Now, if some boilermakers are so dishonest as to try and impose upon the locomotive engineer, who they know will carefully examine every part of his boiler, and who is able to detect any flaw, it is not to be expected that the farmer will escape. Nor does he. The great number of explosions of boilers used in thrashing and in other farm work proves that there are boilermakers who "force their boilers into such localities when their work is not up to the requirements of the law." And the boilermaker, if he be dishonest, is doubly tempted if the broad width of a continent intervenes between him and the farmer for whom his work is intended, and if in the place where the boiler is to be used there are no inspection laws in force. The farmer who lives many miles from a city, and who has no means of testing any boiler he may purchase, is wholly at the mercy of the boilermaker, and must run it until it explodes or time proves it to have been honestly made. Then, again, there are boilermakers who, although making boilers of good iron and of the proper thickness, finish them off so badly that the farmer is put to great inconvenience and expense to put them in working order. Two years ago I purchased a straw-burning engine and boiler made by an Eastern firm. Before it had run ten days the boiler began to leak at the saddle-bolt holes. The engineer tightened the nuts as far as possible, but could not stop the leaks, which at last became so bad that we had to stop work and take the engine to the shop. Upon taking off the saddle and taking out the bolts it was discovered that they were too small for the holes in the boiler, and that they had been wrapped with candle wick and white lead to make them fill the holes, and that a light washer had been put on each bolt between the head and the inside of the boiler. This washer kept the lead in its place, and prevented the boiler from showing a leak when first fired up. The water pipes in the fire-box soon gave out and became utterly useless. Upon inquiring of the patentee of this straw-burning device, who was supposed to have put it in my boiler, he stated that he had had nothing to do with it, but that it was put in by the firm selling these engines, and "as cheaply as possible." Before I got this boiler and engine in fair running order I had spent hundreds of dollars and had to do entirely away with the water grates.