was, of course, highly interested in the wonderful steelyards made by this firm, which would weigh anything that could be lifted by a crane. His only discovery respecting machine tools was, that their manufacture in the United States was generally very inferior. It was fortunate that I had prepared the drawings according to my revised model for three or four sizes of the engines, as otherwise I should not have been able to accept the position offered me at the Philadelphia exposition. I received two more orders before May 24, and two more during the summer, but with the preparations I had made and Mr. Goodfellow’s familiarity with the work, everything went on smoothly during my absence. CHAPTER XXIV Engine Building in Newark. Introduction of Harris Tabor. After my return from Philadelphia the first order I received was a very important one. On the advice of Mr. Holley, the Albany and Rensselaer Iron and Steel Co. of Troy, N. Y., decided to order from me two engines for the new roll trains they were about to establish; this being the first opportunity I had of applying my engine in what proved to be its most important field. These were a 22×36-inch engine to drive a 16-inch train for rolling light steel rails, and an 18×30-inch engine to drive an 8- or 10-inch train for rolling merchant steel. These engines did not run rapidly; the first was a direct-connected engine making only 75 revolutions per minute; the second made only 112 revolutions per minute, but was belted to drive the train at twice that speed. Mr. Corning, president of the company, did not like the slow way in which the rails were turned out of the former train. I happened to be standing with him observing this work when he asked a boy why the billets were not fed to the rolls faster. The boy replied, “Because the gentlemen at the hooks could not catch them, sir.” Where are the gentlemen at the hooks to-day, when rails 200 feet long are turned out of the rolls? These engines stood near each other, the trains extending in opposite directions. The battery of boilers was located at a considerable distance from them. I set between them a vertical steam receiver, four feet in diameter and twelve feet high. This receiver performed two functions: it maintained the steam pressure at the cylinders and separated the steam from the water carried over. This latter was accomplished by admitting the steam at the top of the receiver by a pipe extending two thirds of the way to the bottom, draining the water from the bottom by means of a Nason steam trap, and taking the dry steam to the engine from the top of the receiver. This was my first application of this method, which afterwards proved most valuable in cases of greater importance. These engines were of the highest interest to me, as their successful running opened the door to that important field.