenter's hands, in synthetically producing water. ”

“ The triumph of modern knowledge is the certainty, which nothing can shake, that nature's laws are immutable. The stability of her processes, the precision of her action, and the universality of her laws, is the basis of all science, to which biology forms no exception. ”

“ But in following the process of destructive fermentation as it takes place in large masses of tissue, animal or vegetable, but far preferably the former, as they lie in water at a constant temperature of from 60° to 65° F., it will be seen that the fermentative process is the work, not of one organism, nor, judging by the standard of our present knowledge, of one specified class of vegetative forms, but by organisms which, though related to each other, are in many respects greatly dissimilar, not only morphologically, but also embryologically, and even physiologically. ”

“ Rules only hamper the man of genius; but for us, who either from choice or necessity work away at machine designing without the gift, cannot some simple ruling facts be determined and rules formulated or principles laid down by which we can determine what is really good, and what bad? ”

“ Handiness becomes the more desirable as the machines are smaller, but handiness is not to be despised even in a large machine, except where solidity is sacrificed to obtain it.
The weak point in nearly all (and so nearly all that I feel pretty safe in saying all) small planing machines is their absolute weakness as regards their ability to resist torsional strain in the bed, and both torsional and bending strain in the table. Is it an uncommon thing to see the ways of a planer that has run any length of time cut? ”

“ The subject of cement and concrete has been so well treated of in engineering literature, that to give an extended paper on the subject would be but the collection and reiteration of platitudes familiar to every engineer who has been engaged on foundation works of any magnitude. It shall therefore be the object of this communication to place before the society several notes, stated briefly and to the point, rather as a basis for discussion than as an attempt at an exhaustive treatment of the subject.
Concrete is simply a low grade of masonry. ”

“ I know of no higher hope for this important society than that it may continue in ever increasing strength to promote, criticise, and welcome from every quarter of the world whatever will improve the microscope in itself and in any of its applications, from the most simple to the most complex and important in which its employment is possible. ”

“ If the flanges were cast on the head stock itself, and stand still, rather than on the pulley, where they keep turning, the belt would keep out from between the gear for a certainty. One motion should fasten a foot stock, and as secure as it is possible to secure it, and a single motion free it so it could be moved from end to end of the bed. The reason any lathe takes more than a single motion is because of elasticity in the parts, imperfection in the planing, and from another cause, infinitely greater than the others, the swinging of the hold-down bolts. ”

“ These two tools, the net and the poison bottle, are your catching and killing instruments. You know where to look for butterflies. Moths are vastly more numerous, and while equally beautiful, present more varieties of beauty than butterflies. They can be found by daylight in all kinds of weather, in the grass fields, in brush, in dark woods, sometimes on flowers. Many spend the daytime spread out, others with close shut wings on the trunks of trees in dark woods. The night moths are more numerous and of great variety. ”

“ I think it may be now fairly taken for granted that, as this society has, from the outset, promoted and pointed to the higher scientific perfection of the microscope, so now, more than ever, it is its special function to place this in the forefront as its raison d'etre. The microscope has been long enough in the hands of amateur and expert alike to establish itself as an instrument having an application to every actual and conceivable department of human research ”

“ This, and this only, can lift such a society out of what I believe has ceased to be its danger, that of forgetting that in proportion as the optical principles of the microscope are understood, and the theory of microscopical vision is made plain, the value of the instrument over every region to which it can be applied, and in all the varied hands that use it, is increased without definable limit. It is therefore by such means that the true interests of science are promoted. ”

“ In other words, it is as fatal to success to have too much foundation under the light load as it is too little under a heavy one.
Cannot we analyze causes and effects, cost and requirements, so as to formulate some simple laws similar to the above by which we shall be able to determine what is a good and what a bad arrangement of machinery, foundation, framing or supports? A vast amount of work is expended to make machines true, and the machines, or a large majority of them, are expected to produce true work of some kind in turn. ”

