Learn what they mean and never let your attention be drawn from them.
If the beats weaken—any one of them—it means trouble. Taken in time the difficulty may be easily remedied, allowed to pass unnoticed, death and disaster may result.
Keeping up Steam.
It is scarcely necessary to state that to properly run your engine steam must be kept up.
When the engine has got the train up to speed, steam should begin to issue from the safety valves. When it does not do so there has not been a full boiler, as there always should be at the start and the fireman must be made to understand how to make a starting fire in proper shape.
On short runs this does not matter so much, but on express trains it is of the highest importance.
On long runs if the engine is not instantly up to the mark at the start, and if the feeds must be held off to allow the fire and the engine a chance of recovery, the consequences are that the water in the boiler gets lower and less, and the uncertainty of ever getting the water up again becomes greater every minute, especially with a heavy train and against a strong side wind.
Management of Fires.
Of course the state of the steam depends altogether upon the way the fires are managed, but for us to give directions how to manage a locomotive fire-box to the best advantage would require pages of description which could scarcely be understood unless one had had previous practical experience.