the
discharge, and there is not a rectangular or acute angle within the
box. A machine has now been worked steadily for several weeks, putting
in the concrete in the foundations of the new Jackson Street bridge in
this city, by General Fitz-Simons. The result exceeds expectations.
The concrete is perfectly mixed, the discharge is simple, complete and
effective, and at the same time the cost of labor in mixing and
placing in position is lessened by 50 per cent. as compared with any
known to have been put in under similar circumstances.--_Jour.
Association of Engineering Societies._

* * * * *

MACHINE DESIGNING.[1]

[Footnote 1: A lecture delivered before the Franklin Institute,
Philadelphia, Monday, Jan. 30, 1888. From the journal of the
Institute.]

By JOHN E. SWEET.

"Carrying coals to Newcastle," the oft quoted comparison, fittingly
indicates the position I place myself in when attempting to address
members of this Institute on the subject of machine designing.

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. 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? If there are among you some who have a genius for
it, what I shall have to say will do you no good, for genius needs no
rules, no laws, no help, no training, and the sooner you let what I
have to say pass from your minds, the better. 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