“ An almost endless and likely profitless discussion has been indulged in as to the proper way to guide a slide rest, and different opinions exist. It is a question that, so far as principle is concerned, there ought to be some way to settle which should not only govern the question in regard to the slide rest of a lathe, but all slides that work against a torsional resistance, as it may be called—that is, a resistance that does not directly oppose the propelling power. ”

“ But in other machines built in the form of planing machines, in which the head is traversed while cutting, as is the case with the profiling machine, the planer head form is not right. Both the propelling screw, or whatever gives the side motion, should be as low down as possible, as should also be the guide.
There is a principle underlying the Sellers method of driving a planer table that may be utilized in many ways. The endurance goes far beyond any man's original expectations, and the explanation, very likely, lies in the fact that the point of contact is always changing. ”

“ Philadelphia, the birthplace of the great and nearly all the good work in this, the noblest of all industrial arts, needs no help or praise at my hands, but I hope her sons may be prevailed upon to do in their right way what I shall try to do roughly—that is, formulate some rules or establish principles by which we, who are not endowed with genius, may so gauge our work as to avoid doing that which is truly bad. ”

“ Improvements in the manufacture of hydraulic cements have given an impetus to the use of concrete, but its use is by no means of recent date. It is no uncommon thing in the taking down of heavy walls several centuries old to find that the method of building was to carry up face and back with rubble and stiff mortar, and to fill the interior with bowlders and gravel, the interstices of which were filled by grouting—the whole mass becoming virtually a monolith. Modern quick-setting cement accomplishes this object within a time consistent with the requirements of modern engineering works ”

“ If, then, the simplest forms of the present and the past were not governed by accurate and unchanging laws of life, how did the rigid certainties that manifestly and admittedly govern the more complex and the most complex come into play? ”

“ As dozens, yes, hundreds, of new designs have been brought out by machine tool makers and engine builders since John Richards made a convert of me, without any one else, so far as I know, having applied the principle in its broadest sense, I hope to present the case to you in a material form, in the hope that it may be more thoroughly appreciated.
The usual form of lathe and planer beds or frames is two side plates and a lot of cross girts; their duty is to guide the carriages or tables in straight lines and carry loads resisting bending and torsional strains. ”

“ If a designer desires to make his lathe frame stronger than the other fellows, he thinks, if he thinks at all, that he will put in more iron, rather than, as he ought to think, How shall I distribute the iron so it will do the most good? ”

“ Oil of geranium is produced from the rose or oak-leaved geranium, cuttings of which are planted in well sheltered beds in October. During the winter they are covered over with straw matting. In April they are taken up, and planted in rows in fields or upon easily irrigated terraces. Of water they require quantum sufficit; of nature's other gift, which cheers and not inebriates—the glorious sunshine—they cannot have too much. They soon grow into bushes three or four feet high. At Nice they generally flower at the end of August. At Grasse and cooler places they flower about the end of October. ”

“ A percentage excess of other materials is, however, usually allowed to compensate for imperfection in mixing. While an excess of good mortar is not detrimental to concrete (as it will harden in course of time to equal the stone) , still on the score of economy it is advisable to use gravel or a finer grade of stone in addition to the 2 inch ring stone to fill the interstices—gravel is cheaper than cement. The statement that excess in stone will give body to concrete is a fallacy hardly worth contradicting. ”

“ Every piece of living protoplasm we see has a history; it is the inheritor of countless millions of years. Its properties have been determined by its history. It is the protoplasm of some definite form of life which has inherited its specific history. It can be no more false to that inheritance than an atom of oxygen can be false to its properties. ”

“ The two fungi which have been described are true parasites, attacking the roots of living trees, and causing disease in the timber by traveling up the cambium, etc., into the stem; the fungi I am about to refer to are termed wound parasites, because they attack the timber of trees at the surfaces of wounds, such as cut branches, torn bark, frost cracks, etc., and spread from thence into the sound timber. When we are reminded how many sources of danger are here open in the shape of wounds, there is no room for wonder that such fungi as these are so widely spread. ”

