On the next day matters concerning the motor boat engaged our attention.
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HOW ELECTRICITY FEELS
What is more fickle and yet more fascinating than a motor boat? On the morning after my arrival at Millville the boys wanted me to go out with them in the motor boat on the mill pond, as our beautiful little lake is called.
Each one took a hand at trying to start the boat, but although she had acted perfectly well the day before, on this morning no one could get a single explosion. The switch was closed. The gasolene was turned on. The carburetor valves were set at the mark. The spark coils responded with their familiar buzz. She had been primed and, when she had refused to respond to this treatment, the pet valves were opened and the wheel rolled over several times to sweep out the cylinders. But absolutely nothing moved her—neither coaxing nor gibes. Suddenly some one rolled the wheel over for the five-hundredth time and she started and behaved well all day.
All this would not have given us the slightest aggravation if we could only have found out what was the matter and what it was we finally did to correct it. But this we shall probably never know, and hence we are worshippers of the motor boat while we continue to distrust it and complain of it.
While the boat was running one of the boys noticed that a binding post at the end of one of the spark plugs seemed to be loose. He inadvertently put out his hand to tighten it and received a terrific shock. This raised the question among the boys, why one gets a shock from some of the binding posts in the electrical equipment but not from others. I suggested that we run in and call at the house to get my portable measuring instrument ([Fig. 110]) and a little lunch, and then go up to the upper end of the lake and take our time in examining the electrical equipment of the boat.
