When this final revolution shall have been accomplished, and when all the world has settled down to the steady and undisturbed work of production by daily and regular labor, aided by the genii of steam, of electricity, of all nature, combined for good, the results of the intellectual activity of the inventors of the steam engine will be fully seen. Then no monument will be required to keep green the memory of Watt, Corliss, or any other of these great men, but it will be said of them, as of Sir Christopher Wren in the epitaph in St. Paul's: "Seek you a monument, look about you!" Every wreath of steam rising to the heavens from factory, mill or workshop will be a reminder of Hero of Alexandria, every mine will possess a memorial to Papin, Worcester and Savery; every steamship will bring into grateful memory Fitch and Stevens, and Bell and Fulton; thousands of locomotives, crossing the continents, will perpetuate the thought of the Stephensons and their colleagues in the introduction of the railway; the hum of millions of spindles and the music of the electric wire will tell of the work of Corliss and his contemporaries and successors who made these things possible, and all kingdoms and races, all nations, will revere the name of James Watt, the genius to whom the world is most indebted for the beginnings of all this later and grander civilization which has converted the slow progress of earlier centuries into the meteor-like advance of to-day toward a future as grand and as mighty and as noble as humanity shall choose to make it.
An address delivered at the Centennial Celebration of the American Patent System, Washington, April, 1891.
IMPROVED HAND CAR.
In the accompanying illustration we show a new design of hand car, being introduced by the Courtright Manufacturing Co., of Detroit. It will be seen that the apparatus for propelling the car is very different from the mechanism generally used. An upright framework secured to the platform carries a large sprocket wheel, which is connected to a smaller one upon one of the axles by means of a chain. The larger sprocket wheel is rotated by means of a triangular shaped lever attached at the lower corner to the crank of the sprocket wheel and having a handle at each of its upper corners. It is hinged upon a fulcrum which slides upon the two vertical rods shown in the illustration. It will be seen that this gives a peculiar movement to the handles by which the operators propel the car, but it has been found that the motion is an excellent one, and it is claimed that a higher speed can be obtained with the mechanism here shown than with any other now in use. There is practically no dead center, as in the case where the ordinary crank and lever is used. A number of leading roads have given the car a trial, and being well satisfied it, have given orders for more. The company claim that a car with 20 in. wheels can easily be made to attain a speed of 15 miles an hour by two men.—Railway Review.