“ It has been the life history of these organisms, and not their relations as ferment, that has specially occupied my fullest attention; but it would be in a high degree interesting if we could discover, or determine, what besides the vegetative or organic processes of nutrition are being effected by one, or both, of these organisms on the fast yielding mass. Still more would it be of interest to discover what, if any, changes were wrought in the pabulum, or fluid generally. ”

“ Of simple conveyers, such as a worm screw, little need be said; they are not mixers, and it seems a positive waste of time to pass material through a machine when it comes out in little better shape than it is put in. A box of the shape of a barrel has been used, it being trunnioned at the sides. The objection to this is that the material is thrown from side to side as a mass, there being a waste of energy in throwing about the material in mass without accomplishing an equivalent amount of mixing. ”

“ And of these machine tools none, or few at least, except those mounted upon a single pedestal, are free from detrimental torsion where the floor upon which they rest is distorted by unequal loading. But, to first consider those of such magnitude as to render it absolutely necessary to erect them—not rest them—on masonry, is due consideration always taken to arrange an unequal foundation to support the unequal loads?—and they cannot be expected to remain true if not. ”

“ Any one of the thousand iron planing machines of the country, if put in good condition and set upon the ordinary wood floors, may be made to plane work winding in either direction by shifting a moving load of a few hundred pounds on the floor from one corner of the machine to the other, and the ways of the ordinary turning lathe may be more easily distorted still. Machine tool builders do not believe this, simply because they have not tried it. ”

“ It has been pointed out along what lines the special treatment of the former diseases must be followed, and it only remains to say of the latter: take care of the cortex and cambium of the tree, and the timber will take care of itself. It is unquestionably true that the diseases due to wound parasites can be avoided if no open wounds are allowed to exist. Many a fine oak and beech perishes before its time, or its timber becomes diseased and a high wind blows the tree down, because the spores of one of these fungi alight on the cut or torn surface of a pruned or broken branch. ”

“ On breakwater work, where the writer was engaged, the wall was faced with cement and flint grit, and this was found to form a particularly hard and lasting protection to the face of the work.
Batches of concrete should be placed in position as if they were stones in block masonry, as the union of one day's work with a previous is not by any means so perfect as where one batch is placed in contact with another which has not yet set. A slope cannot be added to with the same degree of perfection that one horizontal layer can be placed on another ”

“ The locomotive of the Great Northern has a leading four-wheeled bogie, which considerably increases the steadiness of the engine, and counterbalances the disturbing effect of outside cylinders. Acting on the same principles which have animated M. Estrade, that is to say, with the aim of reducing the retarding effects of rolling friction, the constructor of the locomotive of the Great Northern has considerably increased the diameter of the wheels of the bogie. In this engine all the bearing are inside, while the cylinders are outside and horizontal. ”

“ A rose tree will live to a good age, but does not yield much after its seventh year. At that period it is dug up and burned, and corn, potatoes, or some other crop is grown on the land for twelve months or more.
In the factory the petals are separated from the calyx, and are distilled with water for the production of rose water and the otto. For the production of the huile and pomade they are treated by maceration. They are finished off, however, by the process of enfleurage, in which the frames before alluded to are made use of. The fat, or pomade, is spread on to the glass on both sides. ”

“ Thus while we have specific ferments which bring about definite and specific results, and while even infusions of proteid substances may be exhaustively fermented by saprophytic bacteria, the most important of all ferments, that by which nature's dead organic masses are removed, is one which there is evidence to show is brought about by the successive vital activities of a series of adapted organisms, which are forever at work in every region of the earth. ”

“ Concrete, when ready to be placed in position, should be of the consistency of a pulpy mass which will settle into place by its own weight, every crevice being naturally filled. Pounding dry concrete is apt to break adjacent work, which will never again set properly. There should be no other object in pounding concrete than to assist it to settle into the place it is intended to fill. This is one of the evils concomitant with imperfection of mixing. ”