They had an order from the Pennsylvania Steel Company for an engine to drive a rolling mill which they were about to establish at Sparrow’s Point on the Chesapeake Bay below Baltimore, for the manufacture of steel rails from Cuban ores, which were found to be especially adapted to the Bessemer process, and where the then new method of rolling was to be employed, the method by which rails are rolled direct from the ingot without reheating, which is now in universal use. This engine was to be much larger than any previously made, and so requiring new drawings. In making the cylinder drawings the draftsman omitted the internal ribs, which are necessary to connect and stiffen the walls of the square steam chest. The consequence of this almost incredible oversight soon appeared. The engine had been running but a few days when the steam chest blew up. The Porter-Allen valve-gear required in its joints eleven hardened steel bushings, which had to be finished inside and out. These we had always made from cast steel bars. This process was extremely wasteful of both material and time. Shortly before I left I had ascertained experimentally that I could import from England solid drawn steel tubing of any size and thickness, sufficiently high in carbon to harden perfectly well. The new management undertook to carry out my plans. For this purpose a list was prepared of all sizes that would be required, with the finished dimensions external and internal. From this another list was prepared, giving the additional material required for finishing. A large lot of the tubing was ordered. When it arrived they discovered they had sent the wrong list, the tubes were too thin to be finished and were useless for any purpose. They had an opportunity to estimate for a pair of very large blowing engines. They got out their estimate for one engine, forgot to multiply the amount by two, and were astonished the morning after they had sent in their tender to receive the acceptance of it by telegraph. [Illustration: JAMES C. BROOKS]