122 ROUGH-AND-TUMBLE ENGINEERING 



PART SEVEN. 



TWO WAYS OF READING 



Now there are two ways to read this book, and if I 

 knew just how you had read it I could tell you in a 

 minute whether to take hold of an engine or leave it 

 alone. If you have read it one way, you are most 

 likely to say, "It is no trick to run an engine." If 

 you have read it the other way you will say, "// is no 

 trouble to learn how to run an engine." Now this 

 fellow will make an engineer, and will be a good one. 

 He has read it carefully, noting the drift of my ad- 

 vice. Has discovered that the engineer is not ex- 

 pected to build an engine, or to improve it after it has 

 been built. He has recognized the fact that the principal 

 thing is to attend to his own business and let other 

 people attend to theirs, and that a monkey wrench is a 

 tool to be left in the tool box till he knows he needs 

 it : that muscle is a good thing to have but not ne- 

 cessary to the successful engineer; that an engineer 

 with a bunch of waste in his hand is a better recom- 

 mendation than an "engineer's license;" that good 

 common sense and a cool head is. the very best tools